Use Managed Identity RBAC to Auth call between APIs in Same Tenant

Stephen Mallin 26 Reputation points
2022-12-02T22:12:23.587+00:00

I'm new to Azure, and trying to use AAD Managed Identity to authenticate and authorize an API call from one API in our tenant to another in the same tenant. I understand how to create the managed identity, how to assign that identity to the calling app, but I am struggling to understand what IAM role (RBAC) I should assign to the identity inside my API that is being called. I know once I select the right role, I can select the manged identity as the user that needs the role, but what role will function as authN/authZ for the API?

Here are the steps as I understand it.

  1. Create Managed Identity (Got it)
  2. Add managed Identity as User-Assigned Identity to API application inside my tenant which is going to call the other API [API A] (No Problem)
  3. Add IAM Role to API being called [API B] (This is the part I'm struggling with)
  4. Add Managed Identity to RBAC Role created in 3 (This seems straightforward)

All the RBAC descriptions I have found to this point have to do with managing access to data... (blob storage, etc) but I want to use this to authenticate an API which is in an Azure App Service. What kind of role needs to be added to API B so that an API with the managed Identity assigned can hit the endpoints? Thanks!

Azure Role-based access control
Azure Role-based access control
An Azure service that provides fine-grained access management for Azure resources, enabling you to grant users only the rights they need to perform their jobs.
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