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Tutorial: Azure Active Directory integration with Cisco Cloud

  • Article
  • 6 minutes to read

In this tutorial, you'll learn how to integrate Cisco Cloud with Azure Active Directory (Azure AD). When you integrate Cisco Cloud with Azure AD, you can:

  • Control in Azure AD who has access to Cisco Cloud.
  • Enable your users to be automatically signed-in to Cisco Cloud with their Azure AD accounts.
  • Manage your accounts in one central location - the Azure portal.

Prerequisites

To get started, you need the following items:

  • An Azure AD subscription. If you don't have a subscription, you can get a free account.
  • Cisco Cloud single sign-on (SSO) enabled subscription.

Scenario description

In this tutorial, you configure and test Azure AD single sign-on in a test environment.

  • Cisco Cloud supports SP and IDP initiated SSO.

To configure the integration of Cisco Cloud into Azure AD, you need to add Cisco Cloud from the gallery to your list of managed SaaS apps.

  1. Sign in to the Azure portal using either a work or school account, or a personal Microsoft account.
  2. On the left navigation pane, select the Azure Active Directory service.
  3. Navigate to Enterprise Applications and then select All Applications.
  4. To add new application, select New application.
  5. In the Add from the gallery section, type Cisco Cloud in the search box.
  6. Select Cisco Cloud 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, as well as walk through the SSO configuration as well. Learn more about Microsoft 365 wizards.

Configure and test Azure AD SSO for Cisco Cloud

Configure and test Azure AD SSO with Cisco Cloud using a test user called B.Simon. For SSO to work, you need to establish a link relationship between an Azure AD user and the related user in Cisco Cloud.

To configure and test Azure AD SSO with Cisco Cloud, perform the following steps:

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

Configure Azure AD SSO

Follow these steps to enable Azure AD SSO in the Azure portal.

  1. In the Azure portal, on the Cisco Cloud application integration page, find the Manage section and select single sign-on.

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

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

    Edit Basic SAML Configuration

  4. On the Basic SAML Configuration section, If you wish to configure the application in IDP initiated mode, perform the following steps:

    a. In the Identifier text box, type a URL using the following pattern: <subdomain>.cisco.com

    b. In the Reply URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<subdomain>.cisco.com/sp/ACS.saml2

  5. Click Set additional URLs and perform the following step if you wish to configure the application in SP initiated mode:

    In the Sign-on URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<subdomain>.cloudapps.cisco.com

    Note

    These values are not real. Update these values with the actual Identifier, Reply URL and Sign-on URL. Contact Cisco Cloud Client support team to get these values. You can also refer to the patterns shown in the Basic SAML Configuration section in the Azure portal.

  6. Your Cisco Cloud application expects the SAML assertions in a specific format, which requires you to add custom attribute mappings to your SAML token attributes configuration. The following screenshot shows the list of default attributes. Click Edit icon to open User Attributes dialog.

    Screenshot shows User Attributes with the Edit icon selected.

  7. In addition to above, Cisco Cloud application expects few more attributes to be passed back in SAML response. In the User Claims section on the User Attributes dialog, perform the following steps to add SAML token attribute as shown in the below table:

    Name Source Attribute
    country user.country
    company user.companyname

    a. Click Add new claim to open the Manage user claims dialog.

    Screenshot shows User claims with the option to Add new claim.

    Screenshot shows the Manage user claims dialog box where you can enter the values described.

    b. In the Name textbox, type the attribute name shown for that row.

    c. Leave the Namespace blank.

    d. Select Source as Attribute.

    e. From the Source attribute list, type the attribute value shown for that row.

    f. Click Ok

    g. Click Save.

  8. On the Set up Single Sign-On with SAML page, In the SAML Signing Certificate section, click copy button to copy App Federation Metadata Url and save it on your computer.

    The Certificate download link

Create an Azure AD test user

In this section, you'll create a test user in the Azure portal called B.Simon.

  1. From the left pane in the Azure portal, select Azure Active Directory, select Users, and then select All users.
  2. Select New user at the top of the screen.
  3. In the User properties, follow these steps:
    1. In the Name field, enter B.Simon.
    2. In the User 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. Click Create.

Assign the Azure AD test user

In this section, you'll enable B.Simon to use Azure single sign-on by granting access to Cisco Cloud.

  1. In the Azure portal, select Enterprise Applications, and then select All applications.
  2. In the applications list, select Cisco Cloud.
  3. In the app's overview page, find the Manage section and select Users and groups.
  4. Select Add user, then select Users and groups in the Add Assignment dialog.
  5. In the Users and groups dialog, select B.Simon from the Users list, then click the Select button at the bottom of the screen.
  6. 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.
  7. In the Add Assignment dialog, click the Assign button.

Configure Cisco Cloud SSO

To configure single sign-on on Cisco Cloud side, you need to send the App Federation Metadata Url to Cisco Cloud support team. They set this setting to have the SAML SSO connection set properly on both sides.

Create Cisco Cloud test user

In this section, you create a user called Britta Simon in Cisco Cloud. Work with Cisco Cloud support team to add the users in the Cisco Cloud platform. Users must be created and activated before you use single sign-on.

Test SSO

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

SP initiated:

  • Click on Test this application in Azure portal. This will redirect to Cisco Cloud Sign on URL where you can initiate the login flow.

  • Go to Cisco Cloud Sign-on URL directly and initiate the login flow from there.

IDP initiated:

  • Click on Test this application in Azure portal and you should be automatically signed in to the Cisco Cloud for which you set up the SSO.

You can also use Microsoft My Apps to test the application in any mode. When you click the Cisco Cloud tile in the My Apps, if configured in SP mode you would be redirected to the application sign on page for initiating the login flow and if configured in IDP mode, you should be automatically signed in to the Cisco Cloud 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 Cisco Cloud 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.