Is there any way to mount Azure Files on macos using AD authentication?

Michał Kwiatek 20

Hello, at my company we're considering using Azure Files to share files but I have a question about authentication - is there any possiility to use AD authentication for mounting Azure Files on MacOS? Or any authentication that would restrict access for specific users on MacOS? In the documentation there's only info about mounting the file share with account password and username

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Sumarigo-MSFT 44,996 Reputation points Microsoft Employee

2023-11-20T08:41:52.62+00:00
@Michał Kwiatek

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Currently for AD Authorization for Azure Files we support Windows/Linux only at this time. Overview - On-premises AD DS authentication to Azure file shares | Microsoft Learn

Only supported on Windows clients running OS versions Windows 8/Windows Server 2012 or newer, or Linux VMs (Ubuntu 18.04+ or an equivalent RHEL or SLES VM) running on Azure.

You can however use storage account and key to map to Azure files, it’s just AD Auth is not currently supported.
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ekpathak 20 Reputation points Microsoft Employee

2023-10-19T11:56:39.6266667+00:00

Hello Michał Kwiatek,

Welcome to Microsoft Q&A and Thank you for posting your query here!

I believe you have already gone through below document:

https://video2.skills-academy.com/en-us/azure/storage/files/storage-how-to-use-files-mac

To mount Azure Files on macOS using AD authentication, you can follow the steps outlined in the Enable AD DS authentication for Azure file shares documentation. This documentation provides detailed instructions on how to enable Active Directory Domain Services authentication over SMB for Azure file shares, allowing your domain-joined macOS machines to access Azure file shares using AD DS credentials.

Please note that the documentation includes PowerShell scripts and manual steps to perform the enablement actions. It is recommended to review the documentation thoroughly and follow the steps accordingly.

Please let us know if you have any further queries. I’m happy to assist you further.

Kindly do not forget to "Accept the answer” and “up-vote” wherever the information provided helps you, this can be beneficial to other community members.

-Ekta
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Michał Kwiatek 20 Reputation points

2023-10-23T19:22:01.3433333+00:00

Hello, thank you very much for your response! But I'm still not clear about some things:
Because here: https://video2.skills-academy.com/en-us/azure/storage/files/storage-files-identity-auth-active-directory-enable

it says: "Only supported on Windows clients running OS versions Windows 8/Windows Server 2012 or newer, or Linux VMs (Ubuntu 18.04+ or an equivalent RHEL or SLES VM) running on Azure."

also in the mounting on macOS guide (https://video2.skills-academy.com/en-us/azure/storage/files/storage-how-to-use-files-mac) it only talks about using the storate keys to authenticate. How can you pass the windows credentials on an end user's macOS laptop?

Also: does this authentication work on macOS on end user's machines or only on VMs running macOS?

ekpathak 20 Reputation points Microsoft Employee

2023-10-30T14:09:07.7933333+00:00

Apologies for the delay in response.
I am checking on this and I will get back to you by tomorrow.

Really appreciate your patience.

Michał Kwiatek 20 Reputation points

2023-11-03T08:41:31.2466667+00:00

hello, maybe I could give some more detail to the question and it's going to make it easier:

We want to share files (they HAVE TO mount the file share, using any other way to access the files doesn't work for us) among:

our employees working on MacOS

our employees working on Windows

our Node.js backend working on a VM

As it could be ok, for our backend to authenticate with storage credentials, we'd like to avoid giving the storage credentials to all our employees. That's why we consider other ways for authentication.

For authenticating it would also be great for the employees to have different permissions: one user would have a possibility to access and change files in one folder, and another would not.

Our employees also work a lot from home - meaning they would be not on our network. They could use some VPN (I'm not sure if it's relevant).

As far as I've read it's possible to authenticate to the mounted storage from windows but the documentation of mounting a file share on MacOS talks only about authenticating with storage credentials. Are other ways of authentication possible while mounting the file share on MacOS?

If so, how do you provide these credentials while mounting the file share? Do the users have to be in our network or can use another (or maybe some VPN)? Best for us would be if they would provide their own credentials and authenticate like this.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Sumarigo-MSFT 44,996 Reputation points Microsoft Employee

2023-11-06T06:06:11.9266667+00:00

@Michał Kwiatek I wish to engage with you offline for a closer look and provide a quick and specialized assistance, please send an email with subject line “Attn:subm” to AzCommunity[at]Microsoft[dot]com referencing this thread and the Azure subscription ID, I will follow-up with you. Once again, apologies for any inconvenience with this issue.
Thanks for your patience and co-operation.

Michał Kwiatek 20 Reputation points

2023-11-06T13:39:14.5666667+00:00

Thank you! I'll email you then

Abdelilah AIT BENDRA 20 Reputation points

2024-03-31T22:55:08.4533333+00:00

Hi,

were you able to perform mounting azure file share on Mac using AD authentication ?

if yes can you share the steps?
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Is there any way to mount Azure Files on macos using AD authentication?

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