The Business Challenge
Askari Bank Limited — one of Pakistan's leading financial institutions and a listed entity on the Pakistan Stock Exchange — faced a convergence of pressures that demanded identity modernization. Operating under strict oversight from the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), the bank's IT environment had become a liability.
Large volumes of password reset requests were consuming help desk resources around the clock. Manual onboarding and offboarding processes stretched what should have been routine HR events into multi-day ordeals spanning five business days per employee. Most critically, plain-text password communication remained embedded in operational workflows — an unacceptable security exposure for a regulated financial institution.
The bank needed a modern identity platform that could simultaneously reduce costs, eliminate security gaps, and satisfy SBP compliance requirements without disrupting the day-to-day operations of thousands of banking staff.
"We needed a partner who understood both the depth of IBM identity technology and the compliance rigors of the Pakistani financial regulatory environment. SPS delivered both."— Askari Bank IT Leadership
The SPS Solution
Askari Bank selected Software Productivity Strategists, Inc. (SPS) as their implementation partner — an IBM Business Partner with deep expertise in IBM Identity and Access Management and established presence in both the US and Pakistan markets.
SPS designed and deployed a comprehensive identity and access management framework built on IBM Verify, addressing each challenge systematically:
Automated Onboarding & Offboarding
SPS built workflows directly integrated with Askari's HR systems, automating the full employee lifecycle. The onboarding cycle dropped from five days to one — making Askari Bank the first financial institution in Pakistan to achieve full automation in digital onboarding and offboarding.
Self-Service Password Reset
A self-service identity portal empowered employees to manage their own credentials — eliminating the flood of help desk tickets that had previously consumed significant IT capacity. Weak and dictionary-based passwords were prevented at the system level, mitigating brute-force attack vectors.
Multifactor Authentication (MFA)
IBM Verify MFA was deployed across all sensitive actions, eliminating plain-text password exchanges and enforcing a zero-trust authentication posture for the bank's entire workforce.
Single Sign-On (SSO) Across 36 Applications
SSO was implemented across 36 banking and enterprise applications — including the bank's core banking platform — making Askari Bank the first financial institution in Pakistan to achieve this level of SSO coverage.
MYID Autopilot: Agentic Identity Operations
Beyond the core IBM Verify deployment, SPS brought its proprietary MYID Autopilot capability — an AI-powered agentic automation layer built on top of IBM Verify. This extended the platform's capabilities far beyond standard IAM tooling.
MYID Autopilot — Agentic IAM Automation
MYID Autopilot is part of the SPS Add-ons suite — a layer of AI-powered agents, mobile self-service tools, and analytics dashboards that extend IBM Verify beyond its out-of-the-box capabilities. Learn more at myidselfverify.com ↗
MYID Autopilot delivered measurable operational impact at Askari Bank across four dimensions:
MTTR in Seconds
Mean time to resolve password and account issues dropped to seconds — with human-in-the-loop or fully agentic auto-resolution depending on risk context.
Reduced SOC Workload
Fewer tickets and escalations reaching the security operations center — automated triage and resolution handled the majority of routine identity incidents.
Breach Prevention
Lateral movement was limited by automated account controls — reducing the blast radius of any potential credential compromise.
User Self-Service Recovery
Employees could recover accounts and reset credentials without any IT involvement — improving experience and reducing downtime.
Key Outcomes
Reduction in help desk time spent on password-related issues
Days onboarding/offboarding cycle time reduction
Staff adoption of the self-service identity platform
MFA enforcement coverage for all sensitive actions
Banking and enterprise applications connected via SSO — including core banking
Plain-text password exchanges remaining in operational workflows
Pakistan Banking Firsts
The Askari Bank engagement produced two industry firsts for financial institutions in Pakistan — achievements that demonstrate the depth of the transformation.
Compliance & Regulatory Impact
Operating under State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) regulations, Askari Bank faced specific cybersecurity and identity management requirements that had to be demonstrably met. The IBM Verify deployment — architected and implemented by SPS — addressed every SBP compliance requirement directly:
- Elimination of plain-text password transmission across all workflows
- MFA enforcement for all sensitive banking operations
- Automated access revocation upon employee departure
- Continuous audit logging for all authentication and provisioning events
- Prevention of weak and dictionary-based passwords across the user population
The result: enhanced compliance with SBP regulations and a materially stronger cyber resilience posture — documented and auditable.
This case study is featured on IBM.com
The Askari Bank engagement has been recognized by IBM as a reference case study. Read the full case study on IBM.com ↗