Sun Microsystems 2005Q1 manual Security, Encryption, and Authentication

Security, Encryption, and Authentication

You can add additional servers and Gateways for site expansion. You can also configure the components of SRA in various ways based on your business requirements.

Security, Encryption, and Authentication

Portal Server system security relies on the HTTPS encryption protocol, in addition to UNIX system security, for protecting the Portal Server system software.

Security is provided by the web container, which you can configure to use SSL, if desired. Portal Server also supports SSL for authentication and end-user registration. By enabling SSL certificates on the web server, the Portal Desktop and other web applications can also be accessed securely. You can use the Access Manager policy to enforce URL-based access policy.

Portal Server depends on the authentication service provided by Sun Java System Access Manager and supports single sign-on (SSO) with any product that also uses the Access Manager SSO mechanism. The SSO mechanism uses encoded cookies to maintain session state.

Another layer of security is provided by SRA. It uses HTTPS by default for connecting the client browser to the intranet. The Gateway uses Rewriter to enable all intranet web sites to be accessed without exposing them directly to the Internet. The Gateway also provides URL-based access policy enforcement without having to modify the web servers being accessed.

Communication from the Gateway to the server and intranet resources can be HTTPS or HTTP. Communication within the Portal Server system, for example between web applications and the directory server, does not use encryption by default, but it can be configured to use SSL.

Portal Server Deployment Components

Portal Server deployment consists of the following components:

•IAccess Manager

Access Manager provides user and service management, authentication and single sign-on services, policy management, logging service, debug utility, the administration console, and client support interfaces for Portal Server. This consists of:

28 Portal Server 6 2005Q1 • Deployment Planning Guide