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Access profiles ensure only users in designated groups can request access to particular roles. This prevents unauthorized access requests and maintains security boundaries across your applications.

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Understanding Access Profiles

Access profiles answer the question: “Who is allowed to request this role?” They work by mapping Serval groups to roles. When a user requests access, Serval checks whether they belong to a group that’s allowed to request that role.
Example: You can create an “Engineering” profile that only allows members of your engineering teams to request access to production databases.
Configure the following settings to define which users can request specific roles:

Name

The user group identifier from Serval. Must match existing Serval group naming conventions.

Description

Optional context about the profile’s purpose, target user population, or usage guidelines.

Associated Groups

Additional Serval groups included in this access profile. Use this to combine multiple groups under a single access policy.

Associated Roles

IdP groups linked to this profile. These determine which roles become requestable for users matching this profile.

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Profile Configurable in the Application

Build access profile

Configure access profile settings

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Create an Access Profile

1

Name the profile

Name: The user group identifier from Serval. Must match existing Serval group naming conventions.Description: Optional context about the profile’s purpose, target user population, or usage guidelines.
2

Add associated groups

Associated Groups: Additional Serval groups included in this access profile. Use this to combine multiple groups under a single access policy.
For example, combine “Engineering-Frontend” and “Engineering-Backend” groups into a single “Engineering” profile.
3

Link IdP groups

Associated Roles: IdP groups linked to this profile. These determine which roles become requestable for users matching this profile.
4

Save the profile

Click “Save profile” to make it available for role configuration

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Manage Access Profiles

Once created, access profiles can be managed centrally and applied to multiple roles across your organization. To access profile management, navigate to the relevant team, click the ”…” button, then select “Access Profiles.”

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What You Can Do

Choose a default profile that applies to new roles automatically. This is typically your broadest user group (e.g., “All Employees”).
Modify profile settings. Changes apply to all roles using that profile, making it easy to update access permissions organization-wide.
See which roles currently use each profile. This helps you understand the impact before making changes.
Add or remove roles that the profile should apply to. Reuse profiles across similar access patterns for consistency.
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Manage access profiles

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Profile Examples

All Employees

Groups: company-all-employees
Purpose: Standard company-wide applications like Slack, Google WorkspaceUse for: Access that every employee should be able to request

Engineering

Groups: eng-frontend, eng-backend, eng-infrastructure
Purpose: Engineering tools and production accessUse for: Developer tools, code repositories, staging environments

Finance Team

Groups: finance-accounting, finance-payroll
Purpose: Financial systems and sensitive dataUse for: Accounting software, payment processors, financial dashboards

Contractors

Groups: contractor-engineering, contractor-design
Purpose: Limited access for external workersUse for: Non-sensitive tools and resources appropriate for contractors

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Best Practices

Map to org structure

Create profiles that mirror your actual organizational structure. This makes it intuitive for admins to assign the right profiles.

Use broad profiles for common access

Create an “All Employees” profile for widely-used applications. This reduces administrative overhead.

Combine groups thoughtfully

Group teams with similar access needs together. For example, all engineering groups can share an “Engineering” profile.

Document profile purposes

Write clear descriptions so admins understand when to use each profile when configuring new roles.