Identity security is no longer just about determining who should be allowed through the door. Now that AI agents act autonomously on behalf of employees and businesses, identity systems must decide whether individual actions should be permitted in real time.
That evolution of identity security will be a central theme at
Ping YOUniverse 2026, taking place on Tuesday and Wednesday, Sept. 1–2, at the JW Marriott in Austin, Texas.
The conference is expected to draw more than 2,000 cybersecurity, IT and digital-business leaders, with sessions spanning customer identity and access management (CIAM), workforce identity, healthcare, public-sector identity and technical implementation.
Tuesday, Sept. 1
Day One begins with Ping Identity CEO and founder Andre Durand, whose opening keynote, "The future of identity: Powering trust in the AI era," will examine why identity must evolve from verifying users at login to determining whether human and AI-agent actions should be trusted as they occur.
Durand will follow that with a fireside conversation with Johnny Deutsch, SVP of IAM at LPL Financial, about using identity to support AI innovation safely.
Both sessions will touch upon the conference's overall argument: Autonomous agents require continuous verification, runtime authorization and governance rather than traditional login-and-session trust.
Click here to register to watch a livestream of both Day One opening sessions.Later on Tuesday, Karen Leavitt of Unum will discuss how identity, sensitive data and regulatory requirements intersect in the insurance industry. Meanwhile, Josh Roth, CISO at Rady Children's Hospital, and Steve Giovannetti, Field CTO at SDG, bring the particularly high-stakes perspective of healthcare security, in which identity controls must protect sensitive information without impeding patient care.
Day One's afternoon breakout sessions will divide into CIAM and workforce tracks. Abhilash Nama and Chris Clute of Southwest Airlines will bring an airline's perspective on identity security, while Chris Milam of Standard Insurance will illustrate how dynamic risk evaluation helps his company combat fraud.
Wednesday, Sept. 2
Day Two opens with Ping Identity Chief Product Officer Peter Barker and his keynote "Building the future of trust in the AI era." Barker will explore the idea of identity becoming a common trust control plane governing both human and agent actions and will lay out Ping's product vision and roadmap for an AI-driven environment.
The following main-stage session, led by Kate Atkinson, Ping Identity VP of Product Management, turns toward AI-first headless identity and how organizations can replace manual configuration with more intent-driven implementation while retaining governance.
Click here to register to watch a livestream of both Day Two opening sessions.Following Atkinson's session, Nishid Sankaranarayanan, Head of IAM at Genuine Party Company, and Sachin Baskmatkar, Executive Director of Enterprise Cybersecurity and Risk at Estée Lauder, will provide an enterprise-risk perspective on trust verification.
Later on Wednesday, Jennifer Price and Joseph Shay of Corebridge, along with Raj Radhakrishnan of Deloitte, add business-operations and global IAM perspectives, offering attendees opportunities to hear how large enterprises translate identity strategy into operational practice. Tod Bickley, AVP of Security & Infrastructure and IAM at Nationwide Insurance, will bring identity and infrastructure security together.
Day Two's afternoon breakout structure expands the conversation further, offering technical, business-value, healthcare and public-sector tracks, giving attendees the opportunity to move from strategic questions about AI and trust into implementation and industry-specific concerns.
Ping Identity Product and Solution Marketing Director Shasta Turney will lead two round-table discussions on trust in the healthcare industry, while Ping's Troy Grubbs, Kelvin Brewer and Justin Chin will conduct two more round-table panels on public-sector trust.
For identity-security professionals, the attraction of YOUniverse will extend beyond individual product announcements. The more consequential question running through the agenda is what happens to IAM when users are no longer necessarily human, actions occur at machine speed, and authentication alone cannot establish sufficient trust.
Click here to register for the Ping YOUniverse conference.
