CIAM (Customer Identity & Access Management) is where IAM meets real product constraints: conversion rates, support costs, fraud, privacy regulation, and at-scale reliability.
This page is vendor-agnostic by design: the concepts apply whether you use a homegrown stack or a CIAM platform.
UX is security
In consumer systems, “secure but annoying” often becomes “not used.” CIAM login should optimize for:
- Low friction for legitimate users
- High friction only when risk is high
Patterns
Passwordless
- Email magic links (phishing-resistant if you bind device/session and set short TTLs)
- Passkeys (WebAuthn) for the best combo of UX and phishing resistance
Social login
- Treat IdP tokens as inputs, not identity truth
- Handle email changes and account linking carefully
Step-up authentication
Use step-up for:
- Changing email/phone
- Exporting data
- Payment actions
- Disabling MFA/passkeys
Checklist
- Clear account recovery path (don’t strand users)
- Device/session binding where possible
- Anti-replay controls (short TTL, one-time links)
- Explicit linking flow for social identities