Chapter 3: Understanding User Authentication
User security is perhaps one of the most critical aspects of a system and, therefore, its architecture. Security has, of course, always been important to protect sensitive information within an organization. However, as we move our applications online and widen our audience, the need to ensure only the correct people gain access to their data has become crucial.
In this chapter, we explore the key differences between authentication and authorization, what tooling we have available within Azure to ensure the safety of user accounts, and how we design solutions according to different business needs.
In this chapter, we will examine the following topics:
- Differentiating authentication from authorization
- Introducing Active Directory (AD)
- Integrating AD
- Understanding Conditional Access (CA), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), and security defaults
- Using external identities
