Chapter 4 Common Scenarios Using ACS

RADIUS and TACACS+ Proxy Requests

During proxying, ACS:

1.Receives the following packets from the NAS and forwards them to the remote RADIUS server:

Access-Request

Accounting-Request packets

2.Receives the following packets from the remote RADIUS server and returns them to the NAS:

Access-Accept

Access-Reject

Access-Challenge

Accounting-Response

3.Receives the following packets from the NAS and forwards them to the remote TACACS+ server:

TAC_PLUS_AUTHOR

TAC_PLUS_AUTHEN

4.Receives the following packets from the remote TACACS+ server and returns them back to the NAS: This behavior is configurable.

TAC_PLUS_ACCT

An unresponsive external RADIUS server waits for about timeout * number of retries seconds before failover to move to the next server.

There could be several unresponsive servers in the list before the first responsive server is reached. In such cases, each request that is forwarded to a responsive external RADIUS server is delayed for number of previous unresponsive servers * timeout * number of retries.

This delay can sometimes be longer than the external RADIUS server timeout between two messages in EAP or RADIUS conversation. In such a situation, the external RADIUS server would drop the request.

We can configure the number of seconds for an unresponsive external TACACS+ server waits before failover to move to the next server.

Related Topics

Supported Protocols, page 4-30

Supported RADIUS Attributes, page 4-31

Configuring Proxy Service, page 4-32

Supported Protocols

The RADIUS proxy feature in ACS supports the following protocols:

Supports forwarding for all RADIUS protocols

All EAP protocols

Protocols not supported by ACS (Since ACS proxy do not interfere into the protocol conversation and just forwards requests)

Note ACS proxy can not support protocols that use encrypted RADIUS attributes.

 

User Guide for Cisco Secure Access Control System 5.3

4-30

OL-24201-01

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Cisco Systems OL-24201-01 manual Supported Protocols, Tacplusauthor Tacplusauthen, Tacplusacct