User Guide for AsyncOS 12.7.0(LD)/12.8.0(GD) for Cisco Content Security Management Appliances
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You can distribute administrative tasks on the Cisco Content Security Management appliance to other people based on the user
roles that you assign to their user accounts.
To set up to distribute administrative tasks, you will determine whether the predefined user roles meet your needs, create
any needed custom user roles, and set up the appliance to authenticate administrative users locally on the security appliance,
and/or externally using your own centralized LDAP or RADIUS system.
Additionally, you can specify additional controls on access to the appliance and to certain information on the appliance.
Additional
configuration is required for quarantine access. See
Access to Quarantines.
Predefined User
Roles
Except as noted, you
can assign each user a predefined user role with the privileges described in
the following table, or a custom user role.
Table 1. Descriptions of
User Roles
User Role
Name
Description
Web Reporting/Scheduled Reports Capability
admin
The admin user is the default user account for the system and has all administrative privileges. The admin user account is listed here
for convenience, but it cannot be assigned via a user role, and it cannot be edited or deleted, aside from changing the passphrase.
Only the
admin user can issue the
resetconfig and
revertcommands.
Yes/Yes
Administrator
User accounts
with the Administrator role have full access to all configuration settings of
the system.
Yes/Yes
Operator
User accounts
with the Operator role are restricted from:
Creating
or editing user accounts
Upgrading
the appliance
Issuing the resetconfig command
Running the System Setup Wizard
Modifying LDAP server profile settings other than username and passphrase, if LDAP is enabled for external authentication.
Configuring, editing, deleting, or centralizing quarantines.
Otherwise,
they have the same privileges as the Administrator role.
Yes/Yes
Technician
User accounts
with the Technician role can initiate system administration activities such as
upgrades and reboots, save a configuration file from the appliance, manage
feature keys, and so forth.
Access to System Capacity reports under the Web and Email tabs
Read-Only
Operator
User accounts
with the Read-Only Operator role have access to view configuration information.
Users with the Read-Only Operator role can make and submit most changes to see
how to configure a feature, but they cannot commit them or make any change that
does not require a commit. Users with this role can manage messages in
quarantines, if access is enabled.
Users with
this role cannot access the following:
File system, FTP, or SCP.
Settings for creating, editing, deleting or centralizing quarantines.
Yes/No
Guest
Users accounts with the Guest role can view status information including reports and Web Tracking, and manage messages in
quarantines, if access is enabled. Users with the Guest role cannot access Message Tracking.
Yes/No
Web Administrator
User accounts with the Web Administrator role have access to all configuration settings under the Web tab.
Yes/Yes
Web Policy Administrator
User accounts with the Web Policy Administrator role can access the Web Appliance Status page and all pages in the Configuration
Master. The web policy administrator can configure identities, access policies, decryption policies, routing policies, proxy
bypass, custom URL categories, and time ranges. The web policy administrator cannot publish configurations.
No/No
Email
Administrator
User accounts
with the Email Administrator role have access to all configuration settings
within the Email menu only, including quarantines.
No/No
Help Desk
User
User
accounts with the Help Desk User role are restricted to:
Message Tracking
Managing messages in quarantines
Users with
this role cannot access the rest of the system, including the CLI. After you
assign a user this role, you must also configure quarantines to allow access by
this user.
No/No
Custom
Roles
User
accounts that are assigned a custom user role can view and configure only
policies, features, or specific policy or feature instances that have been
specifically delegated to the role.
You can create a new Custom Email User Role or a new Custom Web User Role from the Add Local User page. However, you must
assign privileges to this Custom User Role before the role can be used. To assign privileges, go to Management Appliance > System Administration > User Roles and click the user name.
Note
Users
assigned to a Custom Email User Role cannot access the CLI.
The Security
Management appliance allows users with Administration privileges to delegate
administration capabilities to custom roles. Custom roles provide more flexible
control over your users’ access than the predefined user roles do.
Users to whom you
assign custom user roles can manage policies or access reports for a subset of
appliances, features, or end users. For example, you might allow a delegated
administrator for web services to manage policies for an organization’s branch
office in a different country, where the acceptable use policies might be
different from those at the organization’s headquarters. You delegate
administration by creating custom user roles and assigning access permissions
to those roles. You determine which policies, features, reports, custom URL
categories, etc. that the delegated administrators can view and edit.
You can assign custom roles to allow delegated administrators to access
the following on the Security Management appliance:
All reports (optionally
restricted by Reporting Group)
Mail Policy reports
(optionally restricted by Reporting Group)
DLP reports (optionally
restricted by Reporting Group)
Message Tracking
Quarantines
Detailed information about each of these items follows this section. In
addition, all users granted any of these privileges can see the System Status,
available under the Management Appliance tab > Centralized Services menu.
Users assigned to custom email user roles cannot access the CLI.
Note
Custom user roles on the Email Security appliance offer more
granular access than do user roles on the Security Management appliance. For
example, you can delegate access to mail and DLP policies and content filters.
For details, see the “Managing Custom User Roles for Delegated Administration”
section in the “Common Administration” chapter of the documentation or online
help for your Email Security appliance.
Access to Email
Reporting
You can grant custom
user roles access to Email reports as described in the following sections.
If you grant a
custom role access to All Reports, users assigned to this role can see the
following Email Security Monitor pages either for all Email Security
appliances, or for the Reporting Group that you select:
Mail Flow Summary
Mail FLow Details
Outgoing Destinations
User Mail Summary
DLP Incidents
Content Filters
Virus Filtering
TLS Encryption
Scheduled Reports
Archived Reports
Mail Policy
Reports
If you grant a
custom role access to Mail Policy Reports, users assigned to this role can see
the following Email Security Monitor pages either for all Email Security
appliances, or for the Reporting Group that you select:
Mail Flow Summary
Mail FLow Details
Outgoing Destinations
User Mail Summary
Content Filters
Virus Filtering
Archived Reports
DLP
Reports
If you grant a
custom role access to DLP Reports, users assigned to this role can see the
following Email Security Monitor pages either for all Email Security
appliances, or for the Reporting Group that you select:
DLP Incidents
Archived Reports
Access to Message
Tracking Data
If you grant a custom
role access to Message Tracking, users to whom you assign this role can find
the status of all messages tracked by the Security Management appliance.
For more information
about message tracking, including instructions for setting up your appliances
to enable access to message tracking on the Security Management appliance, see
Tracking Messages.
Access to
Quarantines for Custom User Role
If you grant a custom
role access to quarantines, users to whom you assign this role can search for,
view, release, or delete messages in all quarantines on this Security
Management appliance.
Before users can
access quarantines, you must enable that access. See
Access to Quarantines.
Creating Custom
Email User Roles
You can create
custom email user roles for access to Email Reporting, Message Tracking, and
quarantines.
For descriptions of
the access that each of these options permits, see
About Custom Email User Roles
and its subsections.
Note
To grant more
granular access or access to other features, reports, or policies, create
custom user roles directly on each Email Security appliance.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose
Management Appliance > System Administration > User
Roles.
Step 3
Click
Add
Email User Role.
Tip
Alternatively, you can create a new role by duplicating an
existing Email User Role: Click the Duplicate icon in the applicable table row,
then modify the resulting copy.
Step 4
Enter a unique
name for the user role (for example, “dlp-auditor”) and a description.
Email and
Web custom user role names must not be duplicated.
The name
must contain only lowercase letters, numbers, and dashes. It cannot start with
a dash or a number.
If you
grant users with this role access to centralized policy quarantines, and you
also want users with this role to be able to specify those centralized
quarantines in message and content filters and DLP Message Actions on an Email
Security appliance, the name of the custom role must be the same on both
appliances.
Step 5
Choose the
access privileges to enable for this role.
Step 6
Click
Submit to return to the User Roles page, which lists
the new user role.
Step 7
If you limited
access by Reporting Group, click the
no
groups selected link in the Email Reporting column for the user
role, then choose at least one Reporting Group.
Step 8
Commit your
changes.
Step 9
If you granted
this role access to quarantines, enable access for this role:
When a user who is
assigned a custom email user role logs into the appliance, that user sees only
the links to the security features to which that user has access. The user can
return to this main page at any time by selecting Account Privileges in the
Options menu. These users can also access the features to which they have
access by using the menus at the top of the web page. In the following example,
the user has access to all features that are available on the Security
Management appliance via custom email user roles.
Figure 1. Account
Privileges Page for a Delegated Administrator assigned Custom Email User
Roles
About Custom Web
User Roles
Custom web user roles
allow users to publish policies to different Web Security appliances, and gives
them the permission to edit or publish the custom configuration to different
appliances.
From the
Web >
Configuration Master > Custom URL Categories page on the
Security Management appliance, you can view the URL categories and policies
that you are allowed to administer and publish. Additionally, you can go to the
Web >
Utilities > Publish Configuration Now page and view the possible
configurations.
Note
Remember that when
you create a custom role with Publish Privilege capabilities, when user logs
in, they will not have any usable menus. They do not have the publish menu and
they will land on an non-editable landing screen since the URL and policy tabs
do not have any capabilities. In effect, you have a user that cannot publish or
administer any categories or policies.The workaround to this issue is that if
you want a user to be able to publish, but not to be able to manage any
categories or policies, you
must create a custom category which is not used in
any policy, and give that user the ability to manage that custom category along
with publishing. In this way, if they add or delete URLs from that category, it
does not affect anything.
You can delegate web
administration by creating and editing custom user roles.
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose
Management Appliance > System Administration > User
Roles.
Step 3
Click
Add Web
User Role.
Tip
Alternatively, you can create a new role by duplicating an existing Web User
Role: Click the Duplicate icon in the applicable table row, then modify the
resulting copy.
Step 4
Enter a unique
name for the user role (for example, “canadian-admins”) and a description.
Note
The name must contain only lowercase letters, numbers, and
dashes. It cannot start with a dash.
Step 5
Choose whether
you want the policies and custom URL categories to be visible or hidden by
default.
Step 6
Choose whether
you want Publish privileges turned on or off.
This privilege
allows the user to publish any Configuration Master for which the user can edit
Access Policies or URL Categories.
Step 7
Choose whether
to start with new (empty) settings or to copy an existing custom user role. If
you choose to copy an existing user role, choose from the list the role that
you want to copy.
Step 8
Click
Submit to return to the User Roles page, which lists
the new user role.
Note
If you have enabled the anonymized feature within web
reporting, all user roles with access to web reporting will have unrecognizable
user names and roles in the interactive reports page. See the
Scheduling Web Reports
section in chapter
Using Centralized Web Reporting and Tracking.
The exception is the Administrator role, which is able to see actual user names
in the scheduled reports. If the anonymize feature is enabled, scheduled
reports that are generated by the Operator and Web Administrator are
anonymized.
If you use the
Web > Utilities > Security > Services Display
> Edit Security Services Display page to hide one of the
Configuration Masters, the User Roles page also hides the corresponding
Configuration Master column; however, privilege settings for the hidden
Configuration Master are retained.
Editing Custom Web
User Roles
Procedure
Step 1
On the User
Roles page, click the role name to display the Edit User Role page.
Step 2
Edit any of the
settings: name, description, and visibility of policies and custom URL
categories.
Step 3
Click
Submit.
To edit
privileges for a custom user role:
Navigate to the
User Roles page.
To edit
access policy privileges, click “Access policies” to display a list of access
policies configured in the Configuration Master. In the Include column, select
the check boxes of the policies to which you want to give the user edit access.
Click
Submit to return to the User Roles page.
-or-
To edit
custom URL category privileges, click Custom URL Categories to display a list
of the custom URL categories defined on the Configuration Master. In the
Include column, select the check boxes of the custom URL categories to which
you want to give the user edit access. Click
Submit to return to the User Roles page.
Deleting Custom User Roles
If you delete a custom user role that is assigned to one or more users, you do not receive an error.
User Roles with Access to the CLI
Some roles can access both the GUI and the CLI: Administrator, Operator, Guest, Technician, and Read-Only Operator. Other
roles can access the GUI only: Help Desk User, Email Administrator, Web Administrator, Web Policy Administrator, URL Filtering
Administrator (for web security), and custom user.
Using LDAP
If you use an LDAP
directory to authenticate users, you assign directory groups to user roles
instead of to individual users. When you assign a directory group to a user
role, each user in that group receives the permissions defined for the user
role. For more information, see
External User Authentication.
Access to
Quarantines
Before users can
access quarantines, you must enable that access. See the following information:
You can control access to the appliance by defining authorized users locally on the appliance, and/or by using external authentication or two-factor authentication.
Any administrator-level user can change the passphrase for the “admin” user, via the GUI or the CLI.
Note
Cisco recommends you to change the passphrase when you log in to the appliance for the first time or if you reset the configurations
to factory defaults.
To change the passphrase via the GUI, do the following:
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users page and select the admin user.
To change the passphrase for the admin user in the CLI, use the passphrase command. The passphrase command requires you to enter the old passphrase for security.
If you forget the passphrase for the “admin” user account, contact your customer support provider to reset the passphrase.
Note
Changes to the passphrase take effect immediately and do not require you to commit the change.
Changing the User’s Passphrase After Expiry
If your account has expired, you will be prompted with the following message “Your passphrase expired. Please change your passphrase by clicking here.”
Click on the link and enter the login details with your expired passphrase, to proceed to the Change Passphrase page. For more information on setting passphrases, Setting Passphrase and Login Requirements.
Note
Changes to the passphrase take effect immediately and do not require you to commit the change.
Follow this procedure to add users directly to the Security Management appliance if you are not using external authentication.
Alternatively, use the userconfig command in the CLI.
Note
If external
authentication is also enabled, be sure that local user names do not duplicate
externally-authenticated user names.
There is no limit
to the number of user accounts that you can create on the appliance.
Procedure
Step 1
If you will
assign custom user roles, we recommend that you define those roles first. See
Custom User Roles.
Step 2
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 3
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users.
Step 4
Click
Add
User.
Step 5
Enter a unique name for the user. You cannot enter words that are reserved by the system (such as “operator” and “root”).
If you also use external authentication, user names should not duplicate externally-authenticated user names.
Step 6
Enter a full
name for the user.
Step 7
Select a
predefined role or a custom role. See the table
Descriptions of
User Roles in section
Predefined User Roles
for more information about user roles.
Confirm your current passphrase for security validation.
Step 9
You can generate or enter a passphrase and re-enter the passphrase to confirm the same.
Step 10
Submit and
commit your changes.
Step 11
If you added a
custom user role on this page, assign privileges to that role now. See
Custom User Roles.
Editing
Locally-Defined Users
Use this procedure to change a passphrase, for example.
Procedure
Step 1
Click the
user’s name in the Users listing.
Step 2
Make changes to
the user.
Step 3
Confirm your current passphrase for security validation.
Step 4
Submit and
commit your changes.
Deleting
Locally-Defined Users
Procedure
Step 1
Click the trash
can icon corresponding to the user’s name in the Users listing.
Step 2
Confirm the
deletion by clicking
Delete in the warning dialog that appears.
Step 3
Click
Commit to commit your changes.
Viewing the List of
Locally-Defined Users
To view a list of locally-defined users, do the following:
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users.
Note
Asterisks indicate
users assigned custom user roles for delegated administration. “Unassigned”
appears in red if the user’s custom role has been deleted. For more information
on custom user roles, see
Custom User Roles.
Setting and Changing Passphrases
When you add a user, you specify an initial passphrase for that user.
To change passphrases for users configured on the system, use the Edit User page in the GUI (see Editing Locally-Defined Users for more information).
Note
Cisco recommends you to change the passphrase when you log in to the appliance for the first time or after you complete the
System Setup Wizard.
Users can change their own passphrases by clicking the Options menu at the top right side of the GUI and selecting the Change Passphrase option.
Setting Passphrase and Login Requirements
You can define user account and passphrase restrictions to enforce organizational passphrase policies. The user account and passphrase restrictions apply to local users defined on the Security Management appliance. You can configure the following settings:
User account locking. You can define how many failed login attempts cause the user to be locked out of the account.
Passphrase lifetime rules. You can define how long a passphrase can exist before the user is required to change the passphrase after logging in.
Passphrase rules. You can define what kinds of passphrases users can choose, such as which characters are optional or mandatory.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users.
Step 3
Scroll down to the Local User Account and Passphrase Settings section.
Step 4
Click Edit Settings.
Step 5
Configure settings:
Setting
Description
User Account Lock
Choose whether or not to lock the user account after the user fails to login successfully. Specify the number of failed login
attempts that cause the account locking. You can enter any number from one (1) to 60. Default is five (5).
When you configure account locking, enter the message to be displayed to the user attempting to login. Enter text using 7-bit
ASCII characters. This message is only displayed when users enter the correct passphrase to a locked account.
When a user account gets locked, an administrator can unlock it on the Edit User page in the GUI or using the userconfig CLI command.
Failed login attempts are tracked by user, regardless of the machine the user connects from or the type of connection, such
as SSH or HTTP. Once the user successfully logs in, the number of failed login attempts is reset to zero (0).
When a user account is locked out due to reaching the maximum number of failed login attempts, an alert is sent to the administrator.
The alert is set at the “Info” severity level.
Choose whether or not users should be forced to change their passphrases after an administrator changes their passphrases.
You can also choose whether or not users should be forced to change their passphrases after they expire. Enter the number of days a passphrase can last before users must change it. You can enter any number from one (1) to 366. Default is 90. To force users to change
their passphrases at non-scheduled times, see Requiring Users to Change Passphrase on Demand.
When you force users to change their passphrases after they expire, you can display a notification about the upcoming passphrase expiration. Choose the number of days before expiration to notify users.
Note
When a user account uses SSH keys instead of a passphrase challenge, the Passphrase Reset rules still apply. When a user account with SSH keys expires, the user must enter their old passphrase or ask an administrator to manually change the passphrase to change the keys associated with the account.
Passphrase Rules:
Require at least <number> characters.
Enter the minimum number of characters that passphrases may contain.
Enter any number between zero (0) and 128.
The default is 8.
Passphrases can have more characters than the number you specify here.
Passphrase Rules:
Require at least one number (0-9).
Choose whether or not the passphrases must contain at least one number.
Passphrase Rules:
Require at least one special character.
Choose whether or not the passphrases must contain at least one special character. Passphrases may contain the following special characters:
~ ? ! @ # $ % ^ & * - _ + =
\ | / [ ] ( ) < > { } ` ' " ; : , .
Passphrase Rules:
Ban usernames and their variations as passphrases.
Choose whether or not the passphrase are allowed to be the same as the associated user name or variations on the user name. When user name variations are banned,
the following rules apply to passphrases:
The passphrase may not be the same as the user name, regardless of case.
The passphrase may not be the same as the user name in reverse, regardless of case.
The passphrase may not be the same as the user name or reversed user name with the following character substitutions:
"@" or "4" for "a"
"3" for "e"
"|", "!", or "1" for "i"
"0" for "o"
"$" or "5" for "s"
"+" or "7" for "t"
Passphrase Rules:
Ban reuse of the last <number> passphrases.
Choose whether or not users are allowed to choose a recently used passphrase when they are forced to change the passphrase. If they are not allowed to reuse recent passphrases, enter the number of recent passphrase that are banned from reuse.
You can enter any number from one (1) to 15. Default is three (3).
Passphrases Rules:
List of words to disallow in passphrases
You can create a list of words to disallow in passphrases.
Make this file a text file with each forbidden word on a separate line. Save the file with the name forbidden_passphrase_words.txt and use SCP or FTP to upload the file to the appliance.
If this restriction is selected but no word list is uploaded, this restriction is ignored.
Passphrase Strength
You can display a passphrase-strength indicator when an admin or user enters a new passphrase.
This setting does not enforce creation of strong passphrases, it merely shows how easy it is to guess the entered passphrase.
Select the roles for which you wish to display the indicator. Then, for each selected role, enter a number greater than zero.
A larger number means that a passphrase that registers as strong is more difficult to achieve. This setting has no maximum value.
Examples:
If you enter 30 , then an 8 character passphrase with at least one upper- and lower-case letter, number, and special character will register as a strong passphrase.
If you enter 18 , then an 8 character passphrase with all lower case letters and no numbers or special characters will register as strong.
Passphrase strength is measured on a logarithmic scale. Evaluation is based on the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology
rules of entropy as defined in NIST SP 800-63, Appendix A.
Generally, stronger passphrases:
Are longer
Include upper case, lower case, numeric, and special characters
Do not include words in any dictionary in any language.
To enforce passphrases with these characteristics, use the other settings on this page.
To require all or selected users to change their passphrases at any time on an ad-hoc basis, perform the steps in this procedure. This is a one-time action.
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users.
Step 3
In the Users section, select the check boxes beside the users who will be required to change passphrases .
Step 4
Select Enforce Passphrase Changes.
Step 5
Select options.
The global setting for the grace period is configured in Local User Account & Passphrase Settings.
Step 6
Click OK.
Locking and
Unlocking Local User Accounts
Locking a user
account prevents a local user from logging into the appliance. A user account
can be locked in one of the following ways:
You can configure all local
user accounts to lock after users fail to log in successfully after a
configured number of attempts. See
Setting Passphrase and Login Requirements.
AsyncOS displays the
reason why the user account was locked when you view the user account on the
Edit User page.
Locking User
Accounts Manually
Procedure
Step 1
First time only: Set up the appliance to enable user account locking:
Step 2
Perform the following:
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Go to Management Appliance > System Administration > Users.
In the Local User Account & Passphrase Settings section, click Edit Settings.
Select the checkbox to Display Locked Account Message if Administrator has manually locked a user account and enter your message.
Submit the change.
Step 3
Go to
Management Appliance > System Administration >
Users and click the user name.
Note
Before you lock the Admin account, be sure that you can unlock it. See the Note in Unlocking User Accounts.
Step 4
Click
Lock
Account.
AsyncOS
displays a message saying that the user will be unable to log into the
appliance and asks if you want to continue.
Unlocking User Accounts
To unlock a user account, open the user account by clicking on the user name in the Users listing and click Unlock Account.
Note
If you lock the admin account, you can only unlock it by logging in as the admin through a serial communications connection
to the serial console port. The admin user can always access the appliance using the serial console port, even when the admin
account is locked. See the “Setup and Installation” chapter in the documentation or online help for your Email Security appliance
for more information on accessing the appliance using the serial console port.
External User
Authentication
If you store user
information in an LDAP or RADIUS directory on your network, you can configure
your Security Management appliance to use the external directory to
authenticate users who log in to the appliance.
Note
Some features
described in
Customizing Your View
are not available to externally-authenticated users.
If your deployment uses both
local and external authentication, local user names must not duplicate
externally-authenticated user names.
If the appliance cannot
communicate with the external directory, a user who has both an external and a
local account can log in with a local user account on the appliance.
You can use a
RADIUS directory to authenticate users and assign groups of users to user roles
for administering your appliance. The RADIUS server should support the CLASS
attribute, which AsyncOS uses to assign users in the RADIUS directory to user
roles.
Note
If an external
user changes the user role for their RADIUS group, the user should log out of
the appliance and then log back in. The user will have the permissions of their
new role.
Before you begin
The Shared Secret key for access to the RADIUS server must be no more than 48 characters long.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose Management Appliance > System Administration > Users page and click Enable.
Step 3
Select the
Enable
External Authentication check box.
Step 4
Select RADIUS
for the authentication type.
Step 5
Enter the host
name for the RADIUS server.
Step 6
Enter the port number for the RADIUS server. The default port number is 1812.
Step 7
Enter the
Shared Secret key for the RADIUS server.
Note
When
enabling external authentication for a cluster of Email Security appliances,
enter the same Shared Secret key on all appliances in the cluster.
Step 8
Enter the
number of seconds that the appliance waits for a response from the server
before timing out.
Step 9
Select whether to use Passphrase Authentication Protocol (PAP) or Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol (CHAP) for the authentication protocol.
Step 10
(Optional) Click Add Row to add another RADIUS server. Repeat Steps 6 and 7 for each RADIUS server that your appliance uses for authentication.
When you define multiple external servers, the appliance connects to the servers in the order defined on the appliance. You
might want to define multiple external servers to allow for failover in case one server is temporarily unavailable.
Step 11
Enter the
amount of time to store external authentication credentials in the web user
interface.
Note
If the RADIUS server uses one-time passphrases, for example passphrases created from a token, enter zero (0). When the value is set to zero, AsyncOS does not contact the RADIUS server again to
authenticate during the current session.
Step 12
Configure Group
Mapping:
Setting
Description
Map
externally authenticated users to multiple local roles (Recommended)
AsyncOS assigns RADIUS users to appliance roles based on the RADIUS CLASS
attribute. CLASS attribute requirements:
3 character minimum
253 character maximum
no colons, commas, or newline characters
one or more mapped CLASS attributes for each RADIUS user (With this setting, AsyncOS denies access to RADIUS users without
a mapped CLASS attribute.)
For
RADIUS users with multiple CLASS attributes, AsyncOS assigns the most
restrictive role. For example, if a RADIUS user has two CLASS attributes, which
are mapped to the Operator and Read-Only Operator roles, AsyncOS assigns the
RADIUS user to the Read-Only Operator role, which is more restrictive than the
Operator role.
These
are the appliance roles ordered from least restrictive to most restrictive:
Administrator
Email Administrator
Web Administrator
Web Policy Administrator
URL Filtering Administrator (for web security)
Custom user role (email or web)
If a
user is assigned multiple Class attributes that are mapped to custom user
roles, the last class attribute on the list on the RADIUS server will be used.
Technician
Operator
Read-Only Operator
Help Desk User
Guest
Map
all externally authenticated users to the Administrator role
AsyncOS assigns RADIUS users to the Administrator role.
Step 13
(Optional)
Click
Add
Row to add another group. Repeat step 11 for each group of users
that the appliance authenticates.
Step 14
Submit and
commit your changes.
Two-Factor
Authentication
You can use a RADIUS
directory to configure two-factor authentication for specific user roles. The
appliance supports the following authentication protocols for communicating
with the RADIUS server:
Make sure that you
get the required RADIUS server details for two-factor authentication from your
IT administrator.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose System Administration > Users page and click Enable under Two-Factor Authentication.
Step 3
Enter the
hostname or IP address of the RADIUS server.
Step 4
Enter the port
number of the RADIUS server.
Step 5
Enter the Shared Secret passphrase of the RADIUS server.
Step 6
Enter the number of seconds to wait for a response from the server before timing out.
Step 7
Select the
appropriate authentication protocol.
Step 8
(Optional) Click
Add
Row to add another RADIUS server. Repeat steps 2 to 6 for each
RADIUS server.
Note
You can add
up to ten RADIUS servers.
Step 9
Select the
required user roles for which you want to enable two-factor authentication.
Step 10
Submit and
commit your changes.
When two-factor authentication is enabled, the user is prompted to enter a passcode after entering the username and passphrase,
to login to the appliance.
Disabling Two-Factor
Authentication
Before you begin
Make sure you have enabled two-factor authentication on your appliance.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose System Administration > Users page and click Edit Global Settings under Two-Factor Authentication
Step 3
Deselect
Enable
Two-Factor Authentication.
Step 4
Submit and
commit your changes.
Adding an Email or Web Security appliance over SSH with Pre-Shared Keys
The following example demonstrates how to add an Email Security applaince (testesa.example.com) to the Security Management
appliance (testsma.example.com) over SSH using pre-shared keys.
To add a Web Security appliance, choose WSA when prompted to enter the type of Cisco appliance.
testsma.example.com> applianceconfig
Choose the operation you want to perform.
ADD - Add SMA Connection Parameters and Keys.
EDIT - Edit an appliance.
DELETE - Remove an appliance.
TEST - Test that an appliance is properly configured.
SERVICES - Configure the centralized services for an appliance.
STATUS - Display the status of centralized services.
PORT - Configure which port is used to communicate with remote appliances.
[]> add
Please enter the type of Cisco appliance that this device is
1. ESA
2. WSA
[1]> 1
Enter the IP address or hostname of an appliance to transfer data with.
(A hostname may be entered in this field, however it will be immediately
resolved to an IP address when the form is submitted.)
[]> IP address entered
Enter a name to identify this appliance
[]> name of appliance
File transfer access via SSH is required to transfer reporting data, message logs,
and quarantine safelist/blocklist data from appliances
Would you like to configure file transfer access for this appliance? [Y]>
Would you like to use a custom ssh port to connect to this appliance? [N]>
Would you like to connect an Email Security appliance using pre-shared keys?
Use this option if you have enabled two-factor authentication on the Email
Security appliance. [N]> yes
To add an Email Security appliance to the Content Security Management appliance
using pre-shared keys, log in to the Email Security appliance,
run the smaconfig > add command, enter the following details.
Host: vm10sma0006.qa
User Key:
AAAAB3NzaC1yc2EAAAADAQABAAABAQDgm3kG9RHc4gVZxRe0orh5DW5Yje5UB9BpJqcTRQJoxUIAv2Xig
8q5geyaWHZcFoUxH61YQbPX3R8CVMYgJ8/QB/iunjkr3jowV/SCuBBikEFgj1zuxlsFhL0L487epEgby1gH0rfJ
gwSa2/6dhfyUayst6pT87CZGOQltgx7s51wc+ve770X3SqlQD5bdYC4x9+gCX0wdwfhTH1+4/82jwYjK1lAEXc
O4k4TuZJEJnyBQ3YyCyVwXuDkXpI6xJDemxcc36e7Wwtpn3mn2VLaTG2/I38XwSvlYB6TcqmWnO10gL+aD
wkKAKcuhYpz4NFr9myej1mhMk7ZAFXmRNxvT
Note
Before you proceed to the next step, ensure that you have added the Host and User Key details to the Email or Web Security appliance. Commit the changes in your Email or Web Security appliance before continuing
the process of adding connection parameters in the Security Management appliance.
Do you want to continue connecting using pre-shared keys? [Y]> yes
Additional Controls
on Access to the Security Management Appliance
You can control from
which IP addresses users access the Security Management appliance by creating
access lists for users who connect directly to the appliance and users who
connect through a reverse proxy, if your organization uses reverse proxies for
remote users.
You can specify the IP addresses, subnets, or CIDR addresses for machines that can connect to the Security Management appliance.
Users can access the appliance from any machine with IP address from the access list. Users attempting to connect to the appliance
from an address not included in the list are denied access.
Connecting Through a Proxy
If your organization’s network uses reverse proxy servers between remote users’ machines and the Security Management appliance,
AsyncOS allows you create an access list with the IP addresses of the proxies that can connect to the appliance.
Even when using a reverse proxy, AsyncOS still validates the IP address of the remote user’s machine against a list of IP
addresses allowed for user connections. To send the remote user’s IP address to the Email Security appliance, the proxy needs
to include the
x-forwarded-for
HTTP header in its connection request to the appliance.
The
x-forwarded-for
header is a non-RFC standard HTTP header with the following format:
The value for this header is a comma-separated list of IP addresses with the left-most address being the address of the remote
user’s machine, followed by the addresses of each successive proxy that forwarded the connection request. (The header name
is configurable.) The Security Management appliance matches the remote user’s IP address from the header and the connecting
proxy’s IP address against the allowed user and proxy IP addresses in the access list.
Note
AsyncOS supports only IPv4 addresses in the
x-forwarded-for
header.
Creating the Access
List
You can create the network access list either via the Network Access page in the GUI or the adminaccessconfig > ipaccess CLI command. The following figure shows the Network Access page with a list of user IP addresses that are allowed to connect directly to the Security Management
appliance.
The following settings are applicable for the legacy web interface and the new web interface of the appliance.
Figure 2. Example
Network Access Settings
AsyncOS offers four
different modes of control for the access list:
Allow
All. This mode allows all connections to the appliance. This is the
default mode of operation.
Only
Allow Specific Connections. This mode allows a user to connection
to the appliance if the user’s IP address matches the IP addresses, IP ranges,
or CIDR ranges included in the access list.
Only
Allow Specific Connections Through Proxy. This mode allows a user
to connect to the appliance through a reverse proxy if the following conditions
are met:
The connecting proxy’s IP
address is included in the access list’s IP Address of Proxy Server field.
The proxy includes the
x-forwarded-header HTTP header in its connection request.
The value of
x-forwarded-header is not empty.
The remote user’s IP address
is included in x-forwarded-header and it matches the IP addresses, IP ranges,
or CIDR ranges defined for users in the access list.
Only Allow Specific
Connections Directly or Through Proxy. This mode allows users to
connect through a reverse proxy or directly to the appliance if their IP
address matches the IP addresses, IP ranges, or CIDR ranges included in the
access list. The conditions for connecting through a proxy are the same as in
the Only Allow Specific Connections Through Proxy mode.
Please be aware
that you may lose access to the appliance after submitting and committing your
changes if one of the following conditions is true:
If you select
Only
Allow Specific Connections and do not include the IP address of
your current machine in the list.
If you select
Only
Allow Specific Connections Through Proxy and the IP address of the
proxy currently connected to the appliance is not in the proxy list and the
value of the Origin IP header is not in the list of allowed IP addresses.
If you select
Only
Allow Specific Connections Directly or Through Proxy and
the value of the Origin IP header is not in the list of
allowed IP addresses
OR
the value of the Origin IP header is not in the list of
allowed IP Addresses and the IP address of the proxy connected to the appliance
is not in the list of allowed proxies.
If you choose to
continue without correcting the access list, AsyncOS will disconnect your
machine or proxy from the appliance when you commit your changes.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Choose
System
Administration > Network Access.
Step 3
Click
Edit
Settings.
Step 4
Select the mode
of control for the access list.
Step 5
Enter the IP
addresses from which users will be allowed to connect to the appliance.
You can enter
an IP address, IP address range or CIDR range. Use commas to separate multiple
entries.
Step 6
If connecting
through a proxy is allowed, enter the following information:
The IP
addresses of the proxies allowed to connect to the appliance. Use commas to
separate multiple entries.
The name of
the origin IP header that the proxy sends to the appliance, which contains the
IP addresses of the remote user’s machine and the proxy servers that forwarded
the request. By default, the name of the header is x-forwarded-for .
Step 7
Submit and
commit your changes.
Configuring the Web
UI Session Timeout
You can specify how
long a user can be logged into the Security Management appliance’s Web UI
before AsyncOS logs the user out due to inactivity. This Web UI session timeout
applies to all users, including admin, and it is used for both HTTP and HTTPS
sessions.
Once AsyncOS logs a
user out, the appliance redirects the user’s web browser to login page.
Note
The Web UI
Session Timeout does not apply to spam quarantine sessions, which have a 30
minute timeout that cannot be configured.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Use the System Administration > Network Access page.
Step 3
Click Edit Settings.
Step 4
In the Web UI Inactivity Timeout field, enter the number of minutes users can be inactive before being logged out. You can define a timeout period between
5 and 1440 minutes.
Step 5
Submit and
commit your changes.
Configuring the CLI Session Timeout
You can specify how long a user can be logged into the Security Management appliance’s CLI before AsyncOS logs the user out
due to inactivity. The CLI session timeout applies:
To all users, including administrator
Only to the connections using Secure Shell (SSH), SCP, and direct serial connection
Note
Any uncommitted configuration changes at the time of CLI session timeout will be lost. Make sure that you commit the configuration
changes as soon as they are made.
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Use the System Administration > Network Access page.
Step 3
Click Edit Settings.
Step 4
In the CLI Inactivity Timeout field, enter the number of minutes users can be inactive before being logged out. You can define a timeout period between
5 and 1440 minutes.
Step 5
Submit and commit your changes.
What to do next
You can also use the adminaccessconfig command in CLI to configure CLI session timeout. See CLI Reference Guide for AsyncOS for Cisco Email Security Appliances.
Controlling Access
to Sensitive Information in Message Tracking
Procedure
Step 1
[New Web Interface Only] On the Security Management appliance, click to load the legacy web interface.
Step 2
Go to the
Management Appliance > System Administration >
Users page.
Step 3
In the
Tracking
Privileges section, click
Edit
Settings.
Step 4
Select the
roles for which you want to grant access to sensitive information in Message
Tracking.
Only custom
roles with access to Message Tracking are listed.
Step 5
Submit and
commit your changes.
The Centralized
Email Message Tracking feature must be enabled under Management Appliance >
Centralized Services for this setting to take effect.
Displaying a Message
for Administrative Users
You can display a
message that administrative users will see when they sign in to the appliance.
To set or clear a
message:
Procedure
Step 1
If you are planning to use a text file, upload it to the /data/pub/configuration directory on the appliance.
From the Security
Management appliance, you can view all active sessions and users logged in to
the appliance.
Procedure
From the upper
right corner of the window, choose
Options
> Active Sessions.
Figure 3. Active
Sessions Menu
From the Active
Sessions page you can view the User name, what role the user has, the time the
user logged in, idle time, and whether the user is logging in from the command
line or the GUI.
Viewing Your Recent
Login Attempts
To view your last
few recent login attempts (failed or successful) via the web interface, SSH,
and/or FTP:
Procedure
Step 1
Log in.
Step 2
Click the
Figure-icon icon beside "Logged in as" near the top right side of the
screen.
Viewing Administrative User Activity via the Command Line Interface
The following commands support multiuser access to the appliance.
The
who command lists all users who are logged in to
the system via the CLI or the web user interface, the role of the user, the
time of login, the idle time, and the remote host from which the user is logged
in.
The whoami command displays
the user name and full name of the user currently logged in, and which groups
the user belongs to:
The last command displays
which users have recently logged into the appliance. The IP address of the
remote host, and the login, logout, and total time also appear.
mail3.example.com> last
Username Remote Host Login Time Logout Time Total Time
======== =========== ================ ================ ==========
admin 10.1.3.67 Sat May 15 23:42 still logged in 15m
admin 10.1.3.67 Sat May 15 22:52 Sat May 15 23:42 50m
admin 10.1.3.67 Sat May 15 11:02 Sat May 15 14:14 3h 12m
admin 10.1.3.67 Fri May 14 16:29 Fri May 14 17:43 1h 13m
shutdown Fri May 14 16:22
shutdown Fri May 14 16:15
admin 10.1.3.67 Fri May 14 16:05 Fri May 14 16:15 9m
admin 10.1.3.103 Fri May 14 16:12 Fri May 14 16:15 2m
admin 10.1.3.103 Thu May 13 09:31 Fri May 14 14:11 1d 4h 39m
admin 10.1.3.135 Fri May 14 10:57 Fri May 14 10:58 0m
admin 10.1.3.67 Thu May 13 17:00 Thu May 13 19:24 2h 24m
A user to whom you have delegated administration can log in to the
Security Management appliance but sees a message that no access privileges are
assigned.
Solution
Make sure that you have
assigned privileges to the custom user role to which this user is assigned.
Look at Management Appliance > System Administration > Users to determine
the User Role assigned, then go to Management Appliance > System
Administration > User Roles, click the name of the User Role, and assign
privileges to the role.
If you have assigned access
based on Reporting Group, make sure you have selected a Reporting Group for
that user on the Management Appliance > System Administration > User
Roles page. To assign a group, click the
No groups selected link in the Email Reporting
column of the User Roles for Delegated Administration table.
User Has No Active Menus
Problem
A user to whom you have granted Publish privileges has no active menus upon login.
Solution
Make sure you have granted access to at least one Access Policy or Custom URL Category. If you do not want to grant this user
privileges to edit either of these, create a custom URL category which is not used in any policy and grant this user role
privileges to this category on the Custom User Role page.
Externally-Authenticated Users See Preferences Option
Problem
Externally-authenticated users see the Preferences option.
Solution
Ensure that users that you add directly in the Security Management
appliance have unique usernames that are not also used in your external
authentication database.
to load the legacy web interface.
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