PingAccess

Enabling or disabling basic authentication

Configure basic authentication for the administrative user interface in PingAccess.

About this task

The authentication default for the PingAccess admin console is HTTP Basic Authentication. Basic Authentication uses the HTTP Authorization header to transmit the username and password credentials. The PingAccess server response contains a PA_UI cookie, which is a signed JSON Web Token (JWT). Subsequent HTTP requests send this cookie for authentication rather than the less secure HTTP Authorization header.

Basic Authentication supports only one user, the administrator. If multiple users must access the admin UI, you should use single sign-on (SSO) authentication. The Administrator username can’t be changed.

Steps

  • To configure basic authentication for the admin UI:

    1. Click Settings, then go to Admin Authentication > UI Authentication.

    2. In the Authentication Method section:

      Choose from:

      • To enable basic authentication, click Basic Authentication.

      • To disable basic authentication and use SSO instead, click Single Sign-On.

        To define a fallback administrator authentication method if the OIDC token provider is unreachable, enable the admin.auth=native property in the run.properties file. This overrides any configured administrative authentication to basic authentication.

    3. Click Save.

    Learn more in Admin UI SSO authentication.

  • To configure basic authentication for the admin API:

    1. Click Settings, then go to Admin Authentication > API Authentication.

    2. In the Enable section, select the Basic Authentication checkbox to enable basic authentication, or deselect the checkbox to disable it.

      Basic and OAuth authentication can be enabled at the same time.

    3. Click Save.

    Learn more in Configuring API authentication.

Changing the password for basic authentication

Change the password used for basic authentication in PingAccess.

Steps

  1. Click Settings, then go to Admin Authentication > Basic.

  2. Enter the current administrator password.

  3. Enter and confirm the new password.

    The new password must meet the configured password complexity rules defined in pa.admin.user.password.regex in run.properties.

  4. Click Save.