The Developer’s Guide to RBAC and IdPs: Part II

Integrating Identity Providers (IdPs) with authorization systems can be challenging due to complex APIs and varying protocols like SCIM and SAML. The key concept is syncing user data from an external source, such as Okta or Azure AD, to map it to relevant roles or resources in the application. IdP-based authorization allows organizations to manage their roles and permissions through a single source of truth rather than dealing with unique permissions schemes for each SaaS tool. Supporting different IdPs requires building custom UIs for mapping groups and roles from the IdP to the app's permissions, as well as handling various sync scenarios and edge cases. FGA (fine-grained authorization) doesn't work well with IdP-based authorization due to its dynamic nature, but a hybrid RBAC/FGA approach may be more feasible in the future. Designing roles around both application and IT admin needs can help create an intuitive hierarchy between global and resource level roles.

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