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How to Synchronize users Active Directory/Azure Active Directory Photo using Microsoft Identity Manager

Introduction

Whilst Microsoft FIM/MIM can be used to do pretty much anything your requirements dictate, dealing with object types other than text and references can be a little tricky when manipulating them the first time. User Profile Photos fall into that category as they are stored in the directory as binary objects. Throw in Azure AD and obtaining and synchronizing photos can seem like adding a double back-flip to the scenario.

This post is Part 1 of a two-part post. Part two is here. This is essentially the introduction to the how-to piece before extending the solution past a users Active Directory Profile Photo to their Office 365 Profile Photo. Underneath the synchronization and method for dealing with the binary image data is the same, but the API’s and methods used are different when you are looking to implement the solution for any scale.

As for why you would want to do this, refer to Part two here. It details why you may want to do this.

Overview

As always I’m using my favourite PowerShell Management Agent (the Granfeldt PSMA). I’ve updated an existing Management Agent I had for Azure AD that is described here. I highly recommend you use that as the basis for the extra photo functionality that I describe in this post. Keep in mind the AzureADPreview, now AzureAD Powershell Module has change the ADAL Helper Libraries. I detail the changes here so you can get AuthN to work with the new libraries.

Therefore the changes to my previous Azure AD PowerShell MA are to add two additional attributes to the Schema script, and include the logic to import users profile photo (if they have one) in the Import script.

Schema.ps1

Take the schema.ps1 from my Azure AD PSMA here and add the following two lines to the bottom (before the $obj in the last line where I’ve left an empty line (29)).

$obj | Add-Member -Type NoteProperty -Name "AADPhoto|Binary" -Value 0x20 
$obj | Add-Member -Type NoteProperty -Name "AADPhotoChecksum|String" -Value "23973abc382373"

The AADPhoto attribute of type Binary is where we will store the photo. The AADPhotoChecksum attribute of type String is where we will store a checksum of the photo for use in logic if we need to determine if images have changed easily during imports.

 

Import.ps1

Take the import.ps1 from my Azure AD PSMA here and make the following additions;

  • On your MIM Sync Server download/install the Pscx PowerShell Module.
    • The Pscx Powershell Module is required for Get-Hash (to calculate Image checksum) based on variables vs a file on the local disk
    • You can get the module from the Gallery using Install-Module Pscx -Force
    • Add these two lines up the top of the import.ps1 script. Around line 26 is a good spot
# Powershell Module required for Get-Hash (to calculate Image checksum)
Import-Module Pscx
  • Add the following lines into the Import.ps1 in the section where we are creating the object to pass to the MA. After the $obj.Add(“AADCity”,$user.city) line is a good spot. 
  • What the script below does is create a WebClient rather than use Invoke-RestMethod or Invoke-WebRequest to get the users Azure AD Profile image only if the ‘thumbnailPhoto@odata.mediaContentType’ attribute exists which indicates the user has a profile photo. I’m using the WebClient over the PowerShell Invoke-RestMethod or Invoke-WebRequest functions so that the returned object is in binary format (rather than being returned as a string), which saves having to convert it to binary or output to a file and read it back in. The WebClient is also faster for transferring images/data.
  • Once the image has been returned (line 8 below) the image is added to the object as the attribute AADPhoto to be passed to the MA (line 11)
  • Line 14 gets the checksum for the image and adds that to the AADPhotoChecksum attribute in line 16.

Other changes

Now that you’ve updated the Schema and Import scripts, you will need to;

  • Refresh your schema on your Azure AD PSMA to get the new attributes (AADPhoto and AADPhotoChecksum) added
  • Select the two new attributes in the Attributes section of your Azure AD PSMA
  • Create in your MetaVerse via the MetaVerse Designer two new attributes on the person (or whatever ObjectType you are using for users), for AADPhoto and AADPhotoChecksum. Make sure that AADPhoto is of type Binary and AADPhotoChecksum is of type string.

  • Configure your Attribute Flow on your Azure AD PSMA to import the AADPhoto and AADPhotoChecksum attributes into the Metaverse. Once done and you’ve performed an Import and Sync you will have Azure AD Photos in your MV.

  • How do you know they are correct ? Let’s extract one from the MV, write it to a file and have a look at it. This small script using the Lithnet MIIS Automation PowerShell Module makes it easy. First I get my user object from the MV. I then have a look at the text string version of the image (to make sure it is there), then output the binary version to a file in the C:\Temp directory.
$me = Get-MVObject -ObjectType person -Attribute accountName -Value "drobinson"
[string]$myphoto = $me.Attributes.AADPhoto.Values.ValueString
[System.Io.File]::WriteAllBytes("c:\temp\UserPhoto.jpg" ,$me.Attributes.AADPhoto.Values.ValueBinary )
  • Sure enough. The image is valid.

Conclusion

Photos are still just bits of data. Once you know how to get them and manipulate them you can do what ever you need to with them. See Part two that takes this concept and extends it to Office 365.

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Adapting to the changes in the AzureAD Preview PowerShell Module ADAL Helper Library

I’m a big proponent of using PowerShell for integration and automation of Azure Active Directory Services using the Azure AD GraphAPI. You may have seen many of my posts leverage the evolving Azure AD Preview PowerShell Module helper libraries. Lines in my scripts that use this look like the one below. In this case using preview version 2.0.0.52.

# the default path to where the ADAL GraphAPI PS Module puts the Libs
Add-Type -Path 'C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\AzureADPreview\2.0.0.52\Microsoft.IdentityModel.Clients.ActiveDirectory.dll'

The benefit of using this library is the simplification of Authentication to AzureAD, from which we can then receive a token and interact with the GraphAPI via PowerShell using Invoke-RestMethod.

Earlier this week it was bought to my attention that implementation of some of my scripts were failing when using the latest v2 releases of the AzureAD PowerShell Module (v2.0.0.98).  Looking into it the last version I had working is v2.0.0.52. v2.0.0.55 doesn’t work with my scripts either.  So anything after v2.0.0.52 the following will not work

What’s Changed?

First up the PowerShell Module has been renamed. It is no longer AzureADPreview, it is just AzureAD. So the path it gets installed into (depending on the version you have) is now;

'C:\Program Files\WindowsPowerShell\Modules\AzureAD\2.0.0.98\Microsoft.IdentityModel.Clients.ActiveDirectory.dll'

Looking into the updated PowerShell Module there has been a change to the Microsoft.IdentityModel.Clients.ActiveDirectory.dll library.

A number of the methods in the library have changed. I believe this is part of Microsoft transitioning the endpoint to use GraphAPI. With that understanding I approached using PowerShell to integrate with the GraphAPI more akin to the way I do when not using the helper library.

User PowerShell and the ADAL Helper Library to connect to AzureAD via the GraphAPI

Here is the updated script to connect (and retrieve a batch of users). You will need to update lines 4, 17 & 18 for your Tenant name and the username and password (non-MFA enabled) you will be connecting with.

 

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Joining Identities between Active Directory and Azure Active Directory using Microsoft Identity Manager

Introduction

One of the foundations of Identity Management is the ability to join an identity between disparate connected systems. As we extend our management of identities into cloud services this adds a few twists.

A key concept is to use an anchor that is persistent. Something that doesn’t change through a users life-cycle. A user’s Security IDentifier (SID) in Active Directory is perfect. It doesn’t change when a user or group may get renamed.  What gets interesting is how the SID is represented when returned using different methods. That is what I quickly cover in this post.

Overview

The defacto method for connecting your OnPremise Active Directory to Azure Active Directory is to use Azure Active Directory Connect. AADC will synchronise users and groups SID’s to the corresponding object in AAD into the onPremisesSecurityIdentifier attribute. 

When the onPremisesSecurityIdentifier  attribute is retrieved via the GraphAPI the format looks like this: S-1-5-21-3878594291-2115959936-132693609-65242

Using an Active Directory Management Agent for FIM/MIM and synchronizing the objectSID from the OnPremise AD represents the value in the Metaverse in binary format which when viewed as text looks like this:  15000005210002431664623112825230126105190232781820

Translating SID formats so we can join identities

What we need to do is translate the string representation of the SID returned from the GraphAPI and AzureAD so that we have it in a binary format. Then we can then use those attributes in join rules to match users/groups between AzureAD and our OnPremise Active Directory.

Overview-1

 

In my environments I’m using the out of the box FIM/MIM Active Directory Management Agent. For Azure AD/Office 365 I’m using the Granfeldt PowerShell Management Agent to integrate with Azure AD via the GraphAPI.

On my AzureAD PowerShell Management Agent I have an attribute named AADonPremiseSID configured with the format as Binary in my PSMA Schema.ps1 as shown below.

$obj | Add-Member -Type NoteProperty -Name "AADonPremiseSID|Binary" -Value 0x10

On my Azure AD PSMA I have the following lines in my Import.ps1 which essentially takes the value retrieved from the GraphAPI S-1-5-21-3878594291-2115959936-132693609-65242 and converts it to a binary array that in text looks something like 15000005210002431664623112825230126105190232721825400 and stores it in the AADonPremiseSID binary attribute in the connector space.

# Create SID .NET object using SID string from AAD S-1-500-........ 
$sid = New-Object system.Security.Principal.SecurityIdentifier $user.onPremisesSecurityIdentifier
 
#Create a byte array for the length of the users SID
$BinarySid = new-object byte[]($sid.BinaryLength)

#Copy the binary SID into the byte array, starting at index 0
$sid.GetBinaryForm($BinarySid, 0)

#Add the SID to the user in the connector space
$obj.Add("AADonPremiseSID",$BinarySid)

This then lets me join my users (and groups using the same method) between AD and AAD.  Essentially a line to put it into Security Identifier format, two lines to convert it to a binary array and a line to store it in the connector space. Simple when you don’t over think it.

I’m posting this because I know I’m going to need to do this often. Hope it helps someone else too.

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How to create a PowerShell FIM/MIM Management Agent for AzureAD Groups using Differential Sync and Paged Imports

Introduction

I’ve been working on a project where I must have visibility of a large number of Azure AD Groups into Microsoft Identity Manager.

In order to make this efficient I need to use the Differential Query function of the AzureAD Graph API. I’ve detailed that before in this post How to create an AzureAD Microsoft Identity Manager Management Agent using the MS GraphAPI and Differential Queries. Due to the number of groups and the number of members in the Azure AD Groups I needed to implement Paged Imports on my favourite PowerShell Management Agent (Granfeldt PowerShell MA). I’ve previously detailed that before too here How to configure Paged Imports on the Granfeldt FIM/MIM PowerShell Management Agent.

This post details using these concepts together specifically for AzureAD Groups.

Pre-Requisites

Read the two posts linked to above. They will detail Differential Queries and Paged Imports. My solution also utilises another of my favourite PowerShell Modules. The Lithnet MIIS Automation PowerShell Module. Download and install that on the MIM Sync Server where you be creating the MA.

Configuration

Now that you’re up to speed, all you need to do is create your Granfeldt PowerShell Management Agent. That’s also covered in the post linked above  How to create an AzureAD Microsoft Identity Manager Management Agent using the MS GraphAPI and Differential Queries.

What you need is the Schema and Import PowerShell Scripts. Here they are.

Schema.ps1

Two object classes on the MA as we need to have users that are members of the groups on the same MA as membership is a reference attribute. When you bring through the Groups into the MetaVerse and assuming you have an Azure AD Users MA using the same anchor attribute then you’ll get the reference link for the members and their full object details.

Import.ps1

Here is my PSMA Import.ps1 that performs what is described in the overview. Enumerate AzureAD for Groups, import the active ones along with group membership.

Summary

This is one solution for managing a large number of Azure AD Groups with large memberships via a PS MA with paged imports showing progress thanks to differential sync which then allows for subsequent quick delta-sync run profiles.

I’m sure this will help someone else. Enjoy.

Follow Darren on Twitter @darrenjrobinson