Okta Everyone Group Best Practices and Limitations
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Overview
The Everyone group is a built-in, default group in every Okta organization that automatically includes all users. Administrators must understand the limitations of the Everyone group and implement best practices for access control, group rules, and API usage to ensure secure user management.
Review the Everyone group in the Okta Admin Console.
Applies To
- Okta Identity Engine (OIE)
- Okta Classic Engine
- Okta Administration
- Groups
- Group Rules
Solution
What are the best practices for managing the Okta Everyone group?
Implement the following best practices to avoid potential security risks and streamline user management.
- Avoid overreliance: The Everyone group is a convenient default, but administrators must not use it for granular access control. Extensively using the Everyone group in group rules leads to unintended consequences, such as granting unnecessary permissions to a wide range of users.
- Create specific groups: Create specific groups based on user attributes, such as department, location, job title, roles, or organizational units, to implement fine-grained access controls. This allows for precise management of user permissions and avoids granting access to everyone by default.
- Leverage group rules: Utilize group rules to dynamically add or remove users from specific groups based on predefined criteria. This helps automate user provisioning and deprovisioning processes, ensuring users have the correct access levels at all times.
- Consider Single Sign-On (SSO) assignments: Assign SSO applications to specific groups rather than the Everyone group. This ensures that only authorized users access the applications, minimizing potential security risks.
Review additional considerations for the Everyone group.
Review the following additional considerations regarding group membership, API access, and usage for the Everyone group.
- Group membership: Okta automatically adds every user to the Everyone group. Administrators cannot delete or rename this group.
- API access: While administrators can use the
/api/v1/groups/<EveryOne_groupId>/usersAPI to retrieve all users, Okta recommends using the/api/v1/usersAPI for more flexibility and efficient search capabilities. - Usage: The Everyone group is a foundational element of Okta. While administrators can use it for certain broad operations, creating specific groups provides more precise access control and management.
By following the best practices and understanding the limitations of the Everyone group, the user access and permissions can be managed within the Okta organization.
