I'm trying to implement SSO using Atlassian Crowd, and there's a surprising lack of good documentation or even examples out there.
So far, I authenticate a user using CrowdClient.authenticateSSOUser, and get back a SSO Token (String) if successful. Then, I take this token and stuff it in the cookies myself (via HttpServletResponse). On subsequent page visits, I grab all the cookies, search for this one, and then call the CrowdClient.validateSSOAuthentication method on it.
My question is this: Am I supposed to be using more Crowd code for SSO? I seem to be doing more manually than I'd expect.
...I DO see hints of other possibilities out there... For example:
In crowd.properties, you can specify a crowd.token_key, which is apparently what name the app should use store the token in a cookie (though setting this value doesn't magically make that happen).
Things like the CrowdHttpTokenHelper exist in the latest version - yet seem to have no easily-found related examples (or documentation other than JavaDoc).
Yes, there are possibilities out there that will hopefully help or at least serve as reference.
For a readily available implementation, you might want to look into Integrating Crowd with Spring Security.
If you need finer control, use a CrowdHttpAuthenticator. It will allow you to authenticate a request with a username and password as well as check if a session has an existing session cookie. (Its concrete implementation will accept properties and uses crowd.token_key.)
CrowdClient is available if these don't fit your needs, but it's not the only option.
Related
Actually I have an API called update user data, it is called when the user moves from one page to another page. If the user copy the API from console and post in postman, user should not able to update the user data. How to provide security or implement feature to not to update data through post man.
You really can't.
You can slightly make it harder using some CSRF protection, but that's just it - it will only make it a bit harder, but not stop anyone determined.
If your API is public, you should be ready for your users to have custom client apps.
I am a bit confused by your question. Because PostMan or other applications like Fiddler are created to make the job easier for developers during development. anyhow if you are concern about who makes call to your webpage, you can make your API private and just give access to the user that have the right credentials. You can also read about CSRF or XSS.
My task is to implement a resource server(RS) for IdentityServer4(IS4). The RS should fetch data from a database and send the necessary information as a json object back to the caller (client). This is needed because we have to return complex objects.
I already setup IS4 succesfully and its already running in Docker for testing purpose. I also setup the needed database.
My understanding of the flow would be, the user requests data from the RS sending the access-token, the RS then validates the token, checking if the caller is allowed to access the api using the IS4, if everything is okay the RS returns the data to the caller.
My problem is, as I'm new to this subject, how would I implement a RS? Do I create an API which is added as a scope to the user? Or is there a RS already implemented in IS4?
So yes you'll need to write your own API to serve your own resources, IdentityServer will only manage your identities for you (as well as handling external logins if that's what you need). I'd recommend going to the IdentityServer docs and working through the quick starts in order as shown below:
This will give you a good start but you'll then need to go away and research APIs more generally, there's a tonne of good info online about building (RESTful) APIs. You may find it useful to sign up to something like PluralSight and work through a couple of their courses, they're often very good.
One other thing to bear in mind is that IdentityServer is for identity, in other words Authentication and not specifically for Authorisation so you may need to add something for this. You can of course use a users identity for authorisation purposes but in most cases you'll probably need to augment the info you store about their identity to authorise them for access. See this link for more info around this topic.
What options are available for authentication of an MVC3 Web API application that is to be consumed by a JQuery app from another domain?
Here are the constraints/things I've tried so far:-
I don't want to use OAuth; for private apps with limited user bases I cannot expect end users to have their accounts on an existing provider and there is no scope to implement my own
I've had a fully functioning HMAC-SHA256 implemention working just fine using data passed in headers; but this doesn't work in IE because CORS in IE8/9 is broken and doesn't allow you to send headers
I require cross-domain as the consuming app is on a different domain to the API, but can't use jsonp becuase it doesn't allow you to use headers
I'd like to avoid a token (only) based approach, as this is open to replay and violates REST by being stateful
At this point I'm resigned to a HMAC-SHA256 approach that uses either the URL or querystring/post to supply the hash and other variables.
Putting these variables in the URL just seems dirty, and putting them in the querystring/post is a pain.
I was succesfully using the JQuery $.ajaxSetup beforeSend option to generate the hash and attach it to the headers, but as I mentioned you can't use headers with IE8/9.
Now I've had to resort to $.ajaxPrefilter because I can't change the ajax data in beforeSend, and can't just extend data in $.ajaxSetup because I need to dynamically calculate values for the hash based on the type of ajax query.
$.ajaxPrefilter is also an issue because there is no clean/simple way to add the required variables in such a way that is method agnostic... i.e. it has to be querystring for GET and formdata for POST
I must be missing something because I just cannot find a solution that:-
a) supports cross-domain
a) not a massive hack on both the MVC and JQuery sides
c) actually secure
d) works with IE8/9
There has to be someone out there doing this properly...
EDIT
To clarify, the authentication mechanism on the API side is fine... no matter which way I validate the request I generate a GenericPrincipal and use that in the API (the merits of this are for another post, but it does allow me to use the standard authorization mechanisms in MVC, which I prefer to rolling my own... less for other developers on my API to learn and maintain)
The problem lies primarly in the transfer of authentication information from the client to the API:-
- It can't rely on server/API state. So I can't pass username/password in one call, get a token back and then keep using that token (open to replay attack)
- Anything that requires use of request headers is out, because IE uses XDR instead of XHR like the rest of the browsers, and it doesn't support custom headers (I know IE10 supports XHR, but realistically I need IE8+ support)
- I think I'm stuck generating a HMAC and passing it in the URL somewhere (path or querystring) but this seems like a hack because I'm using parts of the request not designed for this
- If I use the path there is a lot of messy parsing because at a minimum I have to pass a username, timestamp and hash with each request; these need to be delimited somehow and I have little control over delimiters being used in the rest of the url
- If I use data (querystring/formdata) I need to change the place I'm sending my authentication details depending on the method I'm using (formdata for POST/PUT/etc and querystring for GET), and I'm also polution the application layer data space with these vars
As bad as it is, the querystring/formdata seems the best option; however now I have to work out how to capture these on each request. I can use a MessageHandler or Filter, but neither provide a convienient way to access the formdata.
I know I could just write all the parsing and handling stuff myself (and it looks like I will) but the point is I can't believe that there isn't a solution to this already. It's like I have (1) support for IE, (2) secure and (3) clean code, and I can only pick two.
Your requirements seem a little bit unjustified to me. You can't ever have everything at the same time, you have to be willing to give something up. A couple of remarks:
OAuth seems to be what you want here, at least with some modifications. You can use Azure's Access Control Service so that you don't have to implement your own token provider. That way, you have "outsourced" the implementation of a secure token provider. Last I checked Azure ACS was still free. There is a lot of clutter when you look for ACS documentation because people mostly use it to plug into another provider like Facebook or Google, but you can tweak it to just be a token provider for your own services.
You seem to worry a lot about replay attacks. Replay attacks almost always are a possibility. I have to just listen to the data passing the wire and send it to your server, even over SSL. Replay attacks are something you need to deal with regardless. Typically what I do is to track a cache of coming requests and add the hash signature to my cache. If I see another request with the same hash within 5 minutes, I ignore it. For this to work, I add the timestamp (millisecond granularity) of the request and some derivative of the URL as my hash parameters. This allows one operation per millisecond to the same address from the same client without the request being marked as replay attack.
You mentioned jQuery which puzzles me a bit if you are using the hashing method. That would mean you actually have your hash algorithm and your signature logic on the client. That's a serious flaw because by just inspecting javascript, I can now know exactly how to sign a request and send it to your server.
Simply said; there is not much special in ASP.NET WebAPI when it comes to authentication.
What I can say is that if you are hosting it inside ASP.NET you'll get support by ASP.NET for the authentication and authorization. In case you have chosen for self-hosting, you will have the option to enable WCF Binding Security options.
When you host your WebAPI in ASP.NET, you will have several authentication options:
Basic Authentication
Forms Authentication - e.g. from any ASP.Net project you can enable Authentication_JSON_AppService.axd in order to the forms authentication
Windows Authentication - HttpClient/WebHttpRequest/WebClient
Or explicitly allow anonymous access to a method of your WebAPI
I have a Facebook canvas app. I am using the JS SDK to authenticate the user on the browser-side and request various information via FB.api (e.g. name, friends, etc.).
I also want to persist some additional user information (not held on Facebook) to the database on my server by making an ajax call:
{ userFavouriteColour: "Red" }
To save this on the server and associate with the correct user, I need to know the Facebook uid and this presents a problem. How do I pass the uid from the client to the server.
Option 1: Add uid to the ajax request:
{ uid: "1234567890",
userFavouriteColour: "Red" }
This is obviously no good. It would be trivial for anyone to make an ajax request to my web service using someone else's Facebook Id and change their favourite colour.
Option 2: On the server, extract the uid from a cookie:
Is this even possible? I have read that Facebook sets a cookie containing the uid and access token but do I have access to this cookie on my domain? More importantly, can I securely extract the uid form the cookie or is this open to spoofing just like option 1.
Option 3: User server-side authentication on the server:
I could use the server-side authentication to validate the user identity on my server. But will this work if I am already using client-side authentication on the browser? Will I end up with two different access tokens? I would like to make FB.api requests from the browser so I need the access token on the client (not just on the server).
This must be a very common scenario so I think I'm missing something fundamental. I have read a lot of the Facebook documentation (various authentication flows, access tokens, signed_request, etc.) and many posts on SO, but I still don't understand how client-side authentication and server-side authentication play nicely together.
In short, I want to know the user's identity on the server but still make requests to the Facebook api from the client browser?
(I am using ASP.NET and the Facebook C# SDK on the server)
EDIT: Added bounty. I was hoping to get a more deifnitive, official recommendation on how to handle this situation, or even an example. As said, I have already read a lot of the official FB docs on authentication flows but I still can't find anything definitive on how client-side and server-side authentication work together.
Option 1:
The easiest way I can think of is to include the accessToken in JS and pass it with the ajax call.
Option 2:
Using the same as option 1, but instead of sending just the accessToken, send the signedRequest.
On the server side you can decode it using (TryParseSignedRequest method) which will give you the UserID :-)
Note: signedRequest is encrypted with the application Secret. you are the only one who should know it, so you are safe on that end.
Disclaimer:
I have no coding experience in C#, but a little search in google gave me this:
Facebook C# SDK for ASP.NET
Making AJAX Requests with the Facebook C# SDK
It's very simple actually.
When the user loads you app use the server side authentication, get the access token and load the user data by issuing an api request from the server.
On the server side you'll have everything you need and it's sandboxed.
When the page renders for the user, using the js sdk get the user authentication data, you should be able to use FB.getLoginStatus since the user already went through the server side authentication.
Now on the client side you also have an access token which you can use to get the user data from the graph api.
The two tokens will be different, and will also have different expiration, but that should not be a problem, both token should work properly as you'd expect them to.
Since both sides have their own token and a way to make requests to the api, there's no need to send any fb data between them.
So the 3rd option you mentioned, to me, sounds the best, and it's really simple to implement that too.
Edit
All facebook SDKs are just wrappers for http request since the entire fb api is made on http requests.
The SDKs just give you easy and shorter access to the data with out the need to build the url yourself (with all the different possible parameters), make the request and parse the response.
To be completely honest, I think that stop providing a way for the C# SDK to support server side authentication is a very bad decision.
What's the point in providing a SDK which does not implement the entire api?
The best answer to your question, from my experience, is to use both server and client side authentication, and since the C# SDK does not support it, my advice to you is to create your own SDK.
It's not complicated at all, I already implemented it for python and java (twice), and since you'll be developing it for your own needs it can be tailored for your exact needs, unlike a public SDK which should support all possible options.
2nd Edit
There's no need to create a completely new SDK, you can just "extend" the ones you're using and add the missing parts that you need, like sever side authentication support.
I don't know if it's language specific but using both server-side and client-side authentication does no harm.
You can work on option 2 but yes, that will be also vulnerable to spoofing.
Doing option 3, you will be having a single access token for that user session, so that would be the best choice according to me since you always have chance of spoofing when passing user information from client side.
I had exactly the same question recently. It's option 2. Check this post from the Facebook blog.
To be honest I am not enough of a hacker to know if you could spoof the UID in the cookie, but this seems to be the 'official' way to do it.
EDIT: to the other question under option 2, yes, I believe you have to access this cookie on your domain.
I'm developing a small CMS in PHP and we're putting on social integration.
The content is changed by a single administrator who as right for publishing news, events and so on...
I'd to add this feature, when the admin publishes something it's already posted on facebook wall. I'm not very familiar with facebook php SDK, and i'm a little bit confused about it.
If (make it an example) 10 different sites are using my CMS, do I have to create 10 different facebook application? (let's assume the 10 websites are all in different domains and servers)
2nd, is there a way for authenticating with just PHP (something like sending username&password directly) so that the user does not need to be logged on facebook?
thanks
You might want to break up your question in to smaller understandable units. Its very difficult to understand what you are driving at.
My understanding of your problem could be minimal, but here goes...
1_ No you do not create 10 different facebook application. Create a single facebook application and make it a service entry point. So that all your cms sites could talk to this one site to interact with facebook. ( A REST service layer).
2_ Facebook api does not support username and password authentication. They only support oauth2.0. Although Oauth is not trivial, but since they have provided library for that, implementing authentication is pretty trivial.
Please read up on http://developers.facebook.com/docs/.
Its really easy and straight forward and well explained.
Your question is so vague and extensive that it cannot be answered well here.
If you experience any specific implementation problems, this is the right place.
However to answer atleast a part of your question:
The most powerful tool when working with facebook applications is the Graph API.
Its principle is very simple. You can do almonst any action on behalf of any user or application. You have to generate a token first that identifies the user and the proper permissions. Those tokens can be made "permanent" so you can do background tasks. Usually they are only active a very short time so you can perform actions while interacting with the user. The process of generating tokens involves the user so that he/she has to confirm the privileges you are asking for.
For websites that publish something automatically you would probably generate a permanent token one time that is active as long as you remove the app in your privacy settings.
Basically yuo can work with any application on any website. There is no limitation. However there are two ways of generating tokens. One involves on an additional request and one is done client side, which is bound to one domain oyu specifiedin your apps settings.
Addendum:
#ArtoAle
you are right about every app beeing assighend to exactly one domain. however once you obtained a valid token it doesnt matter from where or who you use it within the graph api.
let me expalin this a little bit:
it would make no sense since it is you doing the request. there is no such thing as "where the request is coming from". of course there is the "referer" header information, but it can be freely specified and is not used in any context of this.
the domain you enter in your apps settings only restricts where facebook redirects the user to.
why?
this ensures that some bad guy cannot set up a website on any domain and let the user authorize an app and get an access token with YOUR application.
so this setting ensures that the user and the access token are redirected back to YOUR site and not to another bad site.
but there is an alternative. if you use the control flow for desktop applications you don't get an access token right after the user has been redirected back. you get a temporary SESSION-TOKEN that you can EXCCHANGE for an access token. this exchange is done server side over the REST api and requires your application secret. So at this point it is ensured that it is YOU who gets the token.
This method can be done on any domain or in case of desktop applications on no domain at all.
This is a quote from the faceboo docs:
To convert sessions, send a POST
request to
https://graph.facebook.com/oauth/exchange_sessions
with a comma-separated list of
sessions you want to convert:
curl client_id=your_app_id \
-F client_secret=your_app_secret \
-F sessions=2.DbavCpzL6Yc_XGEI0Ip9GA__.3600.1271649600-12345,2.aBdC...
\
https://graph.facebook.com/oauth/exchange_sessions
The response from the request is a
JSON array of OAuth access tokens in
the same order as the sessions given:
[ {
"access_token": "...",
"expires": 1271649600, }, ... ]
However you don't need this method as its a bit more complex. For your use case i would suggest using a central point of authorization.
So you would specify your ONE domain as a redirect url. This domain is than SHARED between your websites. there you can obtain the fully valid access token and seamlessly redirect the user back to your specific project website and pass along the access token.
This way you can use the traditional easy authentication flow that is probably also more future proof.
The fact remains. Once the access token is generated you can perform any action from any domain, there is no difference as ther is literally no "domain" where the request is coming from (see above).
apart from that, if you want some nice javascript features to work - like the comments box or like button, you need to setup up open graph tags correctly.
if you have some implementation problems or as you said "domain errors" please describe them more clearly, include the steps you made and if possible an error message.