Define roles for users

Deep Security uses role-based access control (RBAC) to restrict user permissions to parts of Deep Security. Access rights and editing privileges are attached to roles and not to users. Once you have installed Deep Security Manager, you should create individual accounts for each user and assign each user a role that will restrict their activities to all but those necessary for the completion of their duties. To change the access rights and editing privileges of an individual user, you must assign a different role to the user or edit the role.

The access that roles have to computers and policies can be restricted to subsets of computers and policies. For example, users can be permitted to view all existing computers, but only permitted to modify those in a particular group.

Deep Security comes preconfigured with two roles:

• Full Access: The full access role grants the user all possible privileges in terms of managing the Deep Security system including creating, editing, and deleting computers, computer groups, policies, rules, malware scan configurations, and others.
• Auditor: The auditor role gives the user the ability to view all the information in the Deep Security system but without the ability to make any modifications except to their own personal settings, such as password, contact information, dashboard layout preferences, and others.
  

You can create new roles that can restrict users from editing or even seeing Deep Security objects such as specific computers, the properties of security rules, or the system settings.

Before creating user accounts, identify the roles that your users will take and itemize what Deep Security objects those roles will require access to and what the nature of that access will be (viewing, editing, creating, and so on). Once you have created your roles, you can then begin creating user accounts and assigning them specific roles.

Clicking New () or Properties () displays the Role properties window with six tabs (General, Computer Rights, Policy Rights, User Rights, Other Rights, and Assigned To).

Add or edit a role

1. In Deep Security Manager go to Administration > User Management > Roles.
2. Click New to add a new role or double-click an existing role to edits its settings.
3. Specify the general properties for the role, including:
• Name: The name of the role, which will appear on the Roles page and in the list of available roles when adding a user.
• Description: (Optional) A description of the role.
• Access Type: Select whether users with this role will have access to Deep Security Manager, the Deep Security Manager Web service API (applies to the legacy SOAP and REST APIs), or both.
• To enable the legacy SOAP and REST Web service APIs, go to Administration > System Settings > Advanced > SOAP Web Service API.

4. Use the Computer Rights pane to confer viewing, editing, deleting, alert-dismissal, and event tagging rights to users in a role. These rights can apply to all computers and computer groups or they can be restricted to only certain computers. If you wish to restrict access, select the Selected Computers radio button and put a check next to the computer groups and computers that users in this role will have access to.

5. These rights restrictions will affect not only the user's access to computers in Deep Security Manager, but also what information is visible, including events and alerts. As well, email notifications will only be sent if they relate to data that the user has access rights to.

   Four basic options are available:

   • Allow viewing of non-selected computers and data: If users in this role have restricted edit, delete, or dismiss-alerts rights, you can still allow them to view but not change information about other computers by checking this box.
   • Allow viewing of events and alerts not related to computers: Set this option to allow users in this role to view non-computer-related information (for example, system events, like users being locked out, new firewall rules being created, IP Lists being deleted, and so on)
     The previous two settings affect the data that users have access to. Although the ability of a user to make changes to computers have been restricted, these two settings control whether they can see information relating to computers they don't otherwise have access to. This includes receiving email notifications related to those computers.
   • Allow new computers to be created in selected Groups: Set this option to allow users in this role to create new computers in the computer groups they have access to.
   • Allow sub-groups to be added/removed in selected Groups: Set this option to allow users in this role to create and delete subgroups within the computer groups they have access to.

   You can also enabled these in the Advanced Rights section:

   • Allow computer file imports: Allow Users in this Role to import computers using files created using the Deep Security Manager's Computer Export option.
   • Allow Directories to be added, removed and synchronized: Allow Users in this Role to add, remove, and synchronize computers that are being managed using an LDAP-based directory like MS Active Directory. (Not available with Deep Security as a Service)
   • Allow VMware vCenters to be added, removed and synchronized: Allow Users in this Role to add, remove and synchronize VMware vCenters. (Not available with Deep Security as a Service)
   • Allow Cloud Providers to be added, removed, and synchronized: Allow Users in this Role to add, remove, and synchronize Cloud Providers.
6. Use the Policy Rights tab to confer viewing, editing, and deleting rights to users in a role. These rights can apply to all policies or they can be restricted to only certain policies. If you wish to restrict access, click Selected Policies and put a check mark next to the policies that users in this role will have access to.
   

   When you allow rights to a policy that has "child" policies, users automatically get rights to the child policies as well.

   Two basic options are available:

   • Allow viewing of non-selected Policies: If users in this role have restricted edit or delete rights, you can still allow them to view but not change information about other policies by checking this box.
   • Allow new Policies to be created: Set this option to allow users in this role to create new policies.

   You can also enabled this in the Advanced Rights section:

   • Allow Policy imports: Allow users in this role to import policies using files created with the Deep Security Manager Export option on the Policies tab.
7. The options on the User Rights tab allow you to define permissions for administrator accounts.
   
   
   • Change own password and contact information only: Users in this role can change their own password and contact information only.
   • Create and manage Users with equal or less access: Users in this role can create and manage any users who do not have any privileges greater than theirs. If there is even a single privilege that exceeds those of the users with this role, the users with this role will not be able to create or manage them.
   • Have full control over all Roles and Users: Gives users in this role the ability to create and edit and users or roles without restrictions. Be careful when using this option. If you assign it to a role, you may give a user with otherwise restricted privileges the ability to create and then sign in as a user with full unrestricted access to all aspects of the Deep Security Manager.
   • Custom: You can further restrict the ability of a user to view, create, edit, or delete users and roles by selecting Custom and using the options in the Custom Rights section. Some options may be restricted for certain users if the Can only manipulate Users with equal or lesser rights option is selected.

     The Can only manipulate Users with equal or lesser rights option limits the authority of users in this role. They will only be able to effect changes to users that have equal or lesser rights than themselves. Users in this Role will not be able to create, edit, or delete roles. Selecting this option also places restrictions on some of the options in the Custom Rights section:

     • Can Create New Users: Can only create users with equal or lesser rights.
     • Can Edit User Properties: Can only edit a user (or set or reset password) with equal or lesser rights.
     • Can Delete Users: Can only delete users with equal or lesser rights.
8. The Other Rights tab enables you to restrict roles' permissions so that they can only access specific Deep Security features, and sometimes specific actions with those features. This can be useful if, for example, you have a team of administrators, and you want to make sure that they don't accidentally overwrite each others' work. By default, roles are View Only or Hide for each feature. To allow to full control or customized access, select Custom from the list.
   
9. The Assigned To tab displays a list of the users who have been assigned this role. If you want to test that roles are working correctly, sign in as a newly created user and verify the functionality.

 

Default settings for full access, auditor, and new roles

The following table identifies the default rights settings for the full access role and the auditor role. Also listed are the rights settings that are in place when creating a new role by clicking New in the toolbar on the Roles page.

RIGHTS	SETTINGS BY ROLE
General	Full Access Role	Auditor Role	New Role Defaults
Access to DSM User Interface	Allowed	Allowed	Allowed
Access to Web Service API	Allowed	Allowed	Not allowed
Computer Rights	Full Access Role	Auditor Role	New Role Defaults
View	Allowed, All Computers	Allowed, All Computers	Allowed, All Computers
Edit	Allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers
Delete	Allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers
Dismiss Alerts for	Allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers
Tag Items for	Allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers	Not allowed, All Computers
Allow viewing of non-selected computers and data (e.g. events, reports)	Allowed	Allowed	Allowed, All Computers
Allow viewing of events and alerts not related to computers	Allowed	Allowed	Allowed, All Computers
Allow new computers to be created in selected Groups	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Allow sub-groups to be added or removed in selected Groups	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Allow computer file imports	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Allow Cloud Accounts to be added, removed and synchronized	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Policy Rights	Full Access Role	Auditor Role	New Role Defaults
View	Allowed, All Policies	Allowed, All Policies	Allowed, All Policies
Edit	Allowed, All Policies	Not allowed, All Policies	Not allowed, All Policies
Delete	Allowed, All Policies	Not allowed, All Policies	Not allowed, All Policies
View non-selected Policies	Allowed	Allowed	Allowed
Create new Policies	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Import Policies	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
User Rights (See note on User rights below)	Full Access Role	Auditor Role	New Role Defaults
View Users	Allowed	Allowed	Not allowed
Create Users	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Edit User Properties	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Delete Users	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
View Roles	Allowed	Allowed	Not allowed
Create Roles	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Edit Role Properties	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Delete Roles	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Delegate Authority	Allowed	Not allowed	Not allowed
Other Rights	Full Access Role	Auditor Role	New Role Defaults
Alerts	Full (Can Dismiss Global Alerts)	View-Only	View-Only
Alert Configuration	Full (Can Edit Alert Configurations)	View-Only	View-Only
IP Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Port Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Schedules	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
System Settings (Global)	Full (Can View, Edit System Settings (Global))	View-Only	Hide
Diagnostics	Full (Can Create Diagnostic Packages)	View-Only	View-Only
Tagging	Full (Can Tag (Items not belonging to Computers), Can Delete Tags, Can Update Non-Owned Auto-Tag Rules, Can Run Non-Owned Auto-Tag Rules, Can Delete Non-Owned Auto-Tag Rules)	View-Only	View-Only
Tasks	Full (Can View, Add, Edit, Delete Tasks, Execute Tasks)	View-Only	Hide
Multi-Tenant Administration	Full	Hide	View-Only
Scan Cache Configuration Administration	Full	View-Only	View-Only
Contacts	Full (Can View, Create, Edit, Delete Contacts)	View-Only	Hide
Licenses	Full (Can View, Change License)	View-Only	Hide
Updates	Full (Can Add, Edit, Delete Software; Can View Update For Components; Can Download, Import, Apply Update Components; Can Delete Deep Security Rule Updates)	View-Only	Hide
Asset Values	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete Asset Values)	View-Only	View-Only
Certificates	Full (Can Create, Delete SSL Certificates)	View-Only	View-Only
Relay Groups	Full	View-Only	View-Only
Proxy	Full	View-Only	View-Only
SAML Identity Providers	Full	Hide	Hide
Malware Scan Configuration	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete Malware Scan Configuration)	View-Only	View-Only
Quarantined File	Full (Can Delete, Download Quarantined File)	View-Only	View-Only
Web Reputation Configuration	Full	View-Only	View-Only
Directory Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
File Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
File Extension Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Firewall Rules	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete Firewall Rules)	View-Only	View-Only
Firewall Stateful Configurations	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete Firewall Stateful Configurations)	View-Only	View-Only
Intrusion Prevention Rules	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Application Types	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
MAC Lists	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Contexts	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Integrity Monitoring Rules	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Log Inspection Rules	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Log Inspection Decoders	Full (Can Create, Edit, Delete)	View-Only	View-Only
Application Control Rulesets	Full (Can Create, View, Edit, or Delete Application Control rulesets)	Hide	Hide
Application Control Rule	Full (Can Create, View, Edit, or Delete Application Control rules)	Hide	Hide
Application Control Unrecognized Software	Full (Can View or Allow/Block unrecognized software)	Hide	Hide
Application Control Software Inventory	Full (Can Create, View, or Delete software inventory)	Hide	Hide

The custom settings corresponding to the Change own password and contact information only option are listed in the following table: