Docs
Mobile Identity Connect
Introduction
Mobile Identity Connect (MIC) is a service that bridges mobile applications with existing enterprise identity and single sign-on solutions. MIC enables mobile applications to integrate with a variety of identity solutions using a single OAuth2-based interface. This allows enterprise application developers to avoid the complexity of integrating these protocols into mobile, while providing enterprise IT the means to ensure that access to resources is secured only to authenticated users, as well as maintaining full control over a mobile user's identity.
Core Concepts
MIC Architecture
Mobile Identity Connect (MIC) is the authentication layer for connecting to mobile identity systems. It uses OAuth2 as its underlying identity protocol for connecting client applications. A client application uses OAuth2 to authenticate with the Kinvey Authentication Service. The service provides a login page or redirects to an existing SSO login page, allowing the client user to authenticate.
MIC's architecture enables multi-factor authentication (MFA) for mobile clients during the authentication process by exposing MFA controls through the login page.
Once authenticated, MIC retrieves a token from the underlying identity provider, encrypts it, and securely stores it for use in all future requests to access enterprise resources through Data Link connectors. A Mobile Identity Connect access token is returned to the client, along with an (optional) refresh token.
The client exchanges this token for a Kinvey session token. The Kinvey Cloud Service (KCS) then validates this token with MIC for all future requests from that session token. User credentials are not stored on the device and are never passed directly to KCS.
MIC maintains an internal time-to-live (TTL) for access and refresh tokens which is configured via the Kinvey management console. MIC will re-authenticate the user after the TTL expires which will cause the underlying authentication system to be asked to obtain any tokens again. The TTL should be configured to match the lifetime of the internal authentication.
MIC Architecture with Custom MIC Connector
Mobile Identity Connect offers many out of the box integrations, but when one is not available for your identity provider, you can develop a custom MIC connector to integrate with a host of custom identity systems, such as SSO cookies, database-based authentication, or authentication against a line of business application.
The custom connector sits between Kinvey and the identity system in question. Your adaptor needs to be responsible for verifying the credentials provided from MIC against the identity system. The adaptor is also responsible for obtaining any internal enterprise authentication tokens, such as SSO cookies, SAML assertions, OAuth tokens, or session tokens. Tokens passed back to MIC are stored in the encrypted MIC vault and provided to Kinvey data connectors (if you configure any) during normal Kinvey request processing.
All links controlled by Kinvey are encrypted using TLS. Links not controlled by Kinvey are expected to use TLS encryption for production deployments.
Keep in mind that SSO providers often store their own session data in cookies and logging out of Kinvey will clear the Kinvey session and refresh tokens from the local device. This, in turn, will cause subsequent requests that use these tokens to fail with a 401 Unauthorized response. However, SSO providers may independently retain their sessions through cookies, enabling a user to log in to the Kinvey app again through SSO without re-entering their password.
For instance, using Ping Identity with SAML-Redirect, the user will remain authenticated on the Ping Identity website after logging out of the associated Kinvey application. This would enable a user to log in to their Kinvey app after being logged out.
You need to implement you custom MIC connector as a FlexAuth service and similarly to any other Flex service, you can deploy it either in the Kinvey cloud as an internal Flex service or on infrastructure that you manage as an external Flex service.
Read the Flex Services guide to start off with Flex and the Flex SDK, or go directly to the FlexAuth section to learn how to write an auth service.
Single Sign on across multple Kinvey Mobile Apps
Applications developed with MIC can share authentication credentials between applications hosted on the same device when they use the same Auth Services. An access token granted by Mobile Identity Connect is valid for any environment that is using that specific Auth Service.
Configuring an Auth Service
When two applications share the MIC Auth Services, they can also share the access token between them. This allows a Single Sign On experience for a user on a single device. For example if an enterprise develops an expense reporting application and a separate field service management applications, users of the two apps will only need to log in to either app once to be logged in for both applications. The Kinvey mobile libraries support this feature by storing the access token in secure shared storage on the device. This is configured within Kinvey by using Auth Services on each environment from a shared scope, such as an Organization.
Configuration of Authentication Services is performed in the Service Catalog of the management console. To configure a connector to an Enterprise Identity Source, click the “Add a Service” button and and select "RapidAuth" from the service types and follow up by selecting the type of connector that you want to configure. This will take you to a configuration page with a form specific to each type of connector. See the following sections for details of each specific type of connector.
An auth-service can be created with a scope of a specific environment or at an Organization level. Organization level Auth-services may be used by any environment belonging to the organization. During configuration, the connector must be associated with an environment by selecting the appropriate application and then the environment. Enterprise customers may also choose to associate the connector with their Organization. A list of one or more connectors can be created for each environment or organization.
Configuring the Environment
Once at least one auth connector has been configured for an environment or an organization, it can be activated by navigating to the Mobile Identity Connect tab of the environment details view.
On this page the user can view the set of available services and switch between the environment set or the organization level set, if applicable. Additionally, the default connector can be selected from this view. The default connector is used in the authentication flow if the developer chooses to not specify an auth connector by ID when initiating the authentication flow
Connector Specific Configuration
SAML
Mobile Identity Connect supports SAML SP initiated SSO via POST-POST and Redirect-Post Bindings. Mobile Identity Connect does not support IdP-initiated SSO.
Configuring Kinvey
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth Service protocol to use, set this to SAML-Redirect or SAML-POST based on your IdP requirements. | Yes |
| Provider URI | The single sign-on service URL provided by the SAML Identity Provider | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth Grant | Yes |
| Logout URI | The Logout URI provided by the SAML Identity Provider | Yes |
| Certificate | The X.509 Certificate text provided by the SAML Identity Provider | Yes |
| Name ID Format URI | Aligns the expectations between the identity provider and Kinvey on the format of the user identity that is communicated. The identity provider specifies the user name or the identity of the authenticated user through the NameID attribute. The identity provider defines the format. The setting indicates what format Kinvey should expect from the Identity provider. If none is specified then the default format is "urn:oasis:names:tc:SAML:1.1:nameid-format:emailAddress" | No |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OAuth login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OAuth login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth grant is valid to obtain an OAuth token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
Configuring your SAML Identity Provider to accept Kinvey Requests
When configuring the SAML-Based SSO Identity Provider (IdP), the following information should be used.
https://<instance>-auth.kinvey.comYou can find your Instance ID on the dashboard of the Kinvey Console, next to your App Key and App Secret.
| Field | Description | Value |
|---|---|---|
| entityId | The unique SAML entityID for MIC. | https |
| Metadata URI | The single sign-on service URL provided by the SAML Identity Provider | https |
| Assertion Consumer Service | The SAML Assertion URI where SAML assertions will be passed to MIC by the IdP | https |
| Logout URL | The SAML logout URI | https |
The v1 entityID is kinvey-mobile-identity-connect while the v2+ entityID is https
If the version component is left out of the url, the v1 metadata will be served.
Kinvey does not directly support SSO Single Logout. The SAML identity provider should be accessed manually if single logout is required.
SAML Assertion Attributes
Kinvey supports the passing of SAML assertions to enterprise data sources through Data Link Connectors. Depending on the security requirements of your organization, different SAML attributes may be required for authorization purposes by your data sources. Mobile Identity Connect is configured to accept any attributes in the SAML assertion, and passes them through to any Data Link Connectors as-is.
OAuth2
Mobile Identity Connect supports Authorization Code and Resource Owner Password Credentials Authorization Grant credential types. See your OAuth2 provider administrator or Section 1.3 of the OAuth2 specification for more details.
Configuring Kinvey
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth Service protocol type to use, set this to OAuth2 | Yes |
| Provider URI | The token endpoint provided by the OAuth2 Provider | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI to be used by the client app - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth Grant | Yes |
| Grant Type | The OAuth2 Grant Type to be requested. Authorization Code and Resource Owner Password Credentials are supported. | Yes |
| Grant Endpoint | The OAuth 2.0 authorization grant endpoint provided by the OAuth2 provider | Yes |
| Client Id | The client id supplied by the OAuth2 provider | Yes |
| Client Secret | The client secret supplied by the OAuth2 provider | No |
| User Id Attribute | The attribute to be used to obtain the userId. If no User Id endpoint is supplied, the service will look for the specified attribute in the id_token attribute of the token response. If a User Id endpoint is supplied, a request will be made to that endpoint and the user id will be obtained from the specified attribute. | Yes |
| User Id Endpoint | An endpoint from which to obtain the user id, found in many OAuth2 implementations. Response must be in JSON format. If the URI for the endpoint requires an argument to use JSON, include it here. | No |
| Scope | Any scope attributes as defined by the OAuth2 provider | No |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OAuth login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OAuth login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth grant is valid to obtain an OAuth token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
Configuring your OAuth2 Identity Provider to accept Kinvey Requests
When configuring the OAuth2-Based SSO Identity Provider, the following information should be used.
https://<instance>-auth.kinvey.comYou can find your Instance ID on the dashboard of the Kinvey Console, next to your App Key and App Secret.
| Field | Description | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Redirect Uri | The URI to which the grant code will be sent. | https |
In addition, you should obtain a client id, client secret, authorization grant endpoint, and token endpoint from the administrator of your OAuth2 provider, along with the location of the userId attribute.
Refreshing expired Access Tokens
If a refresh_token is returned from the OAuth provider then it will be used to obtain a new token when the old one expires. This action is triggered when the client refreshes or validates the token provided by MIC. A failed refresh token response from the IdP will result in failure to refresh or validate the MIC access token.
OpenID Connect
Configuring Kinvey
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth service protocol type to use, set this to OpenID Connect | Yes |
| Provider URI | The token endpoint provided by the OpenID Connect Provider | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI to be used by the client app - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth 2.0 Grant | Yes |
| Grant Endpoint | The authorization grant endpoint provided by the OpenID Connect provider | Yes |
| Client Id | The client id supplied by the OpenID Connect provider | Yes |
| Client Secret | The client secret supplied by the OpenID Connect provider | No |
| Issuer Identifier | The issuer identifier supplied by the OpenID Connect provider | Yes |
| Scope | Any scope attributes as defined by the OpenID Connect provider. Include multiple scopes by inserting a space between each scope. You can include both OpenID Connect specific scopes (profile, email, address, phone) and custom scopes. | No |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OpenID Connect login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OpenID Connect login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth 2.0 grant is valid to obtain an OAuth 2.0 token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth 2.0 token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth 2.0 refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth 2.0 refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
Configuring your OpenID Connect Identity Provider to accept Kinvey Requests
When configuring the OpenID Connect SSO Identity Provider, the following information should be used.
https://<instance>-auth.kinvey.comYou can find your Instance ID on the dashboard of the Kinvey Console, next to your App Key and App Secret.
| Field | Description | Value |
|---|---|---|
| Redirect Uri | The URI to which the grant code will be sent. | https |
In addition, you should obtain a client id, client secret, authorization grant endpoint, token endpoint and issuer identifier from the administrator of your OpenID Connect provider.
Refreshing expired Access Tokens
If a refresh_token is returned from the OIDC provider then it will be used to obtain a new token when the old one expires. This action is triggered when the client refreshes or validates the token provided by MIC. A failed refresh token response from the IdP will result in failure to refresh or validate the MIC access token.
Active Directory
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth service protocol to use, set this to Active Directory | Yes |
| Provider URI | The Active Directory URI | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth Grant | Yes |
| Base DN | The Active Directory base DN | Yes |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OAuth login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OAuth login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth grant is valid to obtain an OAuth token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
LDAP
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth service protocol to use, set this to LDAP | Yes |
| Provider URI | The LDAP URI | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth Grant | Yes |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OAuth login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OAuth login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth grant is valid to obtain an OAuth token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
SAML-WRAP
In the Kinvey console Auth Service configuration, the following fields should be filled in:
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Type of Provider | Auth service protocol to use, set this to SAML-WRAP | Yes |
| Provider URI | The URI of the WRAP API | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | The OAuth 2.0 redirect URI - this should be configured to a Callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth Grant | Yes |
| WRAP Scope | The requested scope as provided by your IdP | Yes |
| Do not customize the login experience | Do not use any customization for the OAuth login page | No |
| Use a custom CSS stylesheet for the login page | Use a CSS file to customize the look-and-feel of the OAuth login page (specify the URL of the stylesheet) | No |
| Use a custom login page that I will host | Use a login page hosted outside of Kinvey for the login page (specify the URL of the hosted login page) | No |
| Grant TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth grant is valid to obtain an OAuth token | No |
| Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth token is accepted before requiring a new login or refresh | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | Enable OAuth refresh token support | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | The time (in seconds) that an OAuth refresh token is accepted | No |
| Allowed Attributes | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | See the section on attributes and mappings | Yes |
Facebook Auth
Mobile Identity Connect supports version 3.0 of the Facebook Graph API for Identity Provider (IdP) purposes.
Configuring Kinvey
Complete these steps to create and set up a Facebook Auth connector:
- In the Kinvey Console, go to the Apps tab and select an app environment.
- Go to Identity > Mobile Identity Connect.
- Click Add Auth Service.
- Select the Facebook Auth type.
- Fill in the settings as indicated below and click Save Service.
| Field | Description | Required? |
|---|---|---|
| Name | Arbitrary name. Appears in the list of services. Note that duplicate names are allowed. | Yes |
| Description | Explanatory text to help you distinguish this service easier. | No |
| Scope (generic) | Limits the visibility of the service to the selected domain: app environment or organization. | Yes |
| Redirect URI's | IdP's authorization endpoint to be used by the client app. Should be configured to a callback URI that will be used to pass the OAuth grant. | Yes |
| Client Id | Client ID supplied by Facebook. | Yes |
| Client Secret | Client secret supplied by Facebook. | No |
| User Id Attribute | Attribute name to use as a unique identifier. Once set, changing it can produce duplicate Kinvey user accounts and is not recommended. Overwrites any value set through Unique User Context Field. | Yes |
| Scope (OAuth) | User attributes to request from Facebook with the initial authorization request. The user can prohibit Facebook from sending these. | No |
| Unique user context field | Attribute name from the OAuth access token to use as a unique identifier. If left blank, the username is used. Once set, changing it can produce duplicate Kinvey user accounts and is not recommended. The User ID Attribute value overwrites this value if set. | |
| Grant TTL | How much time the client has to obtain an OAuth access token. Default is 10 s. | No |
| Token TTL | How much time before requiring a new login or token refresh. Default is 3600 s. | No |
| Allow Refresh Tokens | When the OAuth access token expires, you can request a token refresh instead of reauthenticating the user. | No |
| Refresh Token TTL | For how long the refresh tokens is accepted. The user will have to reauthenticate after that. Default is 1209600 s (14 days). | No |
| Allowed Attributes | Attributes that the client is allowed to request from Kinvey after Kinvey reads all user data from Facebook. See Attributes and Mappings. | Yes |
| Data Link Header Mappings | Allows you to map attributes to custom Kinvey headers. See Attributes and Mappings. | Yes |
Configuring Facebook
Set your Facebook app to allow a redirect URI used internally by Kinvey. Log in to your Facebook developer account, open the app, go to Facebook Login > Settings> Valid OAuth Redirect URIs, and enter the following URI:
https://auth.kinvey.com/facebook/redirecthttps://<instance>-auth.kinvey.comYou can find your Instance ID on the dashboard of the Kinvey Console, next to your App Key and App Secret.
Attributes and Mappings
The Allowed Attributes and Data Link Header Mappings settings in the Kinvey Console connector configuration control how enterprise authentication tokens are sent to a data link connector. The attributes id and audience must be included in this section. Click “Add an allowed attribute, and enter the properties.
To send any of these attributes to a data link connector a Data Link Header Mapping is required. Click “Add a header mapping …” and enter client_token as the key and X-Kinvey-Auth as the value. Data link requests will have a header named X-Kinvey-Auth containing the token as a Base64 encoded string.
Authenticating with Mobile Identity Connect
Clients authenticate with Kinvey’s MIC using the OAuth 2.0 protocol. Complete documentation of the OAuth 2.0 protocol is detailed by the IETF.
Information about Refresh Tokens can be found at http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc6749#section-1.5.
All OAuth implementations authenticate the user and return a grant code via a redirect callback URI. For native applications (Android, iOS and Xamarin) the Redirect URI can be any valid URI, record the value and use it during the normal OAuth flow. For hybrid applications (PhoneGap, etc) follow the framework guides for intercepting redirects and use the same Redirect URL as specified in the console. For web applications choose the Redirect URL where the web app listens for OAuth grants.
Making MIC Requests
By default, all requests to Mobile Identity Connect use the base URL of https://auth.kinvey.com/. If you are using a dedicated instance of Kinvey, you need to set the Instance ID to modify the base URL.
You can find your Instance ID on the dashboard of the Kinvey Console, next to your App Key and App Secret.
Client.Builder builder = new Client
.Builder(your_app_key, your_app_secret)
.SetInstanceID("<Your Instance ID");
Client kinveyClient = builder.Build();Selecting an Auth Service
The OAuth2 Spec uses the notion of a client identifier to recognize the application that is accessing the identity service. For Kinvey mobile applications, the client id value is either the App Key from the environment or a combination of the App Key and an Auth Service ID value.
The Auth Service Id is displayed on the Auth Service Listing in the MIC section of the environment. See the following image for an example of where to obtain the Auth Service Id.
If your application only has a single MIC Auth Service configured, you don't need to take additional steps.
When you are using multiple Auth Service configurations, you can control which Auth Service is selected by providing a specific Auth Service ID. If you fail to provide an Auth Service ID, MIC uses the service marked as Default in the Console.
The MIC login function accepts an additional authServiceId parameter for the Auth Service ID. Specifying an Auth Service ID is always optional.
await User.LoginWithMIC(
myUsername,
myPassword,
"myRedirectURI://", authServiceId, kinveyClient
);Specifying API Version
You may need to change the MIC API version used to authenticate with Mobile Identity Connect to enable some MIC features and authentication flows. The default MIC API version is v3.
The code snippet below sets the MIC API version on Client instance level.
Client.SharedClient.MICApiVersion = "v2";