--- title: Roles or Active Directory group management? description: It's an age old question, do you want to go with roles or Active Directory group management?  The answer is, why do you have to choose?  Do both. image: https://blog.empowerid.com/hs-fs/file-18502387-jpg/images/roles_or_active_directory_group_management.jpg --- [![empowerID-logo](https://blog.empowerid.com/hubfs/empowerID-logo.svg "empowerID-logo")](http://www.empowerid.com) **![phone](https://blog.empowerid.com/hubfs/images/phone.svg)   1-877-996-4276   **or**  +1 (614) 652-6825** [![Share on facebook](https://7528309.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hub/7528309/hubfs/raw_assets/public/mV0_d-web-default-modules_hubspot/img/facebook-color.png?width=24&name=facebook-color.png) ](https://www.facebook.com/220903377569) [![Share on linkedin](https://7528302.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hub/7528302/hubfs/raw_assets/public/mV0_d-web-default-modules_hubspot/img/linkedin-color.png?width=24&name=linkedin-color.png) ](https://www.linkedin.com/company/85780) [![Share on twitter](https://7528304.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hub/7528304/hubfs/raw_assets/public/mV0_d-web-default-modules_hubspot/img/twitter-color.png?width=24&name=twitter-color.png) ](https://twitter.com/EmpowerID) [![Share on pinterest](https://7528311.fs1.hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hub/7528311/hubfs/raw_assets/public/mV0_d-web-default-modules_hubspot/img/pinterest-color.png?width=24&name=pinterest-color.png) ](http://www.youtube.com/user/empowerID) # All-In-One Identity Management and Cloud Security Emerging technologies are challenging old paradigms and unveiling new ways of approaching the security discipline that enables the right individuals to access the right resources at the right times for the right reasons. EmpowerID has embedded innovative technologies in every aspect, providing flexible and mature IAM capabilities in the cloud, on premise and in hybrid environments, addressing the mission-critical need across increasingly heterogeneous technology environments, and meeting increasingly rigorous compliance requirements. # Roles or Active Directory group management? Posted by [Edward Killeen](https://blog.empowerid.com/blog-1/author/edward-killeen) on Thu, Jun 07, 2012 - [Tweet](https://twitter.com/share) ![roles or active directory group management](https://blog.empowerid.com/hs-fs/file-18502387-jpg/images/roles_or_active_directory_group_management.jpg)It's an age old question, do you want to go with roles or Active Directory group management?  The answer is, why do you have to choose?  Do both.  Roles and groups. Let me explain. Windows uses security groups, there is no getting around that.  You have probably accumulated a ton of these groups over the years (and that's a problem in and of itself, *ahem*, token bloat).  But, the best part is that roles and Active Directory groups can co-exist and even complement each other. Roles, and especially dynamic roles, are invaluable.  They exist outside of AD so they can be applied to enterprise authorization for any system, they can be applied to file share permissions, they can be applied to any flavor of LDAP directory or even databases.  They can even determine [who can do what to AD groups](http://www.empowerid.com/learningcenter/technologies/rbar). And here's the kicker, you can make a role equal an Active Directory group.  So if you have one specific group that you know is updated (or if you [manage that group dynamically](http://www.empowerid.com/products/groupmanager)) and you want to assign rights and permissions outside of the Microsoft ecosystem, make the membersip of that role an AD group in your RBAC powered metadirectory and you suddenly have an Active Directory group granting permissions everywhere! This is especially useful if you have invested heavily in Active Directory group management in the past and want to leverage all of that hard work. Contact us for a demonstration of [how to make roles and AD groups live peacefully](https://blog.empowerid.com/scheduledemo/) together. 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EmpowerID © 2021 EmpowerID ```json { "@context" : "https://schema.org", "@type" : "BlogPosting", "author" : { "@type" : "Person", "name" : "Edward Killeen", "url" : "https://blog.empowerid.com/blog-1/author/edward-killeen" }, "datePublished" : "2012-06-07T16:26:00.000Z", "headline" : "Roles or Active Directory group management?", "image" : [ "https://blog.empowerid.com/hs-fs/file-18502387-jpg/images/roles_or_active_directory_group_management.jpg" ], "mainEntityOfPage" : { "@id" : "https://blog.empowerid.com/blog-1/bid/164357/Roles-or-Active-Directory-group-management", "@type" : "WebPage" }, "publisher" : { "@type" : "Organization", "logo" : { "@type" : "ImageObject", "url" : "https://blog.empowerid.com/hubfs/Asset%201.svg" }, "name" : "EmpowerID" } } ```