How does authentication for JSD Cloud customers work?

[Philip Armour]

I wonder if anyone can help me understand the rules which JSD Cloud uses for customer authentication?

In some cases the credentials for a given customer (assuming they are not also a licensed user on the Cloud site) seem to be stored in the JSD instance.

For example, customers who self sign-up, provide credentials which are then specific to the site.

In other cases customers can use their Google account or other IDp to authenticate.

It would be great to understand how this works. Thanks in advance!

[Angélica Luz · Accepted solution]

Hello Philip,

Thank you for reaching out to Atlassian Community!

When we add a customer or they create their own accounts on the site, it won't create an Atlassian account, that's why they can just use the email and password instead of Login with Google or SSO if using SAML.

Customers' accounts are indeed stored locally and specific for their site, different from internal users that have Atlassian account that can be used on any Atlassian product.

If a customer has an Atlassian account or is an internal user without application access (not a licensed user), they will have the option below:

It means that they can log in on xxxxx.atlassian.net instead of xxxxx.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portals, but once they log in, since they don't have a license, they will be redirected to the portal.

Hope this helps and if you have any other questions, please let us know.

Regards,
Angélica

[Philip Armour]

Thanks Angélica,

that is really helpful!!

Can we distill what you have described down to:

1. if a customer email is not associated with an Atlassian account, then the credentials are stored locally on the site
2. if the customer email is associated with an Atlassian account, or a claimed domain via Atlassian Access, then they have the option to authenticate via Atlassian/SSO

Please correct me if the above is not quite correct. Does 2 also hold if someone initially creates site specific credentials and later gets an Atlassian account?

Thanks again,

Philip

[Angélica Luz]

I'm happy to help, Philip.

Everything you said is correct.

Also, if someone is created as a customer and then they are migrated to an Atlassian account, they will log in as an internal user and not as a customer anymore.

[Philip Armour]

Hi @Angélica Luz ,

quick follow-up question please. I am interested in how Atlassian Access is licensed, especially when talking about JSD customers who are not licensed in JIRA.

For example if I have 100 licensed JIRA users with email domain @foobar and 1000 unlicensed JSD customers with the same email domain...

Assuming the cutsomers can be authenticated using Atlassian Access (as discussed above)...

do I need to buy the Atlassian Access subscription for 100 users or 1100 users?

Many thanks in advance,

Philip

[Boris Berenberg - Atlas Authority]

1100 if you do a domain claim.

[Philip Armour]

Hi @Boris Berenberg - Atlas Authority , thanks for replying.

I thought you always need to claim a domain with Atlassian Access.

If what you write is true, it will be a disappointment to customers who enjoy the fact that you can otherwise have unlimited customers for free in JSD.

[Boris Berenberg - Atlas Authority]

You're right, I got mixed up. I also went ahead and verified the config on our end and got:

[Philip Armour]

Actually I found the answer on: https://www.atlassian.com/software/access/pricing

"For Jira Service Desk, you are only charged for the unique agents licensed on the product. Users who only create requests via the Jira Service Desk portal aren't licensed, so you will not be charged for them. "