Microsoft Entra ID authentication (P2S)

In the Ultra Transcenders books

AZ-700SC-500

Each book explains Microsoft Entra ID authentication (P2S) in context, with comparison tables and the common traps.

Terms in this definition

• Authentication

  Checking an identity claim made by a person, device or app, for instance by asking for a password plus an extra factor. Authorisation only happens once this step has succeeded.

• Point-to-site VPN

  Connection type in which single client machines, rather than whole sites, tunnel into an Azure virtual network gateway. App Service gateway-required VNet integration relies on it too.

• Microsoft Entra ID

  Cloud identity service from Microsoft, previously named Azure AD, which provides the tenant behind Microsoft 365 and Azure.

• Conditional Access

  Policy engine in Microsoft Entra ID P1 that, depending on signals such as risk or named locations, allows access subject to controls like MFA or a compliant device, or blocks it.

• MFA

  Multifactor authentication: asking for another factor on top of a password at sign-in, usually required by a Conditional Access grant control.

• APPLY

  Evaluates a table-valued expression for every row on its left, inside FROM. Think of OUTER APPLY as a left outer join and CROSS APPLY as an inner join.

• Azure VPN Client

  Microsoft's VPN app for Windows 11 and macOS, needed for point-to-site connections that authenticate with Entra ID; you set it up by importing the azurevpnconfig.xml file from the profile package.

• OpenVPN

  Only this point-to-site tunnel type can use Microsoft Entra ID authentication. It is TLS-based, runs on TCP 443 and has clients for Android, iOS, Linux, macOS and Windows.