PERMISSION_DENIED - Permission Denied: IAM Authorization Failure

#Common Causes

• →Missing IAM Role: Your identity doesn't have a required IAM role at the project, folder, or organization level. IAM role assignments can take 30-60 seconds to propagate across GCP's systems.
• →Resource-Level Permission Missing: Some operations require permissions at the resource level (e.g., specific Compute Engine instance, Cloud SQL database, GKE cluster) in addition to project-level roles. Resource-level bindings take precedence over project-level bindings.
• →Service Account Lacks Role: The service account your application uses doesn't have the IAM role needed for the operation. Service accounts need explicit role assignments—they don't inherit permissions from the user who created them.
• →Organization Policy Denial: Organization policies can explicitly deny operations even if IAM permissions allow them. Policies are evaluated after IAM but can override permissions.

✓Solutions

1. 1Step 1: Diagnose - Check your IAM role assignments at the project level: gcloud projects get-iam-policy PROJECT_ID --flatten="bindings[].members" --filter="bindings.members:YOUR_IDENTITY" --format="table(bindings.role)"
2. 2Step 2: Diagnose - If the operation requires resource-level permissions (e.g., Compute Engine instance, Cloud SQL database), check resource-level IAM: gcloud compute instances get-iam-policy INSTANCE_NAME --zone ZONE --project PROJECT_ID Or for Cloud SQL: gcloud sql instances get-iam-policy INSTANCE_NAME --project PROJECT_ID
3. 3Step 3: Fix - Grant the missing IAM role at the appropriate level: gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID --member="user:EMAIL" --role="roles/ROLE_NAME" For service accounts: gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding PROJECT_ID --member="serviceAccount:SERVICE_ACCOUNT@PROJECT_ID.iam.gserviceaccount.com" --role="roles/ROLE_NAME"
4. 4Step 4: Verify - Wait 30-60 seconds for IAM propagation, then retry your operation. If it still fails, check organization policies: gcloud resource-manager org-policies list --project PROJECT_ID

</>Code Examples

1# This script helps diagnose and fix PERMISSION_DENIED errors
2
3# Step 1: Check your current IAM roles at project level
4# Replace PROJECT_ID with your GCP project ID
5PROJECT_ID="my-project"
6IDENTITY="user:example@example.com"
7
8echo "Checking project-level IAM roles..."
9gcloud projects get-iam-policy $PROJECT_ID \
10  --flatten="bindings[].members" \
11  --filter="bindings.members:$IDENTITY" \
12  --format="table(bindings.role)"
13
14# Step 2: Check resource-level permissions (example: Compute Engine instance)
15INSTANCE_NAME="my-instance"
16ZONE="us-central1-a"
17echo "Checking instance-level IAM policies..."
18gcloud compute instances get-iam-policy $INSTANCE_NAME \
19  --zone $ZONE \
20  --project $PROJECT_ID
21
22# Step 3: Grant missing role (example: Compute Instance Admin)
23# Replace ROLE_NAME with the required role (e.g., roles/compute.instanceAdmin)
24ROLE_NAME="roles/compute.instanceAdmin"
25echo "Granting role $ROLE_NAME..."
26gcloud projects add-iam-policy-binding $PROJECT_ID \
27  --member="$IDENTITY" \
28  --role="$ROLE_NAME"
29
30# Step 4: Wait for IAM propagation (30-60 seconds)
31echo "Waiting 60 seconds for IAM propagation..."
32sleep 60
33
34# Step 5: Verify access
35echo "Verifying access..."
36gcloud compute instances list --project $PROJECT_ID

↗Related Errors