.NET Security and Cryptography

Fundamental Security Mechanisms

In developing secure ASP.NET Web applications, you must consider the following three fundamental mechanisms.

• Authentication

• Authorization

• Impersonation^[4]

  ^[4] Impersonation is useful typically for further authentication or authorization against additional resources.

Authentication: Who Are You?

Authentication is the process of verifying the identity of the client application (principal) before permitting the user/application to access a resource. For example, the user or client application has to launch its identity by providing some form of credentials such as a name/password pair to provide the evidence.

Authorization: Are You Allowed to Access This Resource?

Authorization means, what privilege do you have to access ...