Manage Kubernetes users and roles

Reviewed on October 2, 2026 · View on GitHub

The managed Kubernetes service uses RBAC (Role-Based Access Control) to manage the permissions of a cluster Kubernetes. This page explains how to create and manage users, roles and permissions.

note

The Numspot API provides a kubeconfig with administrator rights. Fine-grained permission management is performed through Kubernetes manifests.

Connect to the Kubernetes cluster

Before creating users or roles, connect to your cluster:

export KUBECONFIG=~/chemin/vers/kubeconfig
kubectl get nodes

To download the kubeconfig, see Download the kubeconfig.

RBAC concepts

RBAC components

Component	Scope	Description
Role	Namespace	Permissions within a namespace
ClusterRole	Cluster	Permissions across the whole cluster
RoleBinding	Namespace	Binds a Role to a user/group
ClusterRoleBinding	Cluster	Binds a ClusterRole to a user/group

Users and groups

Kubernetes distinguishes:

• Users: human accounts (external management);
• ServiceAccounts: accounts for applications;
• Groups: collections of users.

Create a Role

A Role defines permissions within a namespace.

Basic syntax

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: Role
metadata:
  name: <role_name>
  namespace: <namespace>
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["pods"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]

Role examples

Read-only Role

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: Role
metadata:
  name: readonly
  namespace: production
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["pods", "services", "configmaps", "secrets"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]
- apiGroups: ["apps"]
  resources: ["deployments", "replicasets", "statefulsets"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]

Developer Role

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: Role
metadata:
  name: developer
  namespace: production
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["pods", "services", "configmaps", "secrets"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch", "create", "update", "patch", "delete"]
- apiGroups: ["apps"]
  resources: ["deployments", "replicasets"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch", "create", "update", "patch", "delete"]
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["pods/log", "pods/exec"]
  verbs: ["get"]

Namespace administrator Role

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: Role
metadata:
  name: namespace-admin
  namespace: production
rules:
- apiGroups: ["*"]
  resources: ["*"]
  verbs: ["*"]

Create a ClusterRole

A ClusterRole defines permissions at cluster scope.

ClusterRole examples

Cluster read-only ClusterRole

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  name: cluster-readonly
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["nodes", "namespaces", "persistentvolumes"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]
- apiGroups: ["storage.k8s.io"]
  resources: ["storageclasses"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]

Viewer ClusterRole

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRole
metadata:
  name: view
rules:
- apiGroups: [""]
  resources: ["*"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]
- apiGroups: ["apps"]
  resources: ["*"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]
- apiGroups: ["batch"]
  resources: ["*"]
  verbs: ["get", "list", "watch"]

Create a ServiceAccount

ServiceAccounts are used by applications to authenticate.

Create a ServiceAccount

apiVersion: v1
kind: ServiceAccount
metadata:
  name: app-sa
  namespace: production

kubectl apply -f serviceaccount.yaml

Create a ServiceAccount via the CLI

kubectl create serviceaccount <name> -n <namespace>

Assign a role

RoleBinding (namespace)

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: RoleBinding
metadata:
  name: readonly-binding
  namespace: production
subjects:
- kind: User
  name: <user>
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
roleRef:
  kind: Role
  name: readonly
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io

ClusterRoleBinding (cluster)

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: ClusterRoleBinding
metadata:
  name: cluster-view-binding
subjects:
- kind: User
  name: <user>
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io
roleRef:
  kind: ClusterRole
  name: view
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io

Assign to a ServiceAccount

apiVersion: rbac.authorization.k8s.io/v1
kind: RoleBinding
metadata:
  name: app-sa-binding
  namespace: production
subjects:
- kind: ServiceAccount
  name: app-sa
  namespace: production
roleRef:
  kind: Role
  name: developer
  apiGroup: rbac.authorization.k8s.io

Modify a user or a role

Modify a Role

kubectl edit role <role_name> -n <namespace>

Modify a ClusterRole

kubectl edit clusterrole <clusterrole_name>

Modify a RoleBinding

kubectl edit rolebinding <rolebinding_name> -n <namespace>

Manage permissions

Check permissions

#Check if a user can perform an action
kubectl auth can-i <verb> <resource> --as=<user> -n <namespace>

#Exemples
kubectl auth can-i create pods --as=dev-user -n production
kubectl auth can-i delete secrets --as=dev-user -n production
kubectl auth can-i list nodes --as=dev-user

List a user's permissions

kubectl auth can-i --list --as=<user> -n <namespace>

Revoke permissions

Delete the RoleBinding to revoke the permissions:

kubectl delete rolebinding <rolebinding_name> -n <namespace>

Delete a user or a role

Delete a ServiceAccount

kubectl delete serviceaccount <name> -n <namespace>

Delete a Role

kubectl delete role <role_name> -n <namespace>

Delete a ClusterRole

kubectl delete clusterrole <clusterrole_name>

Delete a RoleBinding

kubectl delete rolebinding <rolebinding_name> -n <namespace>

warning

Deleting a Role or ClusterRole is irreversible. Check that no RoleBinding depends on the role before deletion.

Best practices

Principle of least privilege

Grant only the permissions that are required:

• use namespace Roles rather than ClusterRoles;
• limit the verbs (get, list rather than *);
• avoid * permissions on all resources.

Role organization

User type	Recommended Role
Developer	Role within a namespace with pods/deployments
Ops	ClusterRole with read access to nodes/pvs
Namespace admin	Role with extended permissions

Credential rotation

For ServiceAccounts:

#Delete and recreate the token
kubectl delete secret <secret_name> -n <namespace>
kubectl get serviceaccount <sa_name> -n <namespace> -o jsonpath='{.secrets[0].name}'

Access audit

#List the roles
kubectl get roles --all-namespaces

#List the clusterroles
kubectl get clusterroles

#List the rolebindings
kubectl get rolebindings --all-namespaces

#List the clusterrolebindings
kubectl get clusterrolebindings

Audit and extraction of rights

Export all RBAC rules

kubectl get roles,rolebindings,clusterroles,clusterrolebindings --all-namespaces -o yaml > rbac-backup.yaml

List access by user

kubectl get rolebindings,clusterrolebindings --all-namespaces -o json | jq '.items[] | select(.subjects[]?.name != null) | {name: .metadata.name, namespace: .metadata.namespace, subjects: .subjects, roleRef: .roleRef}'

Check sensitive access

#Who can create pods
kubectl auth can-i create pods --all-namespaces

#Who can read secrets
kubectl auth can-i get secrets --all-namespaces

#Who can access the nodes
kubectl auth can-i list nodes

Use with external systems

OIDC integration

For critical deployments, configure an external OIDC (OpenID Connect) identity provider to authenticate users.

Bastion and proxy

For sensitive architectures, use an SSH bastion or an access proxy:

• centralize the connections;
• enforce audit logs;
• implement MFA authentication.

Limitations

Action	Support
Download the kubeconfig	Through the API or the console
Create Roles	Through kubectl only
Create ServiceAccounts	Through kubectl only
Manage ClusterRoles	Through kubectl only
Configure permissions	Through YAML manifests

tip

Automate RBAC management with manifests versioned in your source control system. Use tools such as kustomize or helm to manage the RBAC configurations per environment.