RE: [xacml-users] Handle Multiple Users/Subjects

From
Hal Lockhart <>
Date
2018-01-09T17:08:41+00:00
ID
cfc2ceab-61cc-453b-adf9-bad3dc916381@default
Thread
RE: [xacml-users] Handle Multiple Users/Subjects
Note that XACML supports multiple subject categories. Depending on your needs, the users can all be access subjects or one or more can be other subject categories, such as recipient-subject, intermediary-subject, codebase or requesting-machine. In principle, you can add your own if these are not sufficient. If you do need something else, the committee would like to hear about it.

 

Hal

 

From: David Brossard [mailto:] 
Sent: Tuesday, January 09, 2018 11:57 AM
To: Ludwig Seitz <>
Cc: 
Subject: Re: [xacml-users] Handle Multiple Users/Subjects

 

Hi Arno,

 

When you model your request, do you intend to ask:

Can Alice and Bob both do X? --> Permit

Can Alice do X? Can Bob do X? Permit, Permit

Can Alice who is also Bob do X? Permit

This will help us determine how you would model the authorization request and policies.

 

David

 

On Tue, Jan 9, 2018 at 10:40 AM, Ludwig Seitz <> wrote:

On 2018-01-09 17:14, Arno Appenzeller wrote:

Hi,

I’m researching about Multi User Authorisation and decided to work on a prototype with XACML.

In the Core Spec there is a paragraph about Multiple Subjects. But if I get it right it’s more about multiple Subjects in terms of one Access-Subject which uses a Programm (as another subject) to access resource X.

In my reserach I consider the scenario where Bob and Alice are both on one system and want to access a resource.
I have several ideas how to realise this but I’m not sure if I miss a fundamental point in XACML.

Is it supported that two access-subjects request one resource in a single request?

Best regards,

Arno

I am assuming that you are referring to XACML 3.0 in my answer, the answer might be a bit different for 2.0 (too lazy to think it through).

There is nothing in the standard to prohibit you from putting multiple access-subject attributes in the request, describing both Alice and Bob.

Note that you shouldn't put them in separate <Attributes> elements, since that would trigger the Multiple Decision Profile (if your implementation supports it).

The more tricky question is how to design the policies that handle these requests. You will probably not be able to do that with Target element alone, instead you will need to use Condition elements.

Hope this helps.

/Ludwig

-- 
Ludwig Seitz, PhD
Security Lab, RISE SICS
Phone +46(0)70-349 92 51

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