SELECTIVE AUTHORIZATION BASED ON AUTHENTICATION INPUT ATTRIBUTES

• US 20090178129A1
• Filed: 01/04/2008
• Published: 07/09/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/04/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Shekel, Oded Ye, Luther, Andreas, Leach, Paul J., Jones, Thomas C., Novak, Mark F., Cross, David B.
• Granted Patent: US 8,621,561 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 726/10
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 63/0807 using tickets, e.g. Kerberos cryptographic mechanisms or cryptographic arrangements for entity authentication using tickets or tokens H04L9/3213
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3213 using tickets or tokens, e.g. Kerberos network architectures or network communication protocols for entities authentication using tickets in a packet data network H04L63/0807
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3226 using a predetermined code, e.g. password, passphrase or PIN network architectures or network communication protocols for supporting authentication of entities using passwords in a packet data network H04L63/083
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/3263 involving certificates, e.g. public key certificate [PKC] or attribute certificate [AC]; Public key infrastructure [PKI] arrangements network architectures or network communication protocols for supporting authentication of entities using certificates in a packet data network H04L63/0823

Abstract

Embodiments for providing differentiated access based on authentication input attributes are disclosed. In accordance with one embodiment, a method includes receiving an authentication input at an authentication authority using an authentication protocol. The authentication input being associated with a client. The method also includes providing one or more representations for the authentication input, wherein each of the representations represents an attribute of the authentication input.

Claims

1. A method, comprising:

receiving an authentication input at an authentication authority using an authentication protocol, the authentication input being associated with a client; and

providing one or more representations for the authentication input, each of the representations representing an attribute of the authentication input.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving an access request from a client at a server, the access request including the one or more representations of the authentication input;

comparing the one or more representations against an authorization policy accessible to the server; and

granting access to a resource if the one or more representations meet requirements of the authorization policy.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising returning a token to the client using the authentication protocol, the token includes the one or more representations created from the validated authentication input, wherein receiving an access request includes receiving a token that includes the one or more representations.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the authentication authority includes a Kerberos Key Distribution Center (KDC) in a Windows-based network and the tokens include Kerberos ticket granting tickets (TGTs), and wherein the representations are contained in the Privilege Attribute Certificate (PAC) of the Kerberos TGTs.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein the authentication input includes at least one of a strength attribute, a type attribute, and a type attribute.

6. The method of claim 2, further comprising notifying the client of an access grant to the resource.

7. The method of claim 2, wherein the authorization policy provides different access levels based on representations, and wherein granting access to a server includes grant a specific access level based on one or more attributes represented by the one or more representations.

8. The method of claim 5, wherein the authentication input includes at least one of a password, a hardware identity certificate, or a software identity certificate, and wherein the type attribute is configured to identify the authentication input as including at least one of a password, a hardware-based input, or a software-based input.

9. The method of claim 5, wherein the strength attribute is configured to identify one of a permutational complexity of a password or a cryptographic complexity of an identity certificate.

10. The method of claim 5, wherein the type attribute is configured to identify the authentication input as being obtained by one of a face-to-face request, a local network request, or a remote network request.

11. The method of claim 2, wherein the authorization policy is stored in one of a local location or a networked remote location.

12. The method of claim 2, wherein the server is a Windows-based server, and the local location is an Active Directory located on the Windows-based server.

13. The method of claim 2, wherein the resource is one of an operating system, an application, or a service on a resource server.

14. The method of claim 2, wherein comparing the one or more representations includes using at least one of an application, an operating system, a resource manager, or an authorization system to compare the one or more representations against an authorization policy.

15. The method of claim 2, wherein at least one of the representations and the authorization policy is formatted in one of Abstract Syntax Notation number One (ASN. 1), Extensible Markup Language (XML), or eXtensible rights Markup Language (XrML).

16. A computer readable medium having computer-executable instructions that, when executed, perform acts comprising:

receiving an authentication input at an authentication authority using an authentication protocol, the authentication input being associated with a client; and

returning a token to the client using the authentication protocol, the token includes one or more representations, wherein each claim represents an attribute of the authentication input.

17. The computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the representations include representations that are represented by one of Object Identifiers (OlDs), Globally Unique Identifiers (GUIDs), Security Identifiers (SIDs), and strong representations.

18. The computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the tokens include authorization tokens, service tokens, or Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) tokens.

19. The computer readable medium of claim 16, wherein the authentication protocol is one a NT LAN Manager (NTLM) protocol, a Kerberos protocol, a Web Services (WS)-security protocol, a Public Key Cryptography for Initial Authentication in Kerberos (PKINIT) protocol, a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol, and a Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol.

20. A system, the system comprising:

one or more processors; and

memory to store a plurality of computer-executable instructions for execution by the one or more processors, the computer-executable instructions comprising;

receiving an authentication input at an authentication authority using an authentication protocol, wherein the authentication input is associated with a client; and

providing one or more representations for the authentication input, wherein each of the representations represents an attribute of the authentication input.