WAM session initiation

When a user authenticates, PingAccess applies your configured application and resource-level policies to the Web Access Management (WAM) request.

After completing policy evaluation and determining that the authenticated user should be granted access to a site, PingAccess performs any required token mediation between the backend site and the authenticated user. PingAccess then grants the user access to the site.

Processing steps:

When a user requests access to a web resource from PingAccess, PingAccess inspects the request for a PingAccess token.

If the PingAccess token is missing, PingAccess redirects the user to an OpenID Provider (OP) for authentication.

When using an OP, you must already have an OAuth client configured in PingAccess.

You can find more information on configuring an OAuth client within PingFederate in Configure PingFederate as the token provider for PingAccess and the Administrator’s Reference Guide in the PingFederate documentation.
You can find more information about configuring the OAuth client within PingAccess in Connect PingAccess to PingFederate.

The OP follows the appropriate authentication process, evaluates domain-level policies, and issues an OIDC ID token to PingAccess.

PingAccess validates the ID token and issues a PingAccess token and sends it to the browser in a cookie during a redirect to the original target resource.

After gaining access to the resource, PingAccess evaluates application and resource-level policies and can optionally audit the request.

PingAccess can perform token mediation by exchanging the PingAccess token for the appropriate security token from the PingFederate Security Token Service (STS) or from a cache if token mediation occurred recently.

PingAccess forwards the request to the target site.
PingAccess processes the response from the site to the browser (step not pictured).

You can find more information in the Session management configuration.