Every Active Directory (AD) admin is familiar with nested groups. Rights are assigned to objects by virtue of their location in the tree; that鈥檚 just how things work. It鈥檚 convenient and makes entitlement management easier鈥� until you consider its lack of maturity for identity governance. What once worked well now increases security risks and management overhead.
Cloud directories have the benefit of shedding that type of technical debt. However, it鈥檚 a change in how admins think about how entitlements are handled. The benefits that a flat structure brings to IT efficiency and security may not be obvious, even when attribute-based access control (ABAC) solves identity governance problems that have been festering over the past 20 years.
This brief examines why nested groups have become undesirable and discusses how cloud directories automate user/device lifecycles and enable more effective work through dynamic groups. You鈥檒l also learn how cloud directories will increase your security.
What Are Nested Groups?
AD is a directory services database and uses Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) for interacting with data. Its architecture enables admins to make one AD security group a member of another, thus 鈥渘esting鈥� one group within another. Members of that group then inherit the permissions and rights assigned to the parent group. That concept is simply referred to as nested groups.
Security groups in AD assign users and resources permission to access shared IT assets, and user assignments are either granted manually or by using PowerShell to create elaborate if-else conditions. Nesting is convenient for user provisioning when there are well-specified roles/functions; however, it鈥檚 vulnerable to human error. It鈥檚 important that best practices are followed to avoid security breaches due to forgotten users or overprovisioning.
Add-ons such as Microsoft Identity Manager (MIM) were created out of necessity to manage the identity lifecycle, because nested groups lack automated user management or the ability to synchronize identities between systems. An entire ecosystem of add-ons exists for this purpose.
Admins that don鈥檛 take a proactive approach to lifecycle management through access governance, or purchasing add-ons to extend AD鈥檚 capabilities, will encounter problems.
MIM is being phased out and replaced by Entra ID鈥檚 premium SKUs for privileged access management. AD鈥檚 access control model is being modernized by cloud directory services.
What Problems Can Occur with Nested Groups?
The biggest issue with nested groups is that members of child groups inherit the entitlements of their parent group(s)… which sounds intentional, but unfortunately can result in unintended entitlements, entitlement conflicts, and troubleshooting challenges. This can be especially problematic when there鈥檚 a complex organizational structure.
Child groups aren鈥檛 members of the parent object, but they inherit entitlements from it. It can be difficult for IT admins to unravel user entitlement issues if those entitlements are buried deep within those parent/child entitlement relationships. Nested groups can also lead to individuals gaining improper access to files because of over permissioning.
Group Policy Objects (GPO) are applied to groups for security. However, past configurations can unintentionally expose the environment. Today鈥檚 cyberthreats aren鈥檛 the same as before; they are more sophisticated. Configurations are layered on to deal with emerging threats, which adds to the complexity.
GPOs can overwrite each other, and that makes audits/compliance more difficult than it has to be. There鈥檚 also no certainty that groups are secure.
This scenario, coupled with continued reliance on nested groups, increases the security risks inherent to using these legacy technologies. Cloud directories don’t have that technical debt.
Cloud Directories Deprecate Nested Groups
Cloud directory vendors, including 探花大神 and Microsoft, operate multi-tenant environments where organizational hierarchies had to be reimagined. Managing nested groups across different tenants would introduce complexities, performance problems, and issues with scalability. Implementing nested groups also fails to ensure interoperability and compatibility with other services. A more uniform approach is necessary in the cloud.
Note: Don鈥檛 be fooled: Microsoft鈥檚 Entra ID is previewing a feature that replicates nested groups, but it doesn鈥檛 revert back to the legacy way of doing things in AD. Users are still members of both the parent and child groups. Therefore, its entitlements are explicit and not inherited.
Modern Directories Offer a Simpler, More Secure Experience
Modern directory services utilize a flat architecture where memberships are based upon the attributes of the user object within each organization. Entitlements are then applied directly to groups rather than through an indirect inheritance from the parent group object. This makes it much easier for admins to determine why a user o