Function Description 31
852-1322/852-1328 Industrial Managed Switch
Manual
1.0.01
6
Function Description
6.1
Security
6.1.1
IEEE 802.1X
IEEE 802
.
1X is an IEEE standard for port
-
based Network
-
Access Control
protocol.
It provides an authentication mechanism to devices that need to attach
to a LAN.
This protocol restricts unauthorized clients from connecting to a LAN
through ports that are opened to the Internet
.
The authentication basically
involves three parties
(see Figure 9 “RADIUS Authentication Sequence”)
:
a
supplicant, an authenticator, and an authentication server.
•
Supplicant: A client device that requests access to the LAN
•
Authentication Server: This server performs the actual authentication .We
utilize RADIUS (
R
emote
A
uthentication
D
ial-
I
n
U
ser
S
ervice) as the
authentication server.
•
Authenticator: The Authenticator is a network device (i.e. the WAGO
Industrial managed switch) that acts as a proxy between the supplicant and
the authentication server. It passes around information, verifies information
with the server, and relays responses to the supplicant.
The authenticator acts like a security guard to a protected network. The
supplicant is not allowed accessing to the protected side of the network through
the authenticator until the supplicant
’
s identity has been validated and
authorized.
With IEEE802
.
1X authentication, a supplicant and an authenticator
exchange EAP (Extensible Authentication Protocol, an authentication framework
widely used by IEEE). Then the authenticator forwards this information to the
authentication server for verification.
If the authentication server confirms the
request, the supplicant
(client device
(
will be allowed to access resources located
on the protected side of the network
.
