Which is better for least privilege to allow single Login-User Bulk Insert only ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS or bulkadmin ?

Question

Hello, I've been researching around the web and still a bit confused difference between ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS vs bulkadmin.

From a security perspective...which is better for least privilege to allow Bulk Insert only just for their one DB that they are in db_owner role ? Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Hi @techresearch7777777 ,

ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS is a more granular permission than "bulkadmin" and allows more control over who can perform bulk operations.

ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS allows users to perform both import and export operations while "bulkadmin" only allows import operations.

In detail, the ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS role grants permissions to execute the BULK INSERT statement, as well as to execute the bcp utility and the OPENROWSET(BULK...) function. This role also grants permissions to read from and write to external files, and to specify format files. In contrast, the bulkadmin role grants permissions to execute the BULK INSERT statement and the bcp utility, but does not provide as much flexibility for configuring these operations.

To allow a user to perform bulk insert operations for their own database only, you could add them to the db_owner role for that database, and then grant them the ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS role at the server level. This will allow them to perform bulk insert operations for their own database, but not for other databases on the server. This approach provides a more granular level of security compared to granting the bulkadmin role, which would give the user access to perform bulk insert operations on all databases on the server.

It is recommended to use "ADMINISTER BULK OPERATIONS" instead of "bulkadmin" as it provides more control and is less powerful, limiting the scope of what a user can do.

Best regards,

Seeya

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