Roll out group provisioning to AD for resources and applications
Implementation Effort: High – IT teams must deploy and configure the Microsoft Entra provisioning agent, classify cloud groups, and implement a phased rollout strategy to progressively enable group writeback to Active Directory.
User Impact: Low – This is an administrative backend process that does not require action from end users.
Overview
This rollout involvesclassifying cloud groups based on usage (e.g., app access, resource entitlement), and defining a phased rollout plan that gradually brings groups into scope for writeback. One important consideration for this exercise is to scope it to groups that provide persistent access (this is in contrast to just-in-time access, given potential latencies).Each phase typically starts with low-impact or newly created groups, followed by critical application access groups, to reduce operational risk.
This deployment supports the Zero Trust principle "Verify explicitly" by ensuring authoritative group membership is centrally validated and synchronized. It also enforces "Use least privilege access" by aligning group membership with access policy intent across hybrid resources. Without a deliberate classification and onboarding strategy, organizations risk inconsistent group control between environments, over-provisioning, and group sprawl—creating opportunities for threat actors to exploit gaps in access governance.