Google Zanzibar is a global authorization service that powers access control across products such as Google Docs, YouTube, and Cloud IAM. Designed to handle more than 10 million client queries per second, Zanzibar demonstrates how to build authorization systems that operate at global scale with flexible consistency guarantees. This session unpacks the engineering principles behind Zanzibar and provides a practical guide to applying similar patterns.

Starting with the fundamentals of Relationship-Based Access Control (ReBAC), the talk explores how Zanzibar achieves correctness, scalability, and performance in distributed environments. It covers the system’s APIs, its approach to managing consistency, and how Google addressed challenges such as the “New Enemy” problem to maintain secure, real-time access control. The session also looks at open-source tools and design patterns that enable teams to implement Zanzibar-inspired authorization systems in their own applications.

What You Will Learn

• Core concepts behind Google Zanzibar and Relationship-Based Access Control (ReBAC)
• How to design distributed authorization systems with global consistency and scale
• How to apply open-source frameworks and patterns for fine-grained access control

Who Should Attend

• Software architects
• Backend engineers
• Security engineers
• Developers building distributed systems requiring scalable access control