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Tutorial: Microsoft Entra single sign-on (SSO) integration with Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager

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In this tutorial, you'll learn how to integrate Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager with Microsoft Entra ID. When you integrate Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager with Microsoft Entra ID, you can:

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

Prerequisites

To get started, you need the following items:

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

Scenario description

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

  • Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager supports SP initiated SSO.

To configure the integration of Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager into Microsoft Entra ID, you need to add Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 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 Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager in the search box.
  4. Select Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 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 Microsoft Entra SSO for Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager

Configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 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 Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager.

To configure and test Microsoft Entra SSO with Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager, 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 Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager SSO - to configure the single sign-on settings on application side.
    1. Create Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager test user - to have a counterpart of B.Simon in Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 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.

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

  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager > 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.

    Edit Basic SAML Configuration

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

    a. In the Sign on URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<PUBLISHED VIRTUAL SERVER FQDN>/saml/consume

    b. In the Identifier (Entity ID) text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<PUBLISHED VIRTUAL SERVER FQDN>/saml/metadata

    c. In the Reply URL text box, type a URL using the following pattern: https://<PUBLISHED VIRTUAL SERVER FQDN>/saml/consume

    Note

    These values are not real. Update these values with the actual Sign on URL,Reply URL and Identifier. Contact Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager Client support team to get these values. You can also refer to the patterns shown in the Basic SAML Configuration section.

  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.

    The Certificate download link

  7. On the Set up Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager section, copy the appropriate URL(s) based on your requirement.

    Copy configuration URLs

Create a Microsoft Entra test user

In this section, you'll create a test user 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 single sign-on by granting access to Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager.

  1. Sign in to the Microsoft Entra admin center as at least a Cloud Application Administrator.
  2. Browse to Identity > Applications > Enterprise applications > Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager.
  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 Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager SSO

This section covers the configuration needed to enable Microsoft Entra SAML authentication on the Pulse Virtual Traffic Manager. All configuration changes are made on the Pulse Virtual Traffic Manager using the Admin web UI.

Create a SAML Trusted Identity Provider

a. Go to the Pulse Virtual Traffic Manager Appliance Admin UI > Catalog > SAML > Trusted Identity Providers Catalog page and click Edit.

saml catalogs page

b. Add the details for the new SAML Trusted Identity Provider, copying the information from the Microsoft Entra Enterprise application under the Single sign-on settings page and then click Create New Trusted Identity Provider.

Create New Trusted Identity Provider

  • In the Name textbox, enter a name for the trusted identity provider.

  • In the Entity_id textbox, enter the Microsoft Entra Identifier value which you copied previously.

  • In the Url textbox, enter the Login URL value which you copied previously.

  • Open the downloaded Certificate into Notepad and paste the content into the Certificate textbox.

c. Verify that the new SAML Identity Provider was successfully created.

Verify Trusted Identity Provider

Configure the Virtual Server to use Microsoft Entra authentication

a. Go to the Pulse Virtual Traffic Manager Appliance Admin UI > Services > Virtual Servers page and click Edit next to the previously created Virtual server.

Virtual Servers edit

b. In the Authentication section, click Edit.

Authentication section

c. Configure the following authentication settings for the virtual server:

  1. Authentication -

    authentication settings for virtual server

    a. In the Auth!type, select SAML Service Provider.

    b. In the Auth!verbose, set to “Yes” to troubleshoot any authentication issues, otherwise, leave default as “No”.

  2. Authentication Session Management -

    Authentication Session Management

    a. For Auth!session!cookie_name, leave default as “VS_SamlSP_Auth”.

    b. For auth!session!timeout, leave default to “7200”.

    c. In auth!session!log_external_state, set to “Yes” to troubleshoot any authentication issues, otherwise, leave default as “No”.

    d. In auth!session!cookie_attributes, change to “HTTPOnly”.

  3. SAML Service Provider -

    SAML Service Provider

    a. In the auth!saml!sp_entity_id textbox, set to the same URL used as the Microsoft Entra Single sign-on configuration Identifier (Entity ID). Like https://pulseweb.labb.info/saml/metadata.

    b. In the auth!saml!sp_acs_url, set to the same URL used as the Microsoft Entra Single sign-on configuration Replay URL (Assertion Consumer Service URL). Like https://pulseweb.labb.info/saml/consume.

    c. In the auth!saml!idp, select the Trusted Identity Provider you created in previous step.

    d. In the auth!saml!time_tolerance, leave default to “5” seconds.

    e. In the auth!saml!nameid_format, select unspecified.

    f. Apply changes by clicking Update on the bottom of the page.

Create Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager test user

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

Test SSO

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

  • Click on Test this application, this will redirect to Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager Sign-on URL where you can initiate the login flow.

  • Go to Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager Sign-on URL directly and initiate the login flow from there.

  • You can use Microsoft My Apps. When you click the Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager tile in the My Apps, this will redirect to Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager Sign-on URL. For more information about the My Apps, see Introduction to the My Apps.

Next steps

Once you configure Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 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.