10 Snowflake Roles Best Practices

Snowflake roles are an important part of the Snowflake security model. They provide a way to group users with similar privileges together and simplify the management of user permissions.

In this article, we will discuss 10 best practices for using Snowflake roles. We will cover topics such as role naming conventions, role hierarchy, and least privilege. Following these best practices will help you to better manage user permissions in Snowflake and improve the security of your data.

1. Use Roles to Control Access

By using roles, you can ensure that only the people who need access to certain data have that access. This is important for two reasons.

First, it helps to protect sensitive data. If only a small group of people have access to sensitive data, then it’s less likely that that data will be leaked. Second, it helps to prevent people from accidentally deleting or modifying data. If only a small group of people have access to data, then there are fewer chances that someone will accidentally delete or modify it.

To control access with roles, you’ll need to create a role and then grant permissions to that role. You can do this in the Snowflake UI or via SQL.

2. Create a Role for Each User or Group of Users

When you create a role, you’re essentially creating a new set of permissions that can be assigned to one or more users. By creating a role for each user or group of users, you can ensure that each user has only the permissions they need to do their job.

Not only does this make it easier to manage permissions, but it also helps to improve security. If a user only has the permissions they need, then they can’t accidentally or maliciously access data they shouldn’t have access to.

3. Assign the Least Privileges Necessary

If a user only needs to read data from a table, there’s no need to grant them privileges to write to that table. By granting users the least amount of privileges necessary, you can reduce the risk of accidental or malicious data modification, and limit the damage that can be done if a user’s credentials are compromised.

4. Don’t Grant Permissions Directly to Users

When you grant permissions directly to users, it’s difficult to track who has what permissions. This can lead to problems down the line when you need to revoke a permission from a user or add a new permission for a group of users.

Instead, create roles for each type of user in your system and grant those roles the appropriate permissions. For example, you might have a role for “administrators” that has full access to all data, a role for “managers” that has read-only access to some data, and a role for “users” that has read-only access to other data.

Not only does this make it easier to manage permissions, but it also makes it easier to understand who has access to what data.

5. Avoid Using Default Accounts and Roles

Default accounts and roles are created by Snowflake when a new user is registered. These defaults have very permissive privileges, which means that if they were to fall into the wrong hands, an attacker could easily gain access to sensitive data.

It’s important to create custom roles with more restrictive privileges for each user. This way, even if an attacker does gain access to a user’s account, they would only be able to perform actions that are allowed by the role.

Creating custom roles can be time-consuming, but it’s worth it for the added security. If you need help creating custom roles, Snowflake has a great guide that walks you through the process step-by-step.

6. Enable Logging on All Accounts, Warehouses, Databases, Schemas, and Tables

Enabling logging provides a complete audit trail of all activity within your account, which is essential for both security and compliance. It also allows you to troubleshoot issues more effectively and identify potential problems before they cause major disruptions.

Logging should be enabled at the account level so that all activity is captured, regardless of which warehouse, database, schema, or table it takes place in. You can then use the Snowflake UI to view logs for specific objects, or export them for further analysis.

7. Audit Your Security Configuration Periodically

When you have a lot of users and roles in your system, it can be difficult to keep track of who has access to what. By auditing your configuration regularly, you can ensure that only the people who need access to sensitive data have it, and that all other users are properly restricted.

To audit your snowflake role security configuration, you can use the Snowflake UI or the DESCRIBE ROLE command. The latter is particularly useful if you want to automate your audits.

8. Use Secure Views in Place of Tables

When a user is granted access to a table, they are given full control over that data. They can select, insert, update, and delete data as they please. However, when a user is granted access to a view, their permissions are much more restricted.

A view is essentially a saved query, so the user can only select data from it. They cannot insert, update, or delete data. This makes views much more secure than tables, and it’s why you should always use views in place of tables when possible.

9. Encrypt Sensitive Data with Customer-Managed Keys

When you use customer-managed keys, you are responsible for generating, storing, and managing the keys used to encrypt your data. This means that only you have access to the keys, which helps to ensure that your data is more secure.

Additionally, by encrypting your data with customer-managed keys, you can help to ensure that your data is compliant with regulations such as HIPAA and PCI DSS.

10. Protect Your Credentials

If your snowflake role’s credentials are compromised, then an attacker can use those credentials to access sensitive data and systems. They can also use the credentials to impersonate you and perform actions on your behalf, which could damage your reputation or cause other problems.

To protect your credentials, never store them in plain text. Use a password manager to generate and store strong passwords, and enable two-factor authentication (2FA) whenever possible.