Identity & Access Management

Last update: October 05 2026Open in Markdown

Control panel

In Selectel, you can manage user access to the infrastructure. This is accomplished by using Identity and Access Management (IAM), which checks every request and ensures that only authorized users perform operations on resources.

User access permissions to resources are set at the level of user types and roles. Only the Account Owner or users with the iam_admin role can add users and edit their details and roles. To simplify user management, you can organize them into groups.

By default, two-factor authentication is enabled for all users after registering and completing their profile. With two-factor authentication, logging into an account requires entering a password and a one-time verification code. The verification code can be received via an authenticator app or by email specified in your profile. Only the Account Owner can disable two-factor authentication. We do not recommend disabling two-factor authentication to avoid risks associated with account compromise.

You can also configure authentication in the control panel using Single Sign-On (SSO) technology. To do this, use identity federations — a centralized service for managing the organizational structure, configuring integration with an employee directory, and controlling user access to company resources. When using a federation, user data is stored with your identity provider (such as Keycloak, ADFS, and other SAML-compatible providers).

By default, access to the control panel is allowed from any IP address. However, the Account Owner and a user with the iam.admin role can set restrictions — users will only be able to log in to the account from IP addresses and subnets that have been added to the allowlist.

If you need to share access to the control panel or resources with someone, do not share your credentials. The Account Owner and a user with the iam.admin role can create an additional user to access the control panel or a service user for programmatic access; for details, see the Access management in Selectel products instructions.

Cloud and dedicated servers

You can connect to cloud servers via the console in the control panel, and to dedicated servers via the KVM console. If you connect to the server via other CLIs, to ensure secure remote access to the infrastructure, connect to the server:

• via the SSH protocol — if you have a Linux server;
• or via the RDP protocol — if you have a Windows server.

Configure SSH connection

For secure connection to a cloud or dedicated Linux server, use SSH keys instead of a login and password. This is a key pair: a private key and a public key. The private key is stored on your local computer, and the public key is placed on the server. After configuring the SSH connection and disabling password access, only devices that store the private key will be able to connect to the server, and the server will be protected against brute-force attacks.

For each administrator, create an SSH key pair and place the public key on the cloud or dedicated server. When creating a key, specify a passphrase for additional protection.

After creating the SSH keys, create a user and configure the SSH connection — when creating a server using user data or for an existing server via the CLI. If you use servers with a public IP address, the most secure strategy is to configure security settings at the server creation stage using user data.

User data

You can specify user data for cloud and dedicated servers.

Example of creating a user and configuring SSH connection using user data for Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 64-bit.

#cloud-config
users:
- name: admin
    sudo: ['ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL']
    groups: sudo
    shell: /bin/bash
    lock_passwd: true
    ssh_authorized_keys:
    - <<public_ssh_key> admin@test
ssh_pwauth: false

package_update: true

packages:
- ufw

runcmd:
- sed -i 's/^#Port 22/Port 2222/' /etc/ssh/sshd_config
- sed -i 's/^#PasswordAuthentication yes/PasswordAuthentication no/' /etc/ssh/sshd_config
- sed -i 's/^PermitRootLogin prohibit-password/PermitRootLogin no/' /etc/ssh/sshd_config
- sed -i 's/^#PubkeyAuthentication yes/PubkeyAuthentication yes/' /etc/ssh/sshd_config
- systemctl restart ssh
- ufw allow 2222/tcp
- ufw --force enable
- reboot

Where:

• name: admin — creates the user admin;
• sudo: ['ALL=(ALL) NOPASSWD:ALL'] — allows the user to run commands via sudo without prompting for a password;
• groups: sudo — adds the user to the sudo group;
• lock_passwd: true — disables password login for the admin user;
• <public_ssh_key> admin@test in the ssh_authorized_keys section — adds the public SSH key that you created earlier. Starts with ssh-rsa.
• ssh_pwauth: false — disables password login for all users. Server access will be possible only via an SSH key, and password login will be completely disabled;
• package_update: true — updates the apt library;
• packages: ufw — installs the UFW (Uncomplicated Firewall) firewall, which is required to restrict access to the SSH port;
• commands with sed -i in the runcmd section — change the standard port 22 to 2222, disable password login and root login, and enable key-based authentication.

CLI

Configuration example for Linux OS with Uncomplicated Firewall (UFW) installed.

1. Open the CLI.

2. Create the admin user:

   sudo useradd -m -G sudo -s /bin/bash admin

3. Create a .ssh directory in the home directory of the created user and navigate to it:

   mkdir /home/admin/.ssh
   cd /home/admin/.ssh

4. Create the authorized_keys file:

   touch authorized_keys

5. Add the public SSH key to the authorized_keys file:

   echo <public_ssh_key> >> /home/admin/.ssh/authorized_keys

   Specify <public_ssh_key> — the public SSH key that you created earlier. Starts with ssh-rsa.

6. Configure access rights:

   chown admin:admin /home/admin/.ssh
   chown admin:admin /home/admin/.ssh/authorized_keys
   chmod 700 /home/admin/.ssh
   chmod 600 /home/admin/.ssh/authorized_keys

7. In the /etc/ssh/sshd_config file, configure the SSH connection and disable password access:

   vi /etc/ssh/sshd_config
   PasswordAuthentication no
   PubkeyAuthentication yes
   PermitRootLogin no
   Port 2222

   Where:

   • PasswordAuthentication no — disables password authentication;
   • PubkeyAuthentication yes — enables key authentication;
   • PermitRootLogin no — disables SSH access for the root user;
   • Port 2222 — changes the default SSH port 22 to port 2222.

8. Restart the SSH service for the changes to take effect:

   systemctl restart ssh

9. For the Uncomplicated Firewall (UFW), add a rule that allows using the new port for SSH connections:

   ufw allow 2222/tcp

10. Start the firewall, enable automatic firewall startup, and apply all rules — for example, for the UFW firewall:

    ufw --force enable

11. Restart the server.

Recommendations for using RDP connection

To securely connect via RDP to a cloud or dedicated server running Windows, do not use a public IP address. We recommend using a VPN to access such servers — for example, OpenVPN, WireGuard, or IKEv2/IPsec. To do this, place cloud and dedicated servers in private subnets accessible through a dedicated VPN gateway, or deploy a VPN gateway on the same server.

Use a separate account for each server administrator.

Additional security tools

To protect servers from unauthorized access, we recommend using additional security tools. Examples of free tools:

• Fail2Ban;
• Penalties in OpenSSH;
• CrowdSec.

Certified security features

To further protect servers and comply with regulatory requirements if necessary, you can use additional certified tools for protection against unauthorized access, provided as part of a separate service:

• Secret Net LSP (Linux);
• Secret Net Studio (Windows);
• Dallas Lock trusted boot tool.

Two-factor authentication

To protect your services from unauthorized access, we recommend using two-factor authentication for additional user identity verification. The service is provided in the form of licenses for using the Multifactor solution.

The Multifactor solution meets regulatory requirements:

• is included in the Unified Register of Russian Software (No. 7046);
• complies with the international PCI DSS standard;
• has an FSTEC certificate (No. 5039).

Managed Kubernetes

In a Managed Kubernetes cluster, you can manage access to virtual resources using the RBAC Authorization (RBAC) mechanism. RBAC allows you to assign user roles — create different namespaces for different applications and configure user access to pods in the corresponding namespace.

Managed Databases

In all DBMSs except Redis, you can manage database users and their privileges. Learn more about user management in the instructions for PostgreSQL, PostgreSQL for 1C, PostgreSQL TimescaleDB, PostgreSQL PGVector, MySQL semi-sync, MySQL sync, and Kafka.

For the Redis DBMS, one user is created automatically. The password for this user is set when creating the cluster; after the cluster is created, it can be changed.

S3

Access to S3 resources is regulated by:

• role model — determines access within an account and project;
• access policy — determines access within a bucket.

When an S3 action request is received, access is first checked against the role model. If the role model allows access, the access policy is checked; if not, access is denied. An access policy denies everything that is not explicitly allowed by the policy rules.

For access via the API or FTP, issue keys.

To access objects in a bucket using a custom domain over HTTPS, add a TLS (SSL) certificate. You can issue a certificate from any provider. You can manage certificates in the control panel or Object Storage API .