Prevent the Okta Advanced Server Access and Privileged Access Clients from Automatically Prompting for Updates

The Okta Advanced Server Access (ASA) and Okta Privileged Access (OPA) clients display a pop-up when they detect a new version is available, as the default behavior notifies users of new releases. Administrators can prevent the client from displaying the update prompt by modifying the macOS defaults or changing the Windows environment variable. When a new version is available, the Windows client displays a pop-up message indicating that no release notes are available.

No release notes available.

• Okta Identity Engine (OIE)
• Okta Classic Engine
• Okta Advanced Server Access (ASA)
• Okta Privileged Access (OPA)

The default behavior notifies users of new releases and encourages clients to stay up-to-date.

Okta recommends keeping ASA and OPA clients up to date with the latest release. However, administrators can disable the client from detecting a new version and issuing the prompt.

How does an administrator disable the automatic update prompt on macOS?

Disable the automatic update prompt on macOS by running the following command in the terminal.

defaults write com.scaleft.ScaleFT SUEnableAutomaticChecks NO

How does an administrator disable the automatic update prompt on Windows?

The Windows client checks for new versions by querying the repository specified in the environment variable SFT_UPDATE_URL. Administrators can force the check to fail by setting the SFT_UPDATE_URL environment variable to a different URL.

Disable the automatic update prompt on Windows by setting the environment variable to a different URL using the command line.

setx SFT_UPDATE_URL https://okta.com

This results in the client polling the Okta Website for the ScaleFT clients. The polling fails because Okta does not directly host the ScaleFT client packages. Consequently, the automatic prompt for a new version no longer occurs. This action also breaks the manual check for updates.

NOTE: The client continuously polls the URL specified in SFT_UPDATE_URL for new packages. Set this to an internal URL within the organization's network environment to manage the continuous polling.