Access Control

Google Zanzibar: The Global Authorization System Powering Billions of Permissions In the world of massive-scale internet services, managing who can access what is a monumental challenge. Google Zanzibar addresses this head-on as a globally distributed authorization system that handles trillions of access control lists (ACLs) and millions of queries per second while maintaining sub-10ms latency and over 99.999% availability.[2][3] Deployed across services like Google Drive, YouTube, Photos, Calendar, and Maps, Zanzibar ensures consistent, fine-grained permissions for billions of users without compromising speed or reliability.[2][4] ...

Revolutionizing Microservices Security: Lessons from Uber’s Charter ABAC System In the sprawling ecosystem of modern microservices architectures, where thousands of services interact billions of times daily, traditional access control methods crumble under the weight of complexity. Uber’s engineering team tackled this head-on by developing Charter, an attribute-based access control (ABAC) system that delivers microsecond authorization decisions while handling nuanced policies based on user location, time, data relationships, and more. This innovation not only secures Uber’s vast infrastructure but offers a blueprint for any organization scaling microservices.[1][2] ...