James,
Hi. This is actually a featured but isn't exactly described or advertised as it should. In fact, no matter what the DNN registration is set to there should probably be an option to set the authorization flag within the settings.
The way it works now is based on whatever you have the registration set to within DNN registration. So, the only way that users will be authorized is if you go to Admin, Site Settings, Advanced, and specify that the DNN Registration is set to Public. If the registration is set to Public the user will automatically be authorized, if its set to None, Private, or Verified it will not show up as authorized.
Also, thanks for posting this query for other users... Another option would be to use a similar query in case you only wanted to authorize users only for a particular event. For example, you could setup an Interactive SQL Event where users with the column 'Zip Code' was equal to 55555 then they would be authorized with a query similar like this...
UPDATE dbo.dnn_UserPortals
SET Authorised = 'True'
WHERE (PortalId = 0) and (UserID = $(UserID))
Also, one more thing to note for other users... This is assuming that your object qualifier on the site is dnn_. On many installations there are no object qualifiers so in that case you would just be updating dbo.UserPortals and not dbo.dnn_UserPortals.
Thanks again!
-Chad