Bulk Remove User Access From JIRA During Maintenance Or For Test Instances

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Platform Notice: Cloud, Server, and Data Center - This article applies equally to all platforms.

Support for Server* products ended on February 15th 2024. If you are running a Server product, you can visit the Atlassian Server end of support announcement to review your migration options.

*Except Fisheye and Crucible

Symptoms

Sometimes it is necessary to disable your users' access to JIRA during maintenance windows while you are importing or exporting your environment, or bulk disable unnecessary users following an import to a test instance.  Since you may have hundreds of users, it is not feasible to uncheck each users' Application Access Permission.  This can easily be accomplished using the Global Permissions. 

Environment

This KB is applicable only for Jira pre Version 7.0. For Jira 7.0 and later or Cloud, please see How To Bulk Remove User Access From Jira During Maintenance Or For Test Instances

Diagnosis

During an Import or Export of your Environment or other maintenance windows, you want to disable user JIRA access to prevent any changes during that period. 

Resolution

  1. Choose  > User Management (g+g > User Management). Select Groups > Create Group to create a New User Group. Name the Group what you would like; for this example, we are using a name of Limited-Access
  2. Add your Admin Account(s), or any users that need to maintain access to this instance
     
  3. Choose  > JIRA Administration > System > Global Permissions, (or g+g > Global Permissions) and Add the New Group Limited-Access permission to the JIRA-Users
     
  4. Within the JIRA Permissions section, delete the jira-users group from JIRA Users so that only Limited-Access is listed; by removing the jira-users group from this Global Permission, this undoes the tie between jira-users and Application Access as well, so those users will no longer be consuming a license
  5. Perform the necessary maintenance and once complete, add back the jira-users Group to JIRA Users so that your users have access again

Last modified on Feb 14, 2023

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