SNR S2940-8G-v2 Switch Configuration Guide
802.1x Configuration
Chapter 45
802.1x Configuration
45.1 Introduction to 802.1x
The 802.1x protocol originates from 802.11 protocol, the wireless LAN protocol of IEEE, which is
designed to provide a solution to doing authentication when users access a wireless LAN. The
LAN defined in IEEE 802 LAN protocol does not provide access authentication, which means as
long as the users can access a LAN controlling device (such as a LAN Switch), they will be able
to get all the devices or resources in the LAN. There was no looming danger in the environment
of LAN in those primary enterprise networks.
However, along with the boom of applications like mobile office and service operating networks,
the service providers should control and configure the access from user. The prevailing application
of WLAN and LAN access in telecommunication networks, in particular, make it necessary to
control ports in order to implement the user-level access control. And as a result, IEEE LAN/WAN
committee defined a standard, which is 802.1x, to do Port-Based Network Access Control. This
standard has been widely used in wireless LAN and ethernet.
'Port-Based Network Access Control' means to authenticate and control the user devices on
the level of ports of LAN access devices. Only when the user devices connected to the ports pass
the authentication, can they access the resources in the LAN, otherwise, the resources in the LAN
won't be available.
45.1.1 The Authentication Structure of 802.1x
The system using 802.1x has a typical Client/Server structure, which contains three entities (as
illustrated in the next figure): Supplicant system, Authenticator system, and Authentication server
system.
• The supplicant system is an entity on one end of the LAN segment, should be authenticated
by the access controlling unit on the other end of the link. A Supplicant system usually
is a user terminal device. Users start 802.1x authentication by starting supplicant system
software. A supplicant system should support EAPOL (Extensible Authentication Protocol
over LAN).
• The authenticator system is another entity on one end of the LAN segment to authenticate
the supplicant systems connected. An authenticator system usually is a network device
supporting 802,1x protocol, providing ports to access the LAN for supplicant systems. The
ports provided can either be physical or logical.
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