On systems where the BINDING_ATTR value has been changed should the USERID_ATTR value also be changed?
3 years ago
Originally Published: 2004-01-16
Article Number
000061392
Applies To
RSA Mobile 1.5 Authentication Server
RSA Mobile 1.5
Microsoft Windows 2000 Server SP3
Issue
On systems where the BINDING_ATTR value has been changed, should the USERID_ATTR value also be changed?
Resolution
configtool ADDFULLADMIN cannot add a user value.

Some information regarding the definitions may be found on page 117 of the RSA Mobile 1.5 Planning Deployment and Installation guide, where it explains what the values are, but the true nature of the value may not be apparent.

RSA Mobile has the concept of a "userid", a value an end user types at a login screen when they visit a Web site protected by RSA Mobile. RSA Mobile needs to know how to find this value inside its datastore, and so has a mapping to some value in the store by means of the "USERID_ATTR".

It is very likely that the "cn" value you are creating users with in the directory server will match what you want for RSA Mobile login IDs. Therefore, it is correct that changing to "USERID_ATTR=cn" is a good idea. However, it is possible that in the directory server, users will look as follows:

        dn: cn=John Doe, ou=RSAMobileUsers, o=Acme Banking Corp
        cn=John Doe
        Surname=Doe
        Firstname=John
        uid=jdoe

Here, the directory server (and maybe other applications including the Administrator names in RSA Mobile) generate names with a "friendly" cn value. However, also notice that a uid value has been created by an administrator at the same time, specifically to set as "loginID" for any applications that want a short value.

As another example, lets say users will login using a back account number - you might have this:

        USERID_ATTR=account
        BINDING_ATTR=cn

And a user set up in the directory server like this:

        dn: cn=John Doe, ou=RSAMobileUsers, o=Acme Banking Corp
        cn=John Doe
        Surname=Doe
        Firstname=John
        account=0098573532904

So the directory server would see you as "cn=John Doe, ou=RSAMobileUsers, o=Acme Banking Corp". If you were an RSA mobile administrator, you would have been added as:

        configtool ADMINFULLADMIN John Doe

But if you connected to a Web site, your userID on the Web page would be "0098573532904".