Episode 30 — Harden identity federation paths to prevent trust abuse and token misuse
This episode explains identity federation as a trust relationship that must be deliberately constrained, because federation failures often enable token misuse, lateral movement, and privilege escalation—high-value topics for the GPCS exam. You’ll define federation components such as identity providers, relying parties, assertions or tokens, and claim mapping, then connect misconfigurations to attacker outcomes like impersonation, overbroad access, or session replay across environments. We’ll cover hardening practices including strict audience and issuer validation, minimal and explicit claim mapping, scoped role assumption, short token lifetimes, and robust logging for assertion issuance and use. A scenario follows a trusted partner integration where overly permissive claims allow broader access than intended; you’ll redesign the trust so tokens are only valid for specific apps and roles, and you’ll validate success by attempting the original abuse path and confirming it fails with clear audit evidence. Produced by BareMetalCyber.com, where you’ll find more cyber audio courses, books, and information to strengthen your educational path. Also, if you want to stay up to date with the latest news, visit DailyCyber.News for a newsletter you can use, and a daily podcast you can commute with.
