Do you have to migrate from Azure AD Connect with Cloud Sync?

Uploading and downloading data on the cloud through a phone. — Picture: Dilok/Adobe Inventory

Regardless that a whole lot of the functionality of domain controllers can be moved to the cloud, most organizations that use Energetic Listing want a hybrid infrastructure that offers customers entry to cloud sources (like OneDrive and Microsoft 365) by way of Azure Energetic Listing in addition to on-premises file shares, printers and purposes that also want native credentials.

Over time, Microsoft has had a number of instruments for managing hybrid id and syncing cloud and on-premises customers and teams.

SEE: Discover TechRepublic’s hybrid cloud cheat sheet.

Microsoft Identity Manager, which changed Forefront Id Supervisor, is supported till January 9, 2029, however its Azure AD Connector is deprecated. Azure AD Multi-Issue Authentication Server can be deprecated and can cease dealing with MFA requests after September 30, 2024. For those who’re nonetheless utilizing these instruments, you’ll need to maneuver to a more recent possibility.

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Table of Contents

Azure AD Join and its limitations

Azure AD Connect changed the older DirSync and Azure AD Sync choices for syncing customers, teams and different listing objects to Azure AD. It helps:

Password hash synchronization: Syncing a hash of every person’s AD password into Azure AD.
Pass-through authentication: Sending customers to Azure AD to check in after which validating towards AD, to allow them to use the identical password within the cloud and for native sources while not having to arrange federation.
Energetic Listing Federation Companies use.

However, Azure AD Join requires establishing and sustaining a server in your community, and a few of the requirements for working it don’t work for each group, particularly if in case you have a number of AD “forests,” which makes working with Azure AD complicated.

“To make use of it, you should be in a linked forest; you should have put in a database,” stated Joseph Dadzie, a director within the Microsoft id crew. “That’s costly to handle and deploy.

“We began getting suggestions from a whole lot of prospects round the price of a deploying AD Join sync and of sustaining it, and a few characteristic gaps round if you’re in a disconnected forest or you might be in a company the place you are attempting to do an M&A. So, we set out to have a look at methods to simplify it.”

Cloud sync goals to switch Azure AD Join for cloud

The result’s Azure AD Connect cloud sync, which began out as a device for bringing identities from multiple disconnected AD forests right into a single Azure AD tenant.

It nonetheless does that, but it surely’s now a light-weight various to AD Join that doesn’t have fairly as many options however is far quicker to arrange and requires fewer sources. It’s because cloud sync strikes a lot of the configuration into the cloud, needing solely provisioning brokers.

“While you have a look at AD Join, virtually all of the configuration is finished within the on-prem world, and it’s saved in that native server,” stated Dadzie. “For cloud sync, the concept is to modify the configuration to be cloud based mostly and have a really light-weight agent within the buyer’s atmosphere in order that it’s simple to deploy.

“It takes about 10 megabytes, so you’ll be able to have a number of of those working collectively for prime availability options; one thing that’s tougher to do if in case you have a full Join sync functionality.”

That top availability is especially helpful for those who’re utilizing Microsoft’s really useful password hash synchronization.

The way forward for cloud sync

Cloud sync can deal with teams with as much as 50,000 members, but it surely doesn’t cowl every part you are able to do with AD Join sync but, Dadzie advised us.

“For those who’ve performed a whole lot of customizations on attributes in your AD and you continue to use Trade on-prem, there’s nonetheless some delta within the capabilities,” stated Dadzie. “In the long run, we are going to wish to have it’s the complete substitute; we aren’t there but.”

Presently, it may well’t connect with LDAP directories and doesn’t but have help for system objects, simply customers, teams and contacts. There are superior customization and filtering choices that aren’t obtainable, and cloud sync can’t deal with Trade hybrid writeback, so you’ll be able to’t use it for Trade hybrid migrations.

Federation is supported however not Azure AD Area Companies or Go By Authentication, not less than for disconnected forests. That’s one thing the AD Join crew is engaged on, Dadzie stated, and writeback for safety teams can be in improvement.

“Over the previous yr, we added the self-service password writeback situations,” stated Dadzie.

System writeback can be below improvement, as a result of “virtually any deployment begins with getting a few of the customers from on-prem to the cloud,” Dadzie notes. It’s barely complicated as a result of each Azure AS and Home windows Hey For Enterprise have companies named Cloud Kerberos trust, which do various things, however Microsoft tells us the naming and documentation ought to turn into clearer in future.

The cloud sync crew can be options to writeback.

“When you have an on-prem app and you’ve got a cloud person who wants entry to it, how do you give that person entry with out having an account within the on-prem AD,” stated Dadzie. “We’re what we’d do in that house: Is there a option to have a few of the secrets and techniques go down so to have the person credentials, the place the person will get entry to on-prem with out having to have the person object in there?”

That’s nonetheless within the early levels, however there are common updates to cloud sync performance.

“Each quarter to 6 months, we replace and add new capabilities,” stated Dadzie. “We’re on a mission to chip away on the the reason why somebody may nonetheless wish to use the complete AD Join sync. We’re on a mission to maintain including to cloud sync to the purpose that we finally exchange AD Join sync, however we aren’t there but.”

Selecting between Azure AD Join and cloud sync

There’s no urgency about shifting to cloud sync for those who want an AD Join sync characteristic, however there are some situations the place cloud sync is already the higher selection, in addition to much less demanding.

“It really works nicely for organizations that aren’t as difficult or don’t have a whole lot of objects; if they’ve lower than 150K objects of their listing, then it’s simpler to begin off utilizing cloud sync,” stated Dadzie.

There’s a wizard within the Microsoft 365 admin middle that walks you thru choosing the proper id sync possibility in addition to a step-by-step migration guide if you wish to transfer from Azure AD Join sync to cloud sync.

How complicated that migration shall be relies on how complicated your AD atmosphere is: “The extra complicated the atmosphere is, then a extra phased method works,” Dazie stated. But when your wants are much less complicated and also you’re beginning out with hybrid id, he suggests beginning with cloud sync for simplicity (Determine A).

Determine A

This list of scenarios in the Azure AD sync wizard makes it straightforward to find out if cloud sync fits your needs. — This listing of situations within the Azure AD sync wizard makes it easy to search out out if cloud sync matches your wants. Picture: Mary Branscombe.

In actual fact, a giant a part of the attraction of cloud sync is that it’s designed to be a lot simpler to get began with.

“In Join sync, it’s a must to do all of the Schema Mapping your self, whereas in cloud sync we attempt to autodiscover them for you, so that you don’t must hunt round and to make it simple so that you can configure these,” stated Dadzie. “The principle philosophy we are attempting to get with cloud sync is to make it tremendous, tremendous simple, so prospects don’t must suppose by way of these items.”