WebSphere Application Server extends the Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE) security role-based access control to protect the product administrative and naming subsystems.
A number of administrative roles are defined to provide the degrees of authority that are needed to perform certain WebSphere Application Server administrative functions from either the administrative console or the system management scripting interface called wsadmin. The authorization policy is only enforced when administrative security is enabled. The following table describes the administrative roles:
Role | Description |
---|---|
Monitor | An individual or group that uses
the monitor role has the least amount of privileges. A monitor can complete
the following tasks:
|
Configurator | An individual or group that uses
the configurator role has the monitor privilege plus the ability to change
the WebSphere Application Server configuration. The configurator can perform
all the day-to-day configuration tasks. For example, a configurator can complete
the following tasks:
|
Operator | An individual or group that uses
the operator role has monitor privileges plus ability to change the runtime
state. For example, an operator can complete the following tasks:
|
Administrator | An individual or group that uses
the administrator role has the operator and configurator privileges plus additional
privileges that are granted solely to the administrator role. For example,
an administrator can complete the following tasks:
Note: An administrator cannot map users and groups to the administrator
roles.
|
Adminsecuritymanager | Only users who are granted this role can map users to administrative roles. Also, when fine-grained administrative security is used, only users who are granted this role can manage authorization groups. See Administrative roles for more information. |
Deployer | Users who are granted this role can perform both configuration actions and runtime operations on applications. |
Role | Description |
---|---|
iscadmins | This role is only available for
administrative console users and not for wsadmin users. Users who are granted
this role have administrator privileges for managing users and groups in the
federated repositories. For example, a user of the iscadmins role can complete
the following tasks:
|
When administrative security is enabled, the administrative subsystem role-based access control is enforced. The administrative subsystem includes the security server, the administrative console, the wsadmin scripting tool, and all the Java Management Extensions (JMX) MBeans. When administrative security is enabled, both the administrative console and the administrative scripting tool require users to provide the required authentication data. Moreover, the administrative console is designed so the control functions that display on the pages are adjusted, according to the security roles that a user has. For example, a user who has only the monitor role can see only the non-sensitive configuration data. A user with the operator role can change the system state.
When you are changing registries(for example, from a federated repository to LDAP), make sure you remove the information that pertains to the previously configured registry for console users and console groups.
WebSphere
Application Server for z/OS security customization dialogs prime the administrative
subsystem to accept the MVS identities of all the started WebSphere Application
Server system tasks (for example, controllers, servants, and so on) as WebSphere
administrators and the configured administrator identity. If a federated repository,
a standalone Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) registry, or a standalone
custom registry is specified, the configured server identities are used for
work that is run by the system instead of for work that is run by the started
task identities.
When administrative security is enabled, WebSphere Application
Servers run under the server identity that is defined under the active user
registry configuration. Although it is not shown on the administrative console
and in other tools, a special Server subject is mapped to the administrator
role. The WebSphere Application Server runtime code, which runs under the
server identity, requires authorization to runtime operations. If no other
user is assigned administrative roles, you can log into the administrative
console or to the wsadmin scripting tool using the server identity to perform
administrative operations and to assign other users or groups to administrative
roles. Because the server identity is assigned to the administrative role
by default, the administrative security policy requires the administrative
role to perform the following operations:
Primary administrative user name
The Version 6.1 release of WebSphere Application Server requires an administrative user, distinguished from the server user identity, to improve auditability of administrative actions. The user name specifies a user with administrative privileges that is defined in the local operating system.
Server user identity
The Version 6.1 release of WebSphere Application Server distinguishes the server identity from the administrative user identity to improve auditability. The server user identity is used for authenticating server-to-server communications.
Internal server ID
The internal server ID enables the automatic generation of the user identity for server-to-server authentication. Automatic generation of the server identity supports improved auditability for cells only for Version 6.1 or later nodes. In the Version 6.1 release of WebSphere Application Server, you can save the internally-generated server ID because the Security WebSphere Common Configuration Model (WCCM) model contains a new tag, internalServerId. You do not need to specify a server user ID and a password during security configuration except in a mixed-cell environment. An internally-generated server ID adds a further level of protection to the server environment because the server password is not exposed as it is in releases prior to Version 6.1. However, to maintain backwards compatibility, you must specify the server user ID if you use earlier versions of WebSphere Application Server.
When enabling security, you can assign one or more users and groups to naming roles. For more information, see Assigning users to naming roles. However, before assigning users to naming roles, configure the active user registry. User and group validation depends on the active user registry. For more information, see Configuring user registries.
Special subject
In addition to mapping users or groups, you can map a special-subject to the administrative roles. A special-subject is a generalization of a particular class of users. The AllAuthenticated special subject means that the access check of the administrative role ensures that the user making the request is at least authenticated. The Everyone special subject means that anyone, authenticated or not, can perform the action as if security is not enabled.
CosNaming security offers increased granularity of security control over CosNaming functions. CosNaming functions are available on CosNaming servers such as the WebSphere Application Server. These functions affect the content of the WebSphere Application Server name space. Generally, you have two ways in which client programs result in CosNaming calls. The first is through the Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) call. The second is with common object request broker architecture (CORBA) clients invoking CosNaming methods directly.
When
you configure a local operating system registry with WebSphere Application
Server for z/OS, factors require some additional considerations. Refer to Selecting a registry or repository and Configuring local operating system registries for more information. If you specify
federated repositories, a standalone LDAP registry, or a standalone custom
registry, you must remove the local operating system customization by deleting
the pre-configured WebSphere Application Server configuration group and administrator
identity from the console group and delete the console users.
A Server special-subject is assigned to all of the four CosNaming roles by default. The Server special-subject provides a WebSphere Application Server process, which runs under the server identity, to access all the CosNaming operations. The Server special-subject does not display and cannot be modified through the administrative console or other administrative tools.
Special configuration is not required to enable the server identity as specified when enabling administrative security for administrative use because the server identity is automatically mapped to the administrator role.
Users,
groups, or the special subjects AllAuthenticated and Everyone can be added
or removed to or from the naming roles from the WebSphere Application Server
administrative console at any time. However, a server restart is required
for the changes to take effect.
Configuration
is not required to enable the server identity (as specified) when enablingadministrative security for administrative use because
the server identity is automatically mapped to the administrator role. Users,
groups, or the special subjects AllAuthenticated and Everyone can be added
or removed to or from the naming roles from the WebSphere Application Server
administrative console at any time. However, a server restart is required
for the changes to take effect. When SAF Authorization is chosen, a server
restart is not needed to authorize additional users or groups.
A best practice is to map groups or one of the special-subjects, rather than specific users, to naming roles because it is more flexible and easier to administer in the long run. By mapping a group to a naming role, adding or removing users to or from the group occurs outside of WebSphere Application Server and does not require a server restart for the change to take effect.
The CosNaming authorization policy is only enforced when administrative security is enabled. When administrative security is enabled, attempts to do CosNaming operations without the proper role assignment result in an org.omg.CORBA.NO_PERMISSION exception from the CosNaming server.
Each
CosNaming function is assigned to only one role. Therefore, users who are
assigned the CosNamingCreate role cannot query the name space unless they
have also been assigned CosNamingRead. And in most cases a creator needs to
be assigned three roles: CosNamingRead, CosNamingWrite, and CosNamingCreate.
The CosNamingRead and CosNamingWrite roles assignment for the creator example
are included in the CosNamingCreate role. In most of the cases, WebSphere
Application Server administrators do not have to change the roles assignment
for every user or group when they move to this release from a previous one.
Although the ability exists to greatly restrict access to the name space by changing the default policy, unexpected org.omg.CORBA.NO_PERMISSION exceptions can occur at runtime. Typically, J2EE applications access the name space and the identity they use is that of the user that authenticated to WebSphere Application Server when accessing the J2EE application. Unless the J2EE application provider clearly communicates the expected naming roles, use caution when changing the default naming authorization policy.