Azure Active Directory Blog

Understanding Conditional Access in Azure AD

In today's dynamic IT landscape, securing access to your organization's resources is paramount. Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Conditional Access is a powerful policy engine that provides a centralized way to enforce identity and access management policies for all your cloud applications. It acts as a gatekeeper, allowing or blocking access based on real-time conditions.

What is Conditional Access?

Conditional Access is essentially a set of if-then statements. If a user wants to access a resource, then a set of conditions must be met. These conditions can include:

• User or Group: Which users or groups are subject to the policy.
• Cloud App or Action: Which applications or actions the policy applies to.
• Conditions: These are the most flexible part, including:
  • Device platform (e.g., iOS, Android, Windows)
  • Client applications (e.g., browser, mobile apps, desktop clients)
  • Sign-in risk (detected by Azure AD Identity Protection)
  • User risk (detected by Azure AD Identity Protection)
  • Location (e.g., trusted IP addresses, specific countries)
  • Device state (e.g., compliant or Hybrid Azure AD joined)
• Grant: What action to take if conditions are met. This can be:
  • Grant access
  • Block access
  • Require multi-factor authentication (MFA)
  • Require device to be marked as compliant
  • Require Hybrid Azure AD joined device
  • Require approved client application
  • Require app protection policy

Key Benefits of Using Conditional Access

• Enhanced Security: Reduce the risk of credential theft and unauthorized access by enforcing MFA, limiting access from risky sign-ins, and restricting access from untrusted locations.
• Improved User Experience: By intelligently applying policies, you can ensure users have seamless access when they are in trusted environments and receive prompts for additional security measures only when necessary.
• Centralized Policy Management: Manage access controls across all your cloud applications from a single pane of glass.
• Compliance: Help meet regulatory compliance requirements by enforcing specific access controls.

Common Scenarios

Conditional Access can be used to implement a wide range of security policies. Here are a few common examples:

1. Requiring MFA for Admins

Ensure that administrators, who have broad access, are always prompted for Multi-Factor Authentication when signing in to Azure portal or other administrative applications.

2. Blocking Legacy Authentication

Legacy authentication protocols (like POP, IMAP, SMTP, older Office clients) do not support MFA. Blocking these protocols significantly improves your security posture.

3. Requiring Compliant Devices for Specific Applications

Ensure that sensitive applications, like financial systems, are only accessed from devices that meet your organization's compliance standards.

4. Restricting Access by Location

Allow access to specific applications only from trusted corporate network locations.

Getting Started

Implementing Conditional Access is a journey. We recommend starting with the "Report-only" mode to see the impact of your policies before enforcing them. This allows you to understand how your chosen conditions and controls would affect your users and applications without disrupting their access.

Explore the Azure AD portal to create your first Conditional Access policies and start securing your digital estate.

Stay tuned for more in-depth articles on specific Conditional Access features and best practices!