ASP.NET MVC 3 Custom Authentication/Authorization

Question

I have searched all over the internet and SO, and I have found some good stuff on this topic, but I have a few questions that I am still unsure about:

1) I am using Forms Authentication with a custom Authentication provider. So I use the Authorize attribute and the section in the web.config still, but basically when the FormsAuthenticationTicket does not exist, I redirect to a login page (specified in the web.config) which then utilizes the custom Authentication Provider to auth the user against a db and then issues the FormsAuthenticationTicket. Is this correct?

2) Should I be using a custom Authorize attribute or should I just inject a GenericPrincipal into the HttpContext from the Application_AuthenticateRequest event handler in the global.asax page? Or should I be using User.IsInRole insode of the controller actions?

I just need role based authorization, and I think my Authentication Scheme is pretty good.

Any pointers/advice?

Thanks, Sam

Edit

So from what I have read, the best option for this is to create a custom AuthorizeAttribute and override the AuthorizeCore.

So what I have done is this:

public class CustomAuthorize : System.Web.Mvc.AuthorizeAttribute
    {
        protected override bool AuthorizeCore(HttpContextBase httpContext)
        {
            if (httpContext.User.Identity.IsAuthenticated)
            {
                var model = AdminUserViewModel.FromJsonString(((FormsIdentity)httpContext.User.Identity).Ticket.UserData);
                httpContext.User = new GenericPrincipal(HttpContext.Current.User.Identity, model.SecurityGroups.Select(x => x.Name).ToArray());
            }
            return base.AuthorizeCore(httpContext);
        }

        protected override void HandleUnauthorizedRequest(System.Web.Mvc.AuthorizationContext filterContext)
        {
            //base.HandleUnauthorizedRequest(filterContext);
            filterContext.Result = new System.Web.Mvc.RedirectResult("/Authentication/NotAuthorized", false);
        }
    }

Simply inject a new principal/identity with the roles that are stored in the FormsAuthenticationTicket UserData property. Then let the base do the rest.

Does this seem to be OK?

Edit #2

I am a little weary of using the Application_AuthenticateRequest in the global.asax with IIS7, because of the integrated pipeline, every request fires that event, images, css, js...

Is this correct?

Randy Burden · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-10 20:38:32Z

4

1) I do the same thing.

2) I use Authorize attribute and Application_AuthenticateRequest event handler.

In Application_AuthenticateRequest event handler I do something like this:

    string[] roles = authenticationTicket.UserData.Split(',');

    if (Context.User != null)
        Context.User = new GenericPrincipal(Context.User.Identity, roles);

And at controller or action level I do something like this:

    [Authorize(Roles = "Admin, SuperAdmin")]

answered Oct 10, 2011 at 20:38

Randy Burden

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2 Comments

Sam Over a year ago

How do you redirect to a action/view if they fail authorization?

Sam Over a year ago

Figured that out, just override the HandleUnauthorizedRequest in the custom AuthorizeAttribute.

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