Configure multi party approval

This article describes how you can configure the Just-in-Time Access application to support multi-party approval.

Multi-party approval requires additional configuration and is disabled by default.

Grant the Just-in-Time Access application permission to sign tokens

The Just-in-Time Access application uses activation tokens to pass information about approval requests between parties. To protect against tampering, the application signs activation tokens using the Google-managed service account key of its service account.

To let the application sign tokens using its service account, do the following:

1. Set an environment variable to contain your project ID:

   gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID
   

   Replace PROJECT_ID with the ID of your project.

2. Enable the IAM Credentials API:

   gcloud services enable iamcredentials.googleapis.com
   

3. Grant the Service Account Token Creator role (roles/iam.serviceAccountTokenCreator) to the application's service account. This role lets the Just-In-Time Access application use the service account to sign and verify activation tokens.

   App EngineCloud Run

   APPENGINE_VERSION=$(gcloud app versions list --service default --hide-no-traffic --format "value(version.id)")
   SERVICE_ACCOUNT=$(gcloud app versions describe $APPENGINE_VERSION --service default --format "value(serviceAccount)")
   
   gcloud iam service-accounts add-iam-policy-binding $SERVICE_ACCOUNT \
       --member "serviceAccount:$SERVICE_ACCOUNT" \
       --role "roles/iam.serviceAccountTokenCreator"
   

   SERVICE_ACCOUNT=$(gcloud run services describe jitaccess --format "value(spec.template.spec.serviceAccountName)")
   
   gcloud iam service-accounts add-iam-policy-binding $SERVICE_ACCOUNT \
       --member "serviceAccount:$SERVICE_ACCOUNT" \
       --role "roles/iam.serviceAccountTokenCreator"
   

Configure SMTP

The Just-In-Time Access application notifies users about multi-party approval requests by email. To send email, the application needs access to an SMTP mail server. You can use Google Workspace, your corporate email server, or any other SMTP server for this purpose.

Obtain SMTP credentials

Google WorkspaceMicrosoft 365

You can let the Just-In-Time Access application send email through Google Workspace by using the Gmail SMTP server and a dedicated Google Workspace user account.

To create a new user account in Google Workspace, do the following:

1. Open the Google Workspace Admin Console and sign in as a super-admin user.
2. In the menu, go to Directory > Users and click Add new user to create a user.

3. Provide an appropriate name and email address such as the following:

   • First Name: a name such as JIT Access
   • Last Name: a name such as Notifications
   • Primary email: an email address such as jitaccess-notifications

4. Click Manage user's password, organizational unit, and profile photo and configure the following settings:

   • Password: Select Create password and set a password
   • Ask for a password change at the next sign-in: Disabled

5. Click Add new user.

6. Click Done.

Assign a Google Workspace license to the new user account:

1. Refresh the list of users.
2. Open the details for the user account that you just created.
3. Click Licenses.

4. Set the status for Google Workspace to assigned.

   Note

   You must assign a Google Workspace license. Without a Google Workspace license, the Gmail SMTP server rejects email delivery.

5. Click Save.

Create an app password for the new user account:

1. Open an incognito browser window and go to Google Accounts .
2. Sign in with the new user account that you created.
3. Go to Security > Signing in to Google > 2-step verification and follow the steps to turn on 2-step verification .

4. Go to Security > Signing in to Google > App passwords

   Note

   The App passwords link isn't shown if you haven't turned on 2-step verification yet.

5. On the App passwords page, use the following settings:

   1. Select app: Select Mail
   2. Select device: Select Other and enter a name such as JIT Access

6. Click Generate.

   Take note of the generated app password, because you need it later.

You can let the Just-In-Time Access application send email through Microsoft 365 by using an Office 365 mailbox and SMTP AUTH .

1. Open the Admin Center .

2. Go to Users > Active users and add a new user . Provide an appropriate name and email address such as the following:

   • First Name: a name such as JIT Access
   • Last Name: a name such as Notifications
   • Primary email: an email address such as jitaccess-notifications

   Take note of the user's password, because you need it later.

3. Enable SMTP AUTH for the new user.

Create a secret

You now create a secret in Secrets Manager to store the SMTP password:

1. Enable the Secret Manager API:

   gcloud services enable secretmanager.googleapis.com
   

2. Create a new secret:

   gcloud secrets create jitaccess-smtp --replication-policy="automatic"
   

3. Create a secret version and save the SMTP password:

   echo PASSWORD | gcloud secrets versions add jitaccess-smtp --data-file=-
   

   Replace PASSWORD with the password that you obtained in the previous step.

4. Grant the Secret Accessor role (roles/secretmanager.secretAccessor) to the application's service account. This role lets the Just-In-Time Access application read the secret:

   gcloud secrets add-iam-policy-binding jitaccess-smtp \
     --member="serviceAccount:$SERVICE_ACCOUNT" \
     --role="roles/secretmanager.secretAccessor"
   

5. Look up the resource ID of the secret:

   gcloud secrets versions describe latest --secret jitaccess-smtp --format "value(name)"
   

   Note the output, you'll need in a later step.

Redeploy the application

You now update the configuration and redeploy the Just-in-Time Access application:

1. Clone the GitHub repository and switch to the latest branch:

   git clone https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/jit-access.git
   cd jit-access/sources
   git checkout latest
   

2. Download the configuration file that you used previously to deploy the application and save it to a file app.yaml:

   App EngineCloud Run

   APPENGINE_VERSION=$(gcloud app versions list --service default --hide-no-traffic --format "value(version.id)")
   APPENGINE_APPYAML_URL=$(gcloud app versions describe $APPENGINE_VERSION --service default --format "value(deployment.files.'app.yaml'.sourceUrl)")
   
   curl -H "Authorization: Bearer $(gcloud auth print-access-token)" $APPENGINE_APPYAML_URL -o app.yaml
   

   gcloud run services describe jitaccess --format yaml > app.yaml
   

3. Open the file app.yaml in an editor and add the following configuration options:

   Google WorkspaceMicrosoft 365Other email provider

   SMTP_SENDER_ADDRESS: email_address
   SMTP_USERNAME: email_address
   SMTP_SECRET: secret_path
   

   Replace the following:

   • email_address: the email address of the Google Workspace user that you created previously, for example [email protected]
   • app_password: the app password that you created previously
   • secret_path: the resource ID of the Secret Manager secret, for example projects/PROJECT/secrets/jitaccess-smtp/versions/1

   SMTP_HOST: smtp.office365.com
   SMTP_SENDER_ADDRESS: email_address
   SMTP_USERNAME: email_address
   SMTP_SECRET: secret_path
   

   Replace the following:

   • server: the server name to use for SMTP
   • email_address: the email address of the Microsoft 365 user that you created previously, for example [email protected]
   • secret_path: the resource ID of the Secret Manager secret, for example projects/PROJECT/secrets/jitaccess-smtp/versions/1

   SMTP_HOST: server
   SMTP_SENDER_ADDRESS: email_address
   SMTP_USERNAME: email_address
   SMTP_SECRET: secret_path
   

   Replace the following:

   • server: the server name to use for SMTP
   • email_address: the email address of the Google Workspace user that you created previously, for example [email protected]
   • secret_path: the resource ID of the Secret Manager secret, for example projects/PROJECT/secrets/jitaccess-smtp/versions/1

   For additional configuration options, see Configuration.

   Note

   Make sure that the lines use the same indentation as existing items in the env_variables section.

4. Deploy the application with the updated configuration:

   App EngineCloud Run

   sed -i 's/java11/java17/g' app.yaml
   gcloud app deploy --appyaml app.yaml
   

   PROJECT_ID=$(gcloud config get-value core/project)
   
   docker build -t gcr.io/$PROJECT_ID/jitaccess:latest .
   docker push gcr.io/$PROJECT_ID/jitaccess:latest
   
   IMAGE=$(docker inspect --format='{{index .RepoDigests 0}}'  gcr.io/$PROJECT_ID/jitaccess)
   sed -i "s|image:.*|image: $IMAGE|g" app.yaml
   
   gcloud run services replace app.yaml