In Solana programs, authorities are entities or accounts that have the right to perform certain actions or make changes within the program.

For example

• Token mint authority - Can mint new tokens
• Token freeze authority - Can freeze tokens in an account
• Upgrade authority - Can upgrade the code of a program.

Creating and revoking mint authority

• Create a new token

spl-token create-token

• Create an ata

spl-token create-account <token_mint_address> 

• Try minting some tokens

spl-token mint <token_mint_address> 10000000000

• Check if mint authority exists on explorer

  

• Revoke mint authority

spl-token authorize  <token_id>  mint --disable

• Try to mint again/check the explorer

spl-token mint <token_mint_address> 10000000000