Question

Difficulty: MediumApp Registrations and Service Principals

You are developing a secure multi-tier application where the frontend web app is hosted on-premises and needs to authenticate to a backend API hosted in Azure. You register the frontend application in your Microsoft Entra ID tenant, which automatically creates an application object and a service principal in the tenant. Later, to comply with a security policy, you delete the application registration in the Azure portal. What is the immediate impact of deleting this application registration on the associated service principal in your tenant?

  1. A
    The service principal remains in the tenant and can still be authenticated using the existing certificates.
  2. B
    The service principal remains in the tenant but is permanently disabled.
  3. The service principal is automatically deleted from the tenant.Answer
  4. D
    The service principal is automatically converted into a user-assigned managed identity.

Answer

The service principal is automatically deleted from the tenant.
In Microsoft Entra ID, an application registration creates an application object (the global representation of the app) and a service principal (the local instance of the app in the tenant). In the home tenant where the application is registered, deleting the application registration automatically deletes the associated service principal.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Analyze the relationship between an Application registration and a Service Principal in Microsoft Entra ID.
An application registration creates a global application object and a local service principal in the home tenant.
Understanding the structural dependency between these two resources is essential for managing their lifecycle.
2
Determine the impact of deleting the application registration.
Deleting the application registration removes both the application object and its corresponding service principal in the home tenant.
Since the service principal in the home tenant is directly tied to the application registration lifecycle, removing the registration cleans up the associated security identity.

Key Concept

Application registrations and service principals share a linked lifecycle in their home tenant. Deleting the application registration automatically removes the service principal in that tenant.
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