Provision access to system metadata in Azure SQL Database using Microsoft Purview DevOps policies

DevOps policies are a type of Microsoft Purview access policies. They allow you to manage access to system metadata on data sources that have been registered for Data policy enforcement in Microsoft Purview. These policies are configured directly from the Microsoft Purview governance portal, and after they're saved, they get automatically published and then enforced by the data source. Microsoft Purview policies only manage access for Microsoft Entra principals.

This how-to guide covers how to configure Azure SQL Database to enforce policies created in Microsoft Purview. It covers the configuration steps for Azure SQL Database and the ones in Microsoft Purview to provision access to Azure SQL Database system metadata (DMVs and DMFs) using the DevOps policies actions SQL Performance Monitoring or SQL Security Auditing.

Prerequisites

• An Azure account with an active subscription. Create an account.

• A new or existing Microsoft Purview account. Follow this quickstart guide to create one.

• Create a new Azure SQL Database instance, or use an existing one, in one of the currently available regions for this feature. You can follow this guide to create an Azure SQL Database instance.

Region support

All Microsoft Purview regions are supported.

Configure the Azure SQL Database instance for policies from Microsoft Purview

For the logical server associated with Azure SQL Database to honor policies from Microsoft Purview, you need to configure a Microsoft Entra admin. In the Azure portal, go to the logical server that hosts the Azure SQL Database instance. On the side menu, select Microsoft Entra ID. Set an admin name to any Microsoft Entra user or group that you prefer, and then select Save.

Then, on the side menu, select Identity. Under System assigned managed identity, turn the status to On, and then select Save.

Microsoft Purview Configuration

Register the data source in Microsoft Purview

Before a policy can be created in Microsoft Purview for a data resource, you must register that data resource in Microsoft Purview Studio. You will find the instructions related to registering the data resource later in this guide.

Configure permissions to enable Data policy enforcement on the data source

Once a resource is registered, but before a policy can be created in Microsoft Purview for that resource, you must configure permissions. A set of permissions are needed to enable the Data policy enforcement. This applies to data sources, resource groups, or subscriptions. To enable Data policy enforcement, you must have both specific Identity and Access Management (IAM) privileges on the resource as well as specific Microsoft Purview privileges:

• You must have either one of the following IAM role combinations on the resource's Azure Resource Manager path or any parent of it (that is, using IAM permission inheritance):

  • IAM Owner
  • Both IAM Contributor and IAM User Access Administrator

  To configure Azure role-based access control (RBAC) permissions, follow this guide. The following screenshot shows how to access the Access Control section in the Azure portal for the data resource to add a role assignment.

  

  Note

  The IAM Owner role for a data resource can be inherited from a parent resource group, a subscription, or a subscription management group. Check which Microsoft Entra users, groups, and service principals hold or are inheriting the IAM Owner role for the resource.

• You also need to have the Microsoft Purview Data source admin role for the collection or a parent collection (if inheritance is enabled). For more information, see the guide on managing Microsoft Purview role assignments.

  The following screenshot shows how to assign the Data source admin role at the root collection level.

  

Configure Microsoft Purview permissions to create, update, or delete access policies

To create, update or delete policies, you need to get the Policy author role in Microsoft Purview at root collection level:

• The Policy author role can create, update, and delete DevOps and Data Owner policies.
• The Policy author role can delete self-service access policies.

For more information about managing Microsoft Purview role assignments, see Create and manage collections in the Microsoft Purview Data Map.

In addition, to easily search Microsoft Entra users or groups when creating or updating the subject of a policy, you can greatly benefit from getting the Directory Readers permission in Microsoft Entra ID. This is a common permission for users in an Azure tenant. Without the Directory Reader permission, the Policy Author will have to type the complete username or email for all the principals included in the subject of a data policy.

Delegate access provisioning responsibility to roles in Microsoft Purview

After a resource has been enabled for Data policy enforcement, any Microsoft Purview user with the Policy author role at the root collection level can provision access to that data source from Microsoft Purview.

If a Microsoft Purview account with published policies is deleted, such policies will stop being enforced within an amount of time that depends on the specific data source. This change can have implications on both security and data access availability. The Contributor and Owner roles in IAM can delete Microsoft Purview accounts. You can check these permissions by going to the Access control (IAM) section for your Microsoft Purview account and selecting Role Assignments. You can also use a lock to prevent the Microsoft Purview account from being deleted through Resource Manager locks.

Register the data sources in Microsoft Purview

The Azure SQL Database data source needs to be registered first with Microsoft Purview, before access policies can be created. You can follow these guides:

Register and scan Azure SQL Database.

After you've registered your resources, you'll need to enable Data policy enforcement. Data policy enforcement needs certain permissions and can affect the security of your data, as it delegates to certain Microsoft Purview roles the ability to manage access to data sources. Go through the secure practices related to Data policy enforcement in this guide: How to enable Data policy enforcement

Once your data source has the Data policy enforcement toggle Enabled, it looks like this screenshot. This enables the access policies to be used with the given data source.

Return to the Azure portal for Azure SQL Database to verify it's now governed by Microsoft Purview:

1. Sign in to the Azure portal through this link

2. Select the Azure SQL Server that you want to configure.

3. Go to Microsoft Entra ID on the left pane.

4. Scroll down to Microsoft Purview access policies.

5. Select the button to Check for Microsoft Purview Governance. Wait while the request is processed. It could take a few minutes.

   

6. Confirm that the Microsoft Purview Governance Status shows Governed. Note that it could take a few minutes after you enable Data policy enforcement in Microsoft Purview for the correct status to be reflected.

Create a new DevOps policy

Follow this link for the steps to create a new DevOps policy in Microsoft Purview.

List DevOps policies

Follow this link for the steps to list DevOps policies in Microsoft Purview.

Update a DevOps policy

Follow this link for the steps to update a DevOps policies in Microsoft Purview.

Delete a DevOps policy

Follow this link for the steps to delete a DevOps policies in Microsoft Purview.

Test the DevOps policy

See how to test the policy you created.

Role definition detail

See the mapping of DevOps role to data source actions.

Next steps

See related videos, blogs, and documents.