How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by recursive on Monday July 29, 2019 @08:06PM (#20560847)

I'm trying to build an "SP" or "relying party" as I've learned in the jargon of the domain. Building an implementation from scratch is the last thing I want to do. I feel like I'd rather pull out my own teeth. But a difficulty of finding any information about it has lead me to start reading all the official specs as a kind of last resort.

In my initial research, I did discover Shibboleth, but was under the impression that it was an IDP only. I will check out the SP component, because I would love to not implement it from scratch.

At first glance, I see this: https://www.shibboleth.net/products/service-provider/ It basically seems pretty opaque. The downloads at https://shibboleth.net/downloads/service-provider/latest/ don't really provide much clue of how to build them or incorporate them into my app, which is written in a different language than any of these source files. I'll keep looking.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by labanna on Monday July 29, 2019 @08:26PM (#20560962)

I was just tasked last week with implementing SAML auth for our applications and have settled on Shibboleth.

For the SP I just installed it from yum after adding the centos repos.

There is a repo config generator at https://shibboleth.net/downloads/service-provider/RPMS/ that I used.

It installs as an apache module and I am building a flow from my load balancers to hit the apache/SP and proxy some traffic to the application after authentication success so we can create our login session.

I have a PoC going now, but the documentation is not terribly clear to me and it is really confusing me about some options I need to tune.

For my initial testing, I built the SP and used https://samltest.id/ to test against an IDP.

Shibboleth SP docs: https://wiki.shibboleth.net/confluence/display/SP3/Home

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by identigral on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @03:07AM (#20562686)

If your language/environment supports using Apache HTTPD as a proxy, then you can use mod_auth_mellon to secure your web application. That's just one option, there are lots of others.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by recursive on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @10:54AM (#20565350)

I have heard about these options, but the problem for me is identifying any of them and figuring out how to use them. My web server probably has to be IIS or Kestrel. I've been trying to figure this out for a few weeks now. And I've spent about a day trying to figure out how to do anything with the Shibboleth SP. I think I got it installed, but I can't really tell if it's doing anything or how to use it. And even then, there doesn't seem to be any information on how to actually use it for authentication in my application.

From my perspective as an application developer, writing an application that authenticates via SAML 2.0 is a nightmare, despite the ubiquitous claims of how simple it is.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by identigral on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @01:31PM (#20567091)

If your app is .NET, look at Sustainsys (https://saml2.sustainsys.com/en/2.0/) or ITFoxtec (https://www.itfoxtec.com/IdentitySaml2) libs. Unfortunately there isn't a clear architect/dev-level guidance at the protocol level on key decisions that need to be made when implementing SP that tightly integrates with your app. Give one of these a shot and post your questions on StackOverflow.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by recursive on Tuesday July 30, 2019 @03:01PM (#20568042)

Thanks. This looks more approachable. I'll give these a shot.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:How SAML 2.0 Authentication Works by danellis on Monday July 29, 2019 @08:15PM (#20560901)

If you're willing to use PHP, there's also "the award-winning" SimpleSAMLphp (https://simplesamlphp.org/), which can operate as IdP or SP. I can tell you that many big names in the TV Everywhere space are using it.

[ Parent | on HN ]