UKERNA, the network operator for JANET, the UK's education and research network is to help deliver an open-source supplicant. This will assist institutions in managing secure access to their networks. This follows its technology partnership with the OpenSEA Alliance, recently formed by leading networking and security companies including Extreme Networks, Identity Engines, Infoblox, Symantec Corporation, TippingPoint, and Trapeze Networks.

It is widely acknowledged in the education sector that there are limitations in the functionality provided by the current generation of freely available supplicants, particularly in a cross-platform environment. The alternative of licensing third-party commercial supplicants is likely to be costly. These factors hinder deployment of best practices in securing and controlling access to networks and services in the context of demanding teaching and research environments.

The free OpenSEA Alliance supplicant currently being developed will address these problems and provide tools enabling distribution of pre-configured versions of the supplicant software thereby allowing rapid deployment within organisations.

For users of JANET, this initiative will also enhance the JANET Roaming service which allows users to acquire a connection to JANET at participating organisations using credentials provided by their home institution, thus avoiding the visited site having to manage and issue guest credentials. The new supplicant will reduce the complexity of using JANET Roaming for many users, further increasing the value of the service to the academic community.

The OpenSEA 802.1X supplicant development is well underway as it is based upon the existing Xsupplicant project, a cross-platform open-source 802.1X client originally developed within the University of Maryland and taken over by Chris Hessing while at the University of Utah. Xsupplicant uses a modular architecture to enable extensions including new authentication types and integration with other security components. OpenSEA plans to support the extension of Xsupplicant with key functionality including support for Windows XP and Vista, a robust GUI, and an API for extensibility.

Related links: (Open in a new window.)
www.jisc.ac.uk

View printable version (opens in new window)
Back