Use external authentication providers with user groups

You can use external authentication providers, such as ADFS, AzureAD, and social media authentication providers, such as Google and Facebook, to authenticate users belonging to user groups.
For more information, see Configure external identity providers.

When using external authentication providers, Sitefinity CMS receives account properties, such as the email, from the external provider and creates a corresponding Sitefinity CMS user account, using these properties.

This process enables you to select the roles that Sitefinity CMS automatically assigns to every user account from an external provider. This way, you automate the mapping between users from an external authentication provider and Sitefinity CMS roles. For example, you may assign all users, authenticated via AzureAD, to the BackendUsers role and all users, authenticated via social login, to the Users role.

To do this, perform the following:

1. Open the Sitefinity CMS backend
2. Navigate to Settings » Advanced » Authentication » SecurityTokenService » AuthenticationProvider » <name of your provider>
3. In the Auto assigned roles input field, enter the names of existing roles.

If you do not create this automatic mapping, you will need to manually assign a role to every account, after your visitors have logged in, using an external account provider.

You can also select the authentication providers, which Sitefinity CMS uses, for every user account that is coming from an external provider. This way, you automate the mapping between users from an external authentication provider and Sitefinity CMS data providers, thus assigning these accounts to the sites that use the specified data providers.

To do this, perform the following:

1. Open the Sitefinity CMS backend
2. Navigate to Settings » Advanced » Authentication » SecurityTokenService » AuthenticationProvider » <name of your provider>
3. In the Data provider input field, enter the names of existing authentication providers.