What is the purpose of a role hierarchy in Snowflake?

A role hierarchy is created in Snowflake by granting one role to another. The fundamental purpose of this is to enable privilege inheritance. A role that is granted another role (the "parent") inherits all the privileges of the role that was granted to it (the "child"). This allows for the creation of composite roles from more granular ones, simplifying the management of complex permission schemes and promoting the principle of least privilege without redundant grant statements.

A. To define the sequence of SQL queries: The execution order of SQL queries is determined by application logic or the user, not by the role hierarchy.

C. To manage network settings: Network access controls, such as IP address whitelisting, are managed through Network Policies, not role hierarchies.

D. To store raw data: Roles are security principals for managing access. Raw data is stored in database objects like tables.

- Snowflake Documentation: Role Hierarchy and Privilege Inheritance. The section states, "Roles can be granted to other roles, creating a role hierarchy. The privileges granted to a role are inherited by any roles above that role in the hierarchy."