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Microsoft Entra SSO integration with Cognism

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In this tutorial, you'll learn how to integrate Cognism with Microsoft Entra ID. When you integrate Cognism with Microsoft Entra ID, you can:

  • Control in Microsoft Entra ID who has access to Cognism.
  • Enable your users to be automatically signed-in to Cognism with their Microsoft Entra accounts.
  • Manage your accounts in one central location.

Prerequisites

To integrate Microsoft Entra ID with Cognism, you need:

  • A Microsoft Entra subscription. If you don't have a subscription, you can get a free account.
  • Cognism single sign-on (SSO) enabled subscription.

Scenario description

In this tutorial, you configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO in a test environment.

  • Cognism supports only IDP initiated SSO.
  • Cognism supports Just In Time user provisioning.

To configure the integration of Cognism into Microsoft Entra ID, you need to add Cognism from the gallery to your list of managed SaaS apps.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > New application.
  3. In the Add from the gallery section, type Cognism in the search box.
  4. Select Cognism from results panel and then add the app. Wait a few seconds while the app is added to your tenant.

Alternatively, you can also use the Enterprise App Configuration Wizard. In this wizard, you can add an application to your tenant, add users/groups to the app, assign roles, and walk through the SSO configuration as well. Learn more about Microsoft 365 wizards.

Configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO for Cognism

Configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with Cognism using a test user called B.Simon. For SSO to work, you need to establish a link relationship between a Microsoft Entra user and the related user in Cognism.

To configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with Cognism, perform the following steps:

  1. Configure Microsoft Entra SSO - to enable your users to use this feature.
    1. Create a Microsoft Entra test user - to test Microsoft Entra single sign-on with B.Simon.
    2. Assign the Microsoft Entra test user - to enable B.Simon to use Microsoft Entra single sign-on.
  2. Configure Cognism SSO - to configure the single sign-on settings on application side.
    1. Create Cognism test user - to have a counterpart of B.Simon in Cognism that is linked to the Microsoft Entra representation of user.
  3. Test SSO - to verify whether the configuration works.

Configure Microsoft Entra SSO

Follow these steps to enable Microsoft Entra SSO in the Microsoft Entra admin center.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.

  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > Cognism > Single sign-on.

  3. On the Select a single sign-on method page, select SAML.

  4. On the Set up single sign-on with SAML page, click the pencil icon for Basic SAML Configuration to edit the settings.

    Screenshot shows how to edit Basic SAML Configuration.

  5. On the Basic SAML Configuration section, perform the following steps:

    a. In the Identifier text box, type a URL using one of the following patterns:

    Environment URL
    Production https://app.cognism.com/<ID>
    Staging https://app-staging.cognism.com/<ID>

    b. In the Reply URL text box, type a URL using one of the following patterns:

    Environment URL
    Production https://app.cognism.com/api/users/sso/azureSamlResponse/<ID>
    Staging https://app-staging.cognism.com/api/users/sso/azureSamlResponse/<ID>

    Note

    These values are not real. Update these values with the actual Identifier and Reply URL. Contact Cognism support team to get these values. You can also refer to the patterns shown in the Basic SAML Configuration section in the Microsoft Entra admin center.

  6. On the Set up single sign-on with SAML page, in the SAML Signing Certificate section, find Certificate (Base64) and select Download to download the certificate and save it on your computer.

    Screenshot shows the Certificate download link.

  7. On the Set up Cognism section, copy the appropriate URL(s) based on your requirement.

    Screenshot shows to copy configuration URLs.

Create a Microsoft Entra test user

In this section, you'll create a test user in the Microsoft Entra admin center called B.Simon.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a User Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Users > All users.
  3. Select New user > Create new user, at the top of the screen.
  4. In the User properties, follow these steps:
    1. In the Display name field, enter B.Simon.
    2. In the User principal name field, enter the username@companydomain.extension. For example, B.Simon@contoso.com.
    3. Select the Show password check box, and then write down the value that's displayed in the Password box.
    4. Select Review + create.
  5. Select Create.

Assign the Microsoft Entra test user

In this section, you'll enable B.Simon to use Microsoft Entra single sign-on by granting access to Cognism.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > Cognism.
  3. In the app's overview page, select Users and groups.
  4. Select Add user/group, then select Users and groups in the Add Assignment dialog.
    1. In the Users and groups dialog, select B.Simon from the Users list, then click the Select button at the bottom of the screen.
    2. If you are expecting a role to be assigned to the users, you can select it from the Select a role dropdown. If no role has been set up for this app, you see "Default Access" role selected.
    3. In the Add Assignment dialog, click the Assign button.

Configure Cognism SSO

  1. Log in to Cognism company site as an administrator.

  2. Go to Settings > Single sign-on > Microsoft Azure and click Configure.

    Screenshot shows Settings for the configuration.

  3. In the Microsoft Azure SSO Configuration section, perform the following steps:

    Screenshot shows the Configuration.

    1. Copy the Identifier (Entity ID) and paste it in the Identifier (Entity ID) textbox in the Basic SAML Configuration section in the Microsoft Entra admin center.

    2. Copy the ACS URL and paste it in the Reply URL textbox in the Basic SAML Configuration section in the Microsoft Entra admin center.

    3. In the Entity ID textbox, paste the Microsoft Entra Identifier which you have copied from the Microsoft Entra admin center.

    4. Open the downloaded Certificate (Base64) into Notepad and paste the content into the X.509 Certificate textbox.

    5. Click Enable.

Create Cognism test user

In this section, a user called B.Simon is created in Cognism. Cognism supports just-in-time user provisioning, which is enabled by default. There's no action item for you in this section. If a user doesn't already exist in Cognism, a new one is created after authentication.

Test SSO

In this section, you test your Microsoft Entra single sign-on configuration with following options.

  • Click on Test this application in Microsoft Entra admin center and you should be automatically signed in to the Cognism for which you set up the SSO.

  • You can use Microsoft My Apps. When you click the Cognism tile in the My Apps, you should be automatically signed in to the Cognism for which you set up the SSO. For more information about the My Apps, see Introduction to the My Apps.

Next steps

Once you configure Cognism you can enforce session control, which protects exfiltration and infiltration of your organization's sensitive data in real time. Session control extends from Conditional Access. Learn how to enforce session control with Microsoft Defender for Cloud Apps.