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Row-Level Access Control is currently in beta. Contact your customer success manager for a private preview.
Row-Level Access Control allows you to restrict access to a subset of rows within a table for specific entities (users, groups, or tokens). This provides more granular control than traditional table-level permissions.
Row-Level Access Control builds upon StarTree’s Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) system. Ensure you have RBAC enabled before implementing row-level policies.

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How Row-Level Access Control Works

Unlike table-level RBAC which provides all-or-nothing access to a table, Row-Level Access Control allows you to define conditions that determine which rows a user can access within a table. When a user with row-level policies queries a table, StarTree automatically:
  1. Identifies the user’s assigned roles and associated row-level policies
  2. Extracts the row filter conditions from the policies
  3. Applies these conditions as additional WHERE clauses to the query
  4. Returns only the rows that match both the original query and the row filter conditions

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Policy Configuration

Row-level policies use the same structure as standard RBAC policies but include a conditions section with rowFilters: 
{
  "version": "v1",
  "statements": [
    {
      "description": "Allow access to specific user data only",
      "resources": ["srn2:cluster#pinot:table#pageviews"],
      "effect": "allow",
      "actions": ["query"],
      "conditions": {
        "rowFilters": ["user_id = 18314973"]
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Row Filter Syntax

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Single Condition Filters

Row filters are valid SQL expressions that can be used in WHERE clauses: 
{
  "conditions": {
    "rowFilters": ["user_id = 12345"]
  }
}

{
  "conditions": {
    "rowFilters": ["region = 'US'"]
  }
}

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Multi-Condition Filters

Combine multiple conditions using SQL operators: 
{
  "conditions": {
    "rowFilters": ["user_id = 18314973 AND session_value > 1000"]
  }
}

{
  "conditions": {
    "rowFilters": ["user_id IN (18314973, 18314974, 18314975) AND total_time_spent >= 10000"]
  }
}

{
  "conditions": {
    "rowFilters": ["data_region = 'EU' AND compliance_flag = 'GDPR'"]
  }
}

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Implementation Steps

Row-Level Access Control follows the same implementation process as any other RBAC policy:
  1. Create a policy with row filter conditions in the Security Manager
  2. Create a role and attach the policy to it
  3. Assign the role to users or groups
The process is identical to standard RBAC - the only difference is adding the conditions section with rowFilters to your policy configuration. You can use the StarTree Security Manager UI to apply these policies.

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Use Cases

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Vendor Data Isolation

Allow vendors to see only their own orders in a shared table: 
{
  "version": "v1",
  "statements": [
    {
      "description": "Vendor can only see their own orders",
      "resources": ["srn2:cluster#pinot:table#orders"],
      "effect": "allow",
      "actions": ["query"],
      "conditions": {
        "rowFilters": ["vendor_id = 'VENDOR_123'"]
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Sales Territory Management

Restrict sales reps to view only their assigned accounts: 
{
  "version": "v1",
  "statements": [
    {
      "description": "Sales rep can only access assigned territories",
      "resources": ["srn2:cluster#pinot:table#customer_accounts"],
      "effect": "allow",
      "actions": ["query"],
      "conditions": {
        "rowFilters": ["sales_rep_id = 'REP_456' AND territory = 'West'"]
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Regional Data Compliance

Enforce data residency by region within a global table: 
{
  "version": "v1",
  "statements": [
    {
      "description": "EU users can only access EU data",
      "resources": ["srn2:cluster#pinot:table#user_analytics"],
      "effect": "allow",
      "actions": ["query"],
      "conditions": {
        "rowFilters": ["data_region = 'EU' AND compliance_flag = 'GDPR'"]
      }
    }
  ]
}

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Limitations

  • Row-level policies may take up to one hour to propagate and become effective after creation or modification.
  • Row filter conditions currently require static values to be specified in the policy configuration. Dynamic row filtering capabilities are planned for future releases.

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Next Steps