Atlassian Guard authentication

If you currently subscribe to Atlassian Guard, you can use it as a method to log users into your Jira Align instance.

On this page:

• What is Atlassian Guard?
• Requirements
• Enable Atlassian Guard authentication
• Login experience
• Atlassian heartbeat check
• Find and set AAIDs

What is Atlassian Guard?

Atlassian Guard is a subscription service that enables visibility and security across all Atlassian accounts and products at your company. You can manage your users and enforce security policies from a single location. Atlassian Guard is compatible with your company’s SAML single sign-on (SSO) identity providers, and also offers a standalone two-factor authentication (2FA) solution.

You can set Atlassian Guard as your login method for all users, providing access to your Jira Align access with a common set of Atlassian account credentials or through your enterprise identity provider.

Requirements

To log into Jira Align using Atlassian Guard, the following is required:

• An Atlassian Guard Standard or Premium subscription
  • Atlassian Guard Standard is included free with an Atlassian Cloud Enterprise plan
• If you plan to manually enter Atlassian Account IDs (AAIDs), which is only required if you do not want to automatically connect Jira Align accounts with Atlassian Guard, you will need to locate your AAID prior to changing your authentication method. See find and set AAIDs for details.

Enable Atlassian Guard authentication

To set up your Jira Align instance to use Atlassian Guard for authentication:

1. Navigate to the Security tab inside platform settings.
2. In the Authentication method dropdown, select Atlassian Guard.
3. The Auto-populate Atlassian account ID (AAID) setting displays. To prevent account lockouts, we recommend keeping the default option of Yes.
   1. When set to Yes, Jira Align will automatically populate AAIDs into the External ID field of each user's profile in Jira Align on their first login. Note: Any previous entries in the field will be overwritten. You may have entered data into the External ID field to link accounts with a SAML single sign-on (SSO) provider.
   2. If you would like to change this setting to No, locate each user’s AAID, and enter it into the External ID field of their Jira Align profile.
      Important! Enter your AAID into your user profile before changing this setting. Users who do not have a valid AAID present in their profile will be locked out of Jira Align.
4. Select the Save Settings button.

Login experience

Once Atlassian Guard is enabled, users accessing your Jira Align instance will be redirected to id.atlassian.com.

If your Atlassian Guard subscription is connected to an identity provider (IdP), users will be redirected to your IdP login screen when their email address is recognized.

The first time a user authenticates with Atlassian Guard, their account will be matched between Atlassian Guard and Jira Align using the email address specified in their Jira Align user profile. The Atlassian account ID (AAID) will be automatically entered into the user’s External ID field, creating the link between Jira Align and Atlassian Guard.

Atlassian heartbeat check

Atlassian Guard uses a heartbeat service to monitor active logins to Atlassian products. If a user logs out of an Atlassian product such as Jira, they will also be logged out of Jira Align.

Find and set AAIDs

Jira Align will automatically set Atlassian Account IDs (AAIDs) for each user once the Atlassian Guard authentication method is enabled, as long as you keep the default setting of Yes in the Auto-populate Atlassian account ID (AAID) security setting.

We recommend that users have matching email addresses in Jira Align and Atlassian Guard to enable the auto-population of AAIDs. If there is a mismatch, that user will not be able to log in until you manually set the AAID in Jira Align.

If you need to manually set Atlassian Account IDs (AAIDs) for Jira Align users, perform the following steps:

Find and set your AAID

1. Log into an Atlassian product connected to Atlassian Guard, such as Jira.
2. Select your user profile image in the upper-right corner, and then select Profile.
3. Copy the 24-digit ID from the Atlassian Account ID field.
4. Log into Jira Align and navigate to Admin > People.
5. Locate your user profile and select your UID to open the Edit User slide-out panel.
6. Enter the copied AAID into the External ID field.
7. Select Save & Close.

Find and set another user’s AAID

1. Log into admin.atlassian.com
2. Select Directory at the top of the page.
3. Select Managed accounts from the sidebar.
4. Search for the user, then select their name.
5. Copy the 24-digit ID that displays after users/ from the the URL in your browser.
   Example: admin.atlassian.com/o/[organization id numbering]/users/90ed71859a21bd0071b67afb
6. Log into Jira Align and navigate to Admin > People.
7. Locate the user's profile and select their UID to open the Edit User slide-out panel.
8. Enter the copied AAID into the External ID field.
9. Select Save & Close.