External authentication with Identity

External authentication with Identity

When Identity runs in apache-httpd, you can use external authentication methods that differ from the authentication provided by the identity store back end. For example, you can use an SQL identity back end together with X.509 authentication and Kerberos, instead of using the user name and password combination.

Use HTTPD authentication

Web servers, like Apache HTTP, support many methods of authentication. Identity can allow the web server to perform the authentication. The web server then passes the authenticated user to Identity by using the REMOTE_USER environment variable. This user must already exist in the Identity back end to get a token from the controller. To use this method, Identity should run on apache-httpd.

Use X.509

The following Apache configuration snippet authenticates the user based on a valid X.509 certificate from a known CA:

<VirtualHost _default_:5000>
    SSLEngine on
    SSLCertificateFile    /etc/ssl/certs/ssl.cert
    SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/ssl.key

    SSLCACertificatePath /etc/ssl/allowed_cas
    SSLCARevocationPath  /etc/ssl/allowed_cas
    SSLUserName          SSL_CLIENT_S_DN_CN
    SSLVerifyClient      require
    SSLVerifyDepth       10

    (...)
</VirtualHost>
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