> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.curator.interworks.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Restrict Access

> Control menu visibility and access permissions based on user groups and roles to secure content appropriately.

When you add a Dashboard or other content brought in from connected integrations like Tableau, Curator will inherit the
security settings from those integrations. However, you may want to override those source-systems or you may want to prevent
users from seeing content that exists solely within Curator - for example, restricting access to a specific
[page](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/site_content_design/pages/pages_overview.md).  With **Restrict Access**
you can override inherited security settings when necessary, offering you maximum flexibility over the visibility of content.

## Enabling Restrict Access

1. On the backend of Curator, navigate to the **Content** > **Reorder Navigation** section from the left-hand menu.
2. Find the menu link you'd like to restrict access to and click the pencil/edit icon - or click the "New Menu Link"
   button to create a new menu item.
3. Toggle the Restrict Access to ON to display a list of [groups](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/users_groups/user_management/users_and_groups_overview.md)
4. Select the groups you'd like to grant access to
5. Save the menu item

You can then confirm the restrict access is enabled on the Reorder Navigation page by hovering over the lock icon and
seeing the phrase "Restricted Access based on Group Membership"

**Tableau admins** automatically have access to all Tableau-connected content in Curator.  Restrict access overrides
these permissions, so admins will need to be in one of the selected groups to see the content within the menu.

## Restricting Pages and Files Directly

Pages and Files can also restrict access in their own settings, which secures the content itself rather than a single
menu link to it.  This is the better choice when the content is reachable in more than one way (several menu links,
search, tiles, or a shared URL), or when you do not want to create a menu link at all.  See
[Restricting a Page to Groups](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/site_content_design/pages/pages_overview.md#restricting-a-page-to-groups) and the
[Files](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/site_content_design/files/files.md) documentation.  Content-level and menu-level restrictions stack: a user must
satisfy both to see the content.

## Content Linked From Several Menu Items

The same Page or Dashboard can be linked from more than one menu item, for example from two dropdowns that are each
restricted to a different group.  A user can open the content when **at least one** of its links is open to them, and is
blocked only when every one of those links is restricted for them.

Main and footer menus that a [Group Override](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/site_content_design/theme/group_overrides.md) shows only to other groups do
not count against a user, because that user never sees them.  If the content is linked **only** from menus the user is
not shown, those links still apply, so a restricted link in another group's menu keeps the content protected.  Links in
menus that no theme uses always count.

## Restrict Access and Direct Links

Restrict Access is enforced on every page load, not just when rendering navigation menus. This means that if a user
shares a Curator URL with someone who is not in an authorized group, that person will still be blocked from viewing the
content. There is no additional configuration required to protect against unauthorized access via shared or bookmarked
URLs — the same group-membership check applies regardless of how the page is reached.

## Restrict Access and Tableau Connection Issues

Inherited Tableau permissions can only be checked while Curator is able to reach Tableau Server. If the connection is
down or misconfigured when a user requests a dashboard, Curator cannot verify that user's Tableau permissions, so it
**hides the content instead of showing it**. Menu items, tiles, and search results for that connection disappear, and
opening one of its dashboards by URL shows a page saying the content is temporarily unavailable. Curator checks again
at most every five minutes and restores the content as soon as the connection responds. Content on a disabled
connection stays hidden until the connection is enabled again. See
[Content Hidden While a Connection Is Down](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/creating_integrations/tableau_connection/tableau_connection_troubleshooting.md#content-hidden-while-a-connection-is-down).

Some settings still show content while an enabled connection is down: pass-through authentication, content whose URL
is listed in the Authentication Settings **Whitelist**, and the **Skip checking all Dashboard permissions** and **Skip
checking menu item's Dashboard permissions** settings. **Restrict Access is a separate check that reads only from
Curator's own database, so it is unaffected by Tableau connectivity.** Enable Restrict Access on any menu item that
relies on one of those settings and whose content must stay limited to certain groups during a Tableau outage.

To apply this protection everywhere at once, enable **Settings** > **Security** > **Authentication Settings** >
**Access rules** > **Restrict Access is Always Enabled**, which treats every menu item as restricted and requires
each one to list the groups allowed to see it. See
[Frontend User Permissions](https://docs.curator.interworks.com/users_groups/user_security/frontend_user_permissions.md) for details on that setting.

> [!WARNING]
>
> The global **Restrict Access is Always Enabled** setting only evaluates content that is linked from at least one
> menu item. A dashboard with no menu link has nothing to restrict, so it skips this check and its access still
> depends solely on the Tableau connection. Add a menu link for any content that must remain protected during an
> outage.


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