Manage local accounts with AKS-managed Microsoft Entra integration

Article
10/12/2023

When you deploy an AKS cluster, local accounts are enabled by default. Even when you enable RBAC or Microsoft Entra integration, --admin access still exists as a non-auditable backdoor option. This article shows you how to disable local accounts on an existing cluster, create a new cluster with local accounts disabled, and re-enable local accounts on existing clusters.

Before you begin

See AKS-managed Microsoft Entra integration for an overview and setup instructions.

Disable local accounts

You can disable local accounts using the parameter disable-local-accounts. The properties.disableLocalAccounts field has been added to the managed cluster API to indicate whether the feature is enabled or not on the cluster.

Note

On clusters with Microsoft Entra integration enabled, users assigned to a Microsoft Entra administrators group specified by aad-admin-group-object-ids can still gain access using non-administrator credentials. On clusters without Microsoft Entra integration enabled and properties.disableLocalAccounts set to true, any attempt to authenticate with user or admin credentials will fail.
After disabling local user accounts on an existing AKS cluster where users might have authenticated with local accounts, the administrator must rotate the cluster certificates to revoke certificates they might have had access to. If this is a new cluster, no action is required.

Create a new cluster without local accounts

Create a new AKS cluster without any local accounts using the az aks create command with the disable-local-accounts flag.

az aks create -g <resource-group> -n <cluster-name> --enable-aad --aad-admin-group-object-ids <aad-group-id> --disable-local-accounts

In the output, confirm local accounts are disabled by checking that the field properties.disableLocalAccounts is set to true.
```
"properties": {
    ...
    "disableLocalAccounts": true,
    ...
}
```

Run the az aks get-credentials command to ensure the cluster is set to disable local accounts.

az aks get-credentials --resource-group <resource-group> --name <cluster-name> --admin

Your output should show the following error message indicating the feature is preventing access:

Operation failed with status: 'Bad Request'. Details: Getting static credential isn't allowed because this cluster is set to disable local accounts.

Disable local accounts on an existing cluster

Disable local accounts on an existing Microsoft Entra integration enabled AKS cluster using the az aks update command with the disable-local-accounts parameter.
```
az aks update -g <resource-group> -n <cluster-name> --disable-local-accounts
```
In the output, confirm local accounts are disabled by checking that the field properties.disableLocalAccounts is set to true.
```
"properties": {
    ...
    "disableLocalAccounts": true,
    ...
}
```

Run the az aks get-credentials command to ensure the cluster is set to disable local accounts.

az aks get-credentials --resource-group <resource-group> --name <cluster-name> --admin

Your output should show the following error message indicating the feature is preventing access:

Operation failed with status: 'Bad Request'. Details: Getting static credential isn't allowed because this cluster is set to disable local accounts.

Re-enable local accounts on an existing cluster

Re-enable a disabled local account on an existing cluster using the az aks update command with the enable-local-accounts parameter.
```
az aks update -g <resource-group> -n <cluster-name> --enable-local-accounts
```
In the output, confirm local accounts are re-enabled by checking that the field properties.disableLocalAccounts is set to false.
```
"properties": {
    ...
    "disableLocalAccounts": false,
    ...
}
```
Run the az aks get-credentials command to ensure the cluster is set to enable local accounts.
```
az aks get-credentials --resource-group <resource-group> --name <cluster-name> --admin
```
Your output should show the following message indicating you have successfully enabled local accounts on the cluster:
```
Merged "<cluster-name>-admin" as current context in C:\Users\<username>\.kube\config
```

Next steps

Learn about Azure RBAC integration for Kubernetes Authorization.