So far, we have been using SQL authentication to connect to Azure SQL Database, as we did in the previous chapter, via SQL Server Management Studio. Using Azure Active Directory (AD) will provide centralized administration for database users' identities, providing the following benefits:
- Another method of SQL Server authentication
- Controlling the password change for a centralized location
- Assigning user permissions on the database level
- Support of token-based authentication for the applications that connect to the database
- Protection of user profiles across the database servers
- Avoidance of the need to store passwords, as you will be able to use different methods of authentication, which we will cover shortly
In the next chapter, Azure Active Directory will be covered in more detail.
To enable Azure AD authentication for Azure...