Ensure that between two and four global admins are designated

MediumLevel 1Manual reviewgoogle-workspace

Description

Having more than one Super Admin account is needed primarily so that a single point of failure can be avoided. Also, for larger organizations, having multiple Super Admins can be useful for workload balancing purposes. From a security point of view, having only a single Super Admin Account can be problematic if this user were unavailable for an extended period of time. Also, Super Admin accounts should never be shared amongst multiple users. From a security point of view, having a large number of Super Admin accounts is a bad practice. In general, all users should be assigned the least privileges needed to do their job. This includes Administrators since not everyone that needs to "Administer Something" needs to be a Super Admin. Google Workspaces provides many predefined Administration Roles and also allows the creation of Custom Roles with very granular permission selection.

How it is checked

Audit method: Manual review

This recommendation cannot be checked automatically. A scan lists it with these instructions when you pass --include-manual.

To verify this setting via the Google Admin Console: 1. Log in to https://admin.google.com as an administrator 2. Go to Directory and click on Users, this will show a list of all users 3. Click on + Add a filter, select Admin role, check the Super admin box, and then select Apply 4. The list of Users displayed will only be those with the Super Admin role 5. Make sure more than one (1) user is listed 6. Make sure no more than four (4) users are listed

How it is fixed

Fix method: Guidance or infrastructure patch

Create at least one additional account with a Super Admin role if there is only 1 Super Admin account. If more that 4 accounts with Super Admin access, reduce the number of accounts with a Super Admin role. NOTE: A new account should be created vs adding this role to an existing account since Administration tasks should be done through separate Admin accounts.

Properties

Operating systems: Any
Tags: google-workspacesaas
Reference: CIS Google Workspace Foundations Benchmark v1.4.0 - 1.1.1 Ensure that between two and four global admins are designated