Gartner defines access management (AM) as tools that include authentication and single sign-on (SSO) capabilities, and that establish, manage and enforce runtime access controls for modern standards-based and classic web applications and APIs. AM’s purpose is to enable SSO access for people (employees, consumers and other users) and machines to protected applications in a streamlined and consistent way that enhances the user experience. AM is also responsible for providing security controls to protect the user session in runtime, enforcing authentication and authorization using adaptive access. Lastly, AM can provide identity context for other cybersecurity tools and reliant applications to enable identity-first security.
Gartner defines privileged access management (PAM) as tools that provide an elevated level of technical access through the management and protection of accounts, credentials and commands, which are used to administer or configure systems and applications. PAM tools — available as software, SaaS or hardware appliances — manage privileged access for both people (system administrators and others) and machines (systems or applications). Gartner defines four distinct tool categories for PAM tools: privileged account and session management (PASM), privilege elevation and delegation management (PEDM), secrets management, and cloud infrastructure entitlement management (CIEM).