How to Integrate Azure AD with Other Services – An overview 

Organizations can provide secure access to their employees, partners, and customers by integrating Azure Active Directory with other services. A comprehensive set of capabilities is available with Azure AD, which provides cloud-based identity management and access control.

A number of benefits can be achieved by integrating Azure AD with other services, including:

1. Centralized identity management: Access to different services and applications can be easily managed by using Azure AD as a single source of truth for user identities.
2. Enhanced security: Advanced security features such as multi-factor authentication, conditional access, and identity protection, which can help protect against identity-based attacks are provided by Azure AD.
3. Increased productivity: Integrating Azure AD with other services reduces the need for additional logins and improves productivity by allowing users to use their existing Azure AD credentials to access these services.
4. Simplified administration: Integrating Azure Active Directory with other systems reduces the complexity of administering access to multiple resources from one dashboard.

Let us see how to integrate Azure AD with other serices like Office 365, Dynamics 365 and Azure.

1. Integrating Azure AD with Office 365  

Integrating Azure AD with Office 365 allows you to manage user accounts and access to Office 365 services such as Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, and Microsoft Teams. To integrate Azure AD with Office 365, navigate to the Office 365 service you want to integrate with and follow the instructions provided.  

1. Select “Enterprise applications” in the Azure Active Directory service.
2. Click on “New application” and choose “Office 365“.
3. Follow the prompts to add the Office 365 application to your Azure AD tenant.
4. In the “Properties” section of the Office 365 application page, set the “User assignment required” option to “Yes“.
5. In the “Users and groups” section, assign users or groups to the Office 365 application.
6. In the “Single sign-on” section, select “SAML” as the sign-on method.
7. Configure the SAML settings by entering the “Identifier” and “Reply URL” values for the Office 365 application.
8. Download the Azure AD signing certificate and upload it to the Office 365 admin center.
9. In the Office 365 admin center, configure the SSO settings by entering the “Issuer” and “Login URL” values from the Azure AD SAML settings.
10. Verify the SSO configuration by testing it with a user account that has been assigned to the Office 365 application.
11. Once the integration is successful, users will be able to sign in to Office 365. using their Azure AD credentials, and their access will be managed through Azure AD.

2. Integrating Azure AD with Dynamics 365  

Integrating Azure AD with Dynamics 365 allows you to manage user accounts and access to Dynamics 365 applications such as Dynamics 365 Sales and Dynamics 365 Customer Service. To integrate Azure AD with Dynamics 365, navigate to the Dynamics 365 service you want to integrate with and follow the instructions provided.  

1. From the Enterprise applications, click on “New application” and choose “Dynamics 365“.
2. Follow the prompts to add the Dynamics 365 application to your Azure AD tenant.
3. In the “Users and groups” section of the Dynamics 365 application page, assign users or groups to the application.
4. In the “Single sign-on” section, select “SAML” as the sign-on method.
5. Configure the SAML settings by entering the “Identifier” and “Reply URL” values for the Dynamics 365 application.
6. Download the Azure AD signing certificate and upload it to the Dynamics 365 admin center.
7. In the Dynamics 365 admin center, configure the SSO settings by entering the “Issuer” and “Login URL” values from the Azure AD SAML settings.
8. Configure Dynamics 365 to use Azure AD for authentication by selecting “Azure Active Directory” as the authentication provider in the Dynamics 365 admin center.
9. In the Azure AD application manifest for the Dynamics 365 application, set the “groupMembershipClaims” property to “SecurityGroup“.
10. Create security groups in Azure AD and assign them to the appropriate roles in Dynamics 365.
11. Test the SSO configuration by signing in to Dynamics 365 with a user account that has been assigned to the application and verifying that the correct security groups are assigned.
12. Once the integration is successful, users will be able to sign in to Dynamics 365 using their Azure AD credentials, and their access will be managed through Azure AD.

3. Integrating Azure AD with Azure  

Integrating Azure AD with Azure allows you to manage access to Azure resources and services. To integrate Azure AD with Azure, navigate to the Azure service you want to integrate with and follow the instructions provided.  

1. Select “App registrations” in the Azure Active Directory service.
2. Click on “New registration” and give a name to the application.
3. In the “Redirect URI” section, select “Web” and enter the URL of the application.
4. In the “API permissions” section, click on “Add a permission” and select “Microsoft Graph“.
5. Select the required permissions for the application and click on “Add permissions“.
6. Click on “Certificates & secrets” and generate a new client secret.
7. Note down the client ID, tenant ID, and client secret values for the application.
8. In the Azure portal, click on “Subscriptions” and select the subscription you want to integrate with Azure AD.
9. Click on “Access control (IAM)” and add a role assignment for the application.
10. In the “Add role assignment” dialog, select the role you want to assign and select the application as the assignee.
11. Click on “Azure Active Directory” in the left-hand menu.
12. Select “Enterprise applications” in the Azure Active Directory service.
13. Click on “New application” and choose “Azure“.
14. Follow the prompts to add the Azure application to your Azure AD tenant.
15. In the “Properties” section of the Azure application page, set the “User assignment required” option to “Yes“.
16. In the “Users and groups” section, assign users or groups to the Azure application.
17. In the “Single sign-on” section, select “SAML” as the sign-on method.
18. Configure the SAML settings by entering the “Identifier” and “Reply URL” values for the Azure application.
19. Download the Azure AD signing certificate and upload it to the Azure admin center.
20. In the Azure admin center, configure the SSO settings by entering the “Issuer” and “Login URL” values from the Azure AD SAML settings.
21. Verify the SSO configuration by testing it with a user account that has been assigned to the Azure application.
22. Once the integration is successful, users will be able to sign in to Azure using their Azure AD credentials, and their access will be managed through Azure AD.

Availability of Azure AD integrations allows organizations to choose the services that best suit their needs, including Microsoft and non-Microsoft offerings. During the integration process, the service is typically configured to use Azure AD to authenticate and authorize users, which can be done using protocols such as SAML, OAuth, and OpenID Connect.

Overall, Azure AD can contribute to improved security, reduced administration burdens, and improved user productivity when integrated with other services, making it one of the most essential components of a modern identity management strategy.