In today’s digital age, secure authentication is crucial for all kinds of organizations. Pass Through Authentication enables users to access resources seamlessly without the need for maintaining credentials in on-prem infrastructure. The user credentials are validated against the organization’s directory service such as Active Directory without the need to store credentials. PTA is used commonly in hybrid environments where organizations want control over authentication while integrating with cloud services. The diagram below depicts the process of Pass Through Authentication via Active Directory in SailPointIdentityIQ.
Image: Pass Through Authentication via Active Directory
A user requests to log in to an application, in our case, SailPoint.
The application (SailPoint) secures the credentials by encrypting them.
The login configuration is checked and found out to be Pass Through Authentication.
The credentials are validated against Active Directory.
After successful validation, the user is logged in.
Advantages
⦁ Pass Through Authentication ensures the credentials are not stored, reducing the risk of exposure. ⦁ Simplifies user management by validating with a directory system like Active Directory. ⦁ Provides real-time authentication, ensuring accurate and up-to-date access control. ⦁ Offers seamless experience as users can log in to on-prem and cloud-based applications using the same credentials.
Let’s have a close look into Pass Through Authentication in below video.
In this video, a detailed demonstration on Pass Through Authentication via Active Directory and usecases like AD Birthright Provisioning are discussed.
SailPointIdentity Security Cloud is a comprehensive Identity and Access Management (IAM) solution designed to help organizations manage user access to critical systems and applications efficiently and securely. Within IdentityNow, Launcherand Launchpadare key components that enhance user experience and streamline access management processes.
Launcher is a feature within IdentityNow that allows users to manually initiate interactive processes related to access management. It is tied to entitlements and can be assigned to users through regular governance practices. Here’s how it works:
Manual Initiation: Users can manually start processes such as access requests, certifications, and reviews.
Entitlements: The launcher is linked to specific entitlements, ensuring that users have the appropriate permissions to initiate these processes.
Governance Integration: It integrates with IdentityNow’s governance framework, allowing for seamless management and oversight of access-related activities.
Launchpadis a centralized interface within IdentityNow that provides users with a single point of access to various identity management tasks and applications. It offers a user-friendly and intuitive way to navigate and manage identity-related activities. Key features include:
Centralized Access: Users can access different identity management functions from one place, improving efficiency and ease of use.
Customization: The launchpad can be customized to meet the specific needs of an organization, allowing for personalized dashboards and workflows.
Self-Service Capabilities: Users can perform self-service tasks such as password resets, access requests, and profile updates directly from the launchpad.
Together, Launcher and Launchpad enhance the user experience by providing intuitive and efficient ways to manage access and identity-related tasks within IdentityNow.
In the video below, I have thoroughly explained Launcher and Launchpad, along with Forms and Workflow, using a simple presentation:
In this video, I have vividly explained the entire process of Launcher and Launchpad using real-life analogies:
The age of AI and automation is here. With organizations all around the globe leveraging Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, more and more tasks and processes previously done manually, are now being automated. This leads to the creation of several machine accounts dealing with Robotic Process Automation (RPA), privileged service accounts for authenticating requests from an external system, and the like. Consequently, organizations are spending more time and resources managing the access held by these non-human accounts in every application, which can often lead to complicated situations as there is no centralized view of the same.
Why Machine Identity Management?
As described above, organizations are automating mundane processes, and thus more machine accounts are being created. These accounts can be difficult to manage and govern in a standalone environment, considering the lack of ownership and effective ways to control and manage their access. The following are some statistical insights on machine accounts shared by SailPoint: –
83% organizations experienced at least one machine account takeover in the past year
This gives a clear picture as to how AI, Automated Scripts and Robotic Processes are taking over the workplace, which signifies the difficulty as well as importance of managing these machine accounts.
The solution – SailPoint Machine Identity Security
Discover any accurately configured machine account on any source
Classify the accounts as machine accounts, by using an account attribute/set of attributes (eg, in Active Directory, if there are machine accounts containing the word “bot” in their sAMAccountName, we can use this account attribute to classify these accounts as machine accounts in SailPoint)
Assign a human owner to a machine account. This identity will be responsible for reviewing the access held by the machine account in a certification campaign
It provides clear visibility and insights on all machine accounts across various applications.
It provides tools to automate the management of machine accounts. This eliminates the need to maintain and manage these accounts and their access manually, such as on excel sheets.
Human owners can be assigned to machine accounts, ensuring accountability, risk detection and mitigation.
Access reviews via Certification Campaigns help ensure that machine accounts follow the principle of Least Privileged Access Control.
Hope this blog gave you some insights into how you can use SailPointMachine Identity Security to effectively classify, manage and govern machine accounts from any source. Please share your thoughts and feedback in the comment box below.
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Duo is a two-factor authentication solution that helps organizations boost security by verifying user identity, establishing device trust, and providing a secure connection to company networks and applications.
Why Duo
Duo is fast, easy and flexible. Passwords and even basic Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) aren’t enough to keep you safe from today’s attackers. Duo gives you the extra layers of protection you need for secure access management. With this setup, Duo two-factor authentication (2FA) is added as a verification option for account unlocking and password resets.
Prerequisites to integrate Duo
Configure SailPoint Web application and copy ClientID, secret and hostname these details are required for SailPoint integration.
Add users and enroll them in the application. User should have an account in SailPoint.
Technical Overview:
Here’s the technical demonstration on the integration of Duo
Use case Demonstration – Integration flow:
Please refer to the below video to have an understanding about Duo integration
SailPoint configuration
The steps to be done in SailPoint tenant for duo integration
First in SailPoint, integrate the Duo and then check the test connection after successful test connection
Enable multifactor Authentication in Identity profile
And select duo web in Password Reset and Unlock Settings
Now you are all set to use duo authentication
Duo 2FA for Identity security cloud password reset
With duo integration user can reset his password
First user has to proceed to reset password
Enter the username
Then you should enter the passcode received from duo after successful duo authentication you can able to set new password
Duo 2FA for Identity security cloud Unlock account
If the user account got locked, then he can unlock his account with duo integration
First user has to proceed to unlock account
Enter the username
After successful duo authentication your account will be unlocked
In today’s digital landscape, organizations rely on various applications to enhance productivity, necessitating secure access for diverse workforces, including remote employees and contractors. To ensure secure access for remote workers using new devices, implementing Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) is essential. When accessing sensitive applications from unrecognized devices, Okta prompts for MFA, requiring additional authentication steps such as a one-time password or biometric verification. Administrators can set contextual-behavior based sign-on policies to determine when MFA is necessary, enhancing security and reducing unauthorized access risks, while logging all attempts for monitoring and auditing.
Usecase Overview:
Please refer to the below video to have an understanding about Okta Sign-On Policies focusing on their structure, functionality, and how they enhance security using contextual behavior detection methods.
Usecase Demonstration:
This demonstration offers a comprehensive overview of the Sign-on Policies in Okta, highlighting the practical application with a common scenario around WFH / remote employees.
Challenges:
In general, many organizations encounter various challenges when it comes to user access management:
Securing access for remote employees, contractors, and full-time staff who require varying levels of access to applications.
Ensuring consistent user attributes and access permissions across all applications.
Demonstrating compliance with security standards by implementing strong access controls and monitoring user activity.
Minimizing administrative overhead associated with managing user identities and access.
Conclusion:
Implementing Okta for centralized security management enables organizations to leverage the platform’s robust features and benefits. By setting up user groups, integrating applications, configuring session policies, and enabling MFA, companies can create a secure and efficient identity management system that meets their specific requirements.
Active Directory (AD), a directory service developed by Microsoft for Windows domain networks, is primarily used for authentication and authorization, helping organizations manage user access to resources. However, as organizations increasingly adopt cloud-based applications, managing user access across disparate directories has become a challenge for traditional Active Directory (AD)/LDAP systems. Each cloud service often introduces its own user store, leading to a proliferation of login credentials and making it difficult to maintain consistent, secure access control.
This complexity can result in administrative headaches, such as trouble deactivating user accounts when employees leave and a lack of visibility into resource access. To address these issues, many companies turn to Okta, an identity management platform that integrates seamlessly with Active Directory, bridging the gap between on-premises and cloud environments. By using Okta, organizations can continue to leverage their existing AD or LDAP services for user authentication while centralizing User Lifecycle Management, providing a unified dashboard for administrators to ensure consistent, secure access control across all systems.
Understanding Okta Universal Directory
Okta Universal Directory is a centralized platform designed for managing user identities from various sources. As a core component of the Okta Identity Cloud, Universal Directory provides a centralized view of all users and their respective attributes, making it easier for IT teams to oversee and manage user data. This product enables organizations to maintain a unified profile for a user, no matter where their data comes from. This capability is especially advantageous for enterprises with multiple user directories, as it simplifies user management and bolsters security.
Key Features of Okta Universal Directory
Centralized User Management: Universal Directory allows you to manage all your user identities in one place. This means that whether your users are employees, partners, or customers, you can easily create, modify, or deactivate their accounts without jumping between different platforms.
Integration with Multiple Sources: It allows integration with various identity sources, including Active Directory (AD), LDAP, and HR systems like Workday. This flexibility ensures that organizations can consolidate user information from different platforms seamlessly.
Customizable User Profiles: Universal Directory supports both Okta user profiles and app-specific user profiles. This capability allows organizations to define and manage user attributes tailored to their applications, ensuring that each app only accesses the data it needs.
Customizable User Attributes: With Universal Directory, you can customize user attributes to fit your organization’s unique needs. This flexibility enables you to collect and store specific information relevant to your users, such as job titles, department details, or location data.
Real-Time Synchronization: Changes made in AD, such as user updates or account deactivations, are synchronized in real-time with Okta. This ensures that terminated employees lose access immediately, enhancing security and compliance.
Delegated Authentication: The integration allows for delegated authentication, meaning that users can authenticate against AD without needing direct access to the AD environment. This feature simplifies the authentication process while maintaining security.
Prerequisites
Okta Tenant:
You must possess an account with Super Admin role privileges.
On-Premises Active Directory:
The host server should have at least two CPUs and a minimum of 8 GB RAM.
Host server running Windows server 2016 & above.
.NET framework 4.6.2 and above.
The host server should be a member server part of the same domain.
Okta agent installation wizard should be executed from the host server.
An account with Domain administrator privileges for domain discovery & AD agent application installation in the host server.
Delegated Authentication – Enables the users to use their AD credentials to access Okta & downstream applications. This feature is enabled by default.
Usecase Overview:
Check out the video below to explore Okta’s Universal Directory and how it works with Active Directory integration. Along with that, benefits of Universal Directory & the integration flow.
Technical Demonstration – Integration flow:
Here’s a technical demonstration, a step-by-step approach explaining the integration between Active Directory and Okta.
Conclusion
Integrating Active Directory with Okta not only streamlines identity management but also enhances security and user experience. With Okta’s Universal Directory, organizations can manage user identities more effectively, ensuring that they are well-equipped to handle the demands of a cloud-first world. This integration empowers IT teams to focus on strategic initiatives rather than being bogged down by the complexities of traditional identity management systems.
Many organizations face difficulties in securely managing access to their servers. This often results in compromised static credentials, delay in accessing the servers and increase in security risks. Okta’s approach to address this problem is unique, comes with Advanced Server Access (ASA) to provide simple & secure way to access the servers through ephemeral certificates. These certificates are short-lived & tightly scoped which ensures strong security for the connection. And also, JIT Passwordless authentication for server access which will create & revoke access for the user through time-bound constraints. It streamlines the login process and enhances security, ensuring that only the right people can access right resources.
To get started, we need to create and configure an ASA team, which is a designated group of users that can authenticate with Okta. Each team acts as an Advanced Server Access tenant, with all configurations and resources scoped to that team.
Prerequisites:
An Okta Org account with the necessary permissions to configure applications and integrations.
Supported OS for ASA Server Agent – Linux & Windows
Supported OS for ASA Client Agent – Linux, Windows & MacOS
Administrative permission to install ASA Server Agent & Client Agent on servers & end devices.
Please refer to the below video to have an understanding about Okta Advanced Server Access & the usecase around integrating servers with Okta ASA.
Technical Demonstration:
Here’s the technical demonstration on the integration of Windows and Linux servers with Okta ASA. We will cover the process of creating an ASA team in ScaleFT, followed by integrating and configuring the ASA application in Okta. Next, we will explain how to enroll servers and clients, and finally, we will test the process by accessing the server from client machines to showcase a seamless user experience.
Conclusion:
On a closure note, with all the steps carried out in this blog it is fair enough to say integrating Servers with Okta Advanced Server Access not only enhances security through ephemeral credentials but also simplifies management processes while ensuring compliance. Its scalable architecture supports modern cloud environments, making it a comprehensive solution for organizations looking to secure their server access effectively.
In today’s fast-paced business environment, manually logging into multiple App’s can be a tedious and time-consuming process, especially when dealing with multiple accounts or complex password policies. Moreover, security risks associated with password-based authentication can put your organization’s sensitive data at risk.
That’s where Okta Single Sign-On (SSO) comes in, a solution that streamlines App access, boosts productivity, and fortifies security. By integrating Okta SSO with multiple App’s like Salesforce, Slack, LinkedIn, etc.., organizations can provide teams with seamless, one-click access to the platform, while maintaining the highest levels of security.
In this blog, we’ll explore the benefits of using Okta SSO with Salesforce and provide a step-by-step guide on how to set up and configure this powerful integration.
Pre-requisites:
Okta Tenant:
An account with Super Admin role privileges
Salesforce Tenant:
Salesforce Org with system administrator privileges
Custom Domain: acme
Usecase Overview – Integration flow:
Please refer to the below video to have an understanding about Okta & the use case around integrating Salesforce with Okta.
Technical Demonstration:
Here’s the technical walkthrough on the integration and provisioning between Salesforce & Okta.
Conclusion:
In conclusion, integrating Okta with Salesforce has significantly streamlined the users access to the platform. With Okta’s Single Sign-On (SSO) capabilities, users can now seamlessly log in to salesforce without remembering multiple passwords, reducing login times and increasing productivity. The integration backed up with Okta’s Sign-On policies, enhances organization security posture by providing an additional layer of authentication, ensuring that only authorized personnel can access sensitive customer data. By streamlining Salesforce access with Okta, we have improved user experience, increased efficiency and strengthened security, ultimately driving business growth and success.
Most of the organizations, rely on Microsoft Active Directory Services or LDAP for a centralized store for identities & access permissions. Majority of the on-prem applications rely on these services to authenticate and authorize the actions. But with the cloud-based application, where the applications would have their own identity profiles to manage the application it is challenging for the administrator to manage the user accounts & it would be challenging for the end user too to use multiple identities for multiple applications.
Okta provides a solution to utilize the existing Microsoft Active Directory Services / LDAP services to access the SaaS applications through Active Directory / LDAP integration. This allows a single dashboard for the users to access the applications using their existing credentials and for administrators a centralized service to handle the lifecycle management.
In this section, we will integrate an existing on-premises Active Directory to Okta and let Okta provision the user accounts for us in Microsoft 365 tenant.
For simulating this in our lab environment, we’ll need to have access to 3 entities & few prerequisites.
Okta Tenant.
Member Server for Okta Active Directory Agent Installation.
Microsoft 365 tenant.
Pre-requisites:
Okta Tenant:
An account with Super Admin role privileges.
Member Server for Okta Active Directory Agent Installation:
The host server should have at least two CPUs and a minimum of 8 GB RAM.
Host server running Windows server 2016 & above is supported.
.NET framework 4.6.2 and above is supported.
Host server should be a member server part of the same domain.
Okta agent installation wizard should be executed from host server.
Microsoft 365 Tenant:
Microsoft 365 tenant name – This is the default tenant name registered as “comanyname.onmicrosoft.com”
Microsoft 365 domain – This is the custom domain which is chosen for federation.
Microsoft 365 global administrator user account.
Usecase Overview – Integration flow:
Please refer to the below video to have an understanding about Okta & the use case around integrating Office365 with Okta.
Technical Walkthrough:
Here’s the technical demonstration on the integration between Office 365 & Okta.
Conclusion:
On a closure note, with all the steps carried out in this blog it is fair enough to say integrating Okta with Active Directory & Office 365 eases the overhead of IT administrators for access management and provisioning happening through Single Sign-on. With this integration in place, IT administrators can manage the user assignments & modifying the attributes from Okta and the replication will happen to AD & Office 365 tenant.
Connectivity is critical to successful IAM deployments. SailPoint is committed to providing design, configuration, troubleshooting and best practice information to deploy and maintain connectivity to target systems. SailPoint IdentityIQ enables you to manage and govern access for digital identities across various applications in your environment. Connectors are the bridges that IdentityIQ uses to communicate with and aggregate data from applications. SailPoint IdentityIQ provides a wide range of OOTB connectors that facilitate integration with variety of systems, applications and data sources. These connectors are designed to simplify the process of managing Identity information and access across different platforms.
In SailPoint IdentityIQ, a Custom Connector is a specialized integration component that allows the IdentityIQ platform to connect and interact with external systems, applications, or data sources that are not supported by the standard OOTB connectors. Custom connectors extend the capabilities of IdentityIQ by enabling it to manage identity-related information in a wider range of systems.
High level architecture of Custom connector
Custom Connector Development
Developing Custom connector in SailPoint IdentityIQ involves creating a Java-based implementation that adheres to the connector framework and API provided by SailPoint.
This allows you to define the interaction between IdentityIQ and the specific external system you want to integrate with. A typical development of custom connector includes 4 steps –
Creating a new implementation of functionality and packaging it into JAR file.
The custom connector uses the openconnector framework provided by SailPoint in the openconnector package where there are lot of methods provided for different type of operations.
The custom logic which you want to implement using this custom connector shall be developed in the specified methods.
Once code development is completed, Custom connector code with all the classes must be compiled and packaged to a JAR file.
And the JAR file must be placed in WEB-INF/lib folder of IIQ Installation directory
Defining Connector type in Connector Registry
Connector Registry is an XML file present in IdentityIQ as Configuration object. This file contains the information about all the different connectors and their related details.
Now that we have created a new connector in our IdentityIQ, we have to declare its information and details in Connector Registry.
Here we will create an xml file consisting of the details pertaining to our custom connector. Once we Import this xml file into IdentityIQ, it will be merged with the existing Connector Registry file in IdentityIQ database allowing IdentityIQ to create a new entry in the list of connectors.
Alternatively, the Connector Registry could be manually edited through the Debug page.
Defining .xhtml page which specifies required and optional connection parameters.
Usually, some parameters are required to define the connection to the target resource (e.g. host, port, username, password, etc.).
To allow these parameters to be specified through the UI for each application that uses this connector, an .xhtml page must be written to define how the Application Configuration user interface will request and record those parameters.
This file must be placed in the [IdentityIQ Installation Directory]/define/applications/ directory and must be referenced in the application definition’s XML as the “formPath” entry.
Testing the connector by Creating an application which uses this connector.
Finally, after completing all the development related activities, one must start the application server which is hosting IdentityIQ.
An Application object must be created for using the IdentityIQ’s UI. Select the configured custom connector as application type to tie it to the connector registry configuration and specifying any connection parameters through the configuration.
Once the application is onboarded, we can perform all the configured functionalities in it and verify back the results within the targeted external application.
Alternatively, Applicationconnector can be tested from the integration console (run iiq integration from the [IdentityIQ Installation Directory]/WEB-INF/bin directory).
This console can be used to test the various features of your connector including Aggregation and Provisioning.
The following presentation gives you clear understanding of custom connector development in detail.
