Pete, Shane is right; the way you described your problem, the client credential grant type may be appropriate. That's especially true if the client will be accessing resources that don't necessarily belong to specific users. But if the client (web site) will be using the API (OAuth auth/resource server) to access user-specific resources, then the authorization code grant type is a better fit. It doesn't matter that the OAuth server trusts the client without needing user authorization.
The authorization code flow offers a solution for user identification that is absent in the client credential flow. In other words, even though the OAuth server trusts the client and will comply with all API requests, how is the client x supposed to identify a user so it can request the right resource from the resource server? By using an authorization code grant, the client can acquire an access token that is bound to a specific user. This is makes the authorization code flow suitable for single sign-on implementations, whereas the client credential flow is not appropriate for user authentication. Don't worry about the fact that the client does not need to be authorized by the user. You can still use the authorization code flow, and the authorization server will not need to prompt the user for authorization because you will have pre-authorized the client for all users. As an added bonus, this sets you up perfectly for when you add new clients which are not pre-authorized and need user authorization. I hope that helps. Regards, Andre DeMarre On Wed, Feb 29, 2012 at 6:59 PM, Shane B Weeden <[email protected]> wrote: > 1. Yes, client credentials sounds right for what you described. Think of it > as lightweight b2b authentication in that sense (but two steps - one to get > a token, and another to use it). > 2. Can't help you with source - but do have a product-based solution :) > 3. Absolutely it should for the resource server, but the answer may depend > have same dependency on the implementation you use. > > Regards, > Shane. > > > > From: Pete Clark <[email protected]> > To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> > Date: 29/02/2012 06:50 PM > Subject: [OAUTH-WG] Securing APIs with OAuth 2.0 > Sent by: [email protected] > > > > Hey all, I've joined the list because I'd like to use OAuth 2 to implement > security for a new set of REST APIs I'm developing for a client. I'm > coding with PHP, but my questions are more general. Right now, there will > be only one web site that uses the APIs, in a server-to-server fashion, and > currently we don't have a need for a third party application to gain access > to user data, such that a user would need to authorize that app. We do, > however, want to have that ability down the road. My question is, can I > still use OAuth 2 in some way to implement our first phase? From what I've > read, it seems like the "client credentials" flow is the one I want to use > for now. Can someone: > > 1) Confirm that that's what I should use for this first phase? > 2) Point me to an implementation of this flow (in any language) that I > could use or port to PHP? I've found some libraries for php but can't > really tell, being new, if they offer the "client credentials" flow > 3) Answer one more question.. Will using the client credentials flow now > allow me to move to one of the user-authorizes-external-app flows down the > road without having to reimplement or throw away the client credentials > flow code? > > I apologize for all the questions, but these would really help point me in > the right direction.. Thank you for reading! > > Sincerely, > Pete > > > > _______________________________________________ > OAuth mailing list > [email protected] > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/oauth > > > > _______________________________________________ > OAuth mailing list > [email protected] > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/oauth _______________________________________________ OAuth mailing list [email protected] https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/oauth
