Configure MinIO for Authentication using Active Directory / LDAP

Active Directory / LDAP Compatible IDentity Provider

This procedure assumes an existing Active Directory or LDAP service. Instructions on configuring AD/LDAP are out of scope for this procedure.

MinIO requires a read-only access keys with which it binds to perform authenticated user and group queries.

Ensure each AD/LDAP user and group intended for use with MinIO has a corresponding policy on the MinIO deployment. An AD/LDAP user with no assigned policy and with membership in groups with no assigned policy has no permission to access any action or resource on the MinIO cluster.

MinIO Deployment

This procedure assumes an existing MinIO cluster running the latest stable MinIO version. Defer to the Install and Deploy MinIO for more complete documentation on new MinIO deployments.

This procedure may work as expected for older versions of MinIO.

Install and Configure mc with Access to the MinIO Cluster

This procedure uses mc for performing operations on the MinIO cluster. Install mc on a machine with network access to the cluster. See the mc Installation Quickstart for instructions on downloading and installing mc.

This procedure assumes a configured alias for the MinIO cluster.

1) Set the Active Directory / LDAP Configuration Settings

You can configure the AD/LDAP provider using either environment variables or server runtime configuration settings. Both methods require starting/restarting the MinIO deployment to apply changes. The following tabs provide a quick reference of all required and optional environment variables and configuration settings respectively:

export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_SERVER_ADDR="ldaps.example.net:636"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_LOOKUP_BIND_DN="CN=xxxxx,OU=xxxxx,OU=xxxxx,DC=example,DC=net"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_USER_DN_SEARCH_BASE_DN="dc=example,dc=net"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_USER_DN_SEARCH_FILTER="(&(objectCategory=user)(sAMAccountName=%s))"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_LOOKUP_BIND_PASSWORD="xxxxxxxxx"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_GROUP_SEARCH_FILTER="(&(objectClass=group)(member=%d))"
export MINIO_IDENTITY_LDAP_GROUP_SEARCH_BASE_DN="ou=MinIO Users,dc=example,dc=net"

mc admin config set ALIAS/ identity_ldap \
   server_addr="ldaps.example.net:636" \
   lookup_bind_dn="CN=xxxxx,OU=xxxxx,OU=xxxxx,DC=example,DC=net" \
   lookup_bind_password="xxxxxxxx" \
   user_dn_search_base_dn="DC=example,DC=net" \
   user_dn_search_filter="(&(objectCategory=user)(sAMAccountName=%s))" \
   group_search_filter= "(&(objectClass=group)(member=%d))" \
   group_search_base_dn="ou=MinIO Users,dc=example,dc=net"

2) Restart the MinIO Deployment

You must restart the MinIO deployment to apply the configuration changes. Use the mc admin service restart command to restart the deployment.

mc admin service restart ALIAS

Replace ALIAS with the alias of the deployment to restart.

3) Use the MinIO Console to Log In with AD/LDAP Credentials

The MinIO Console supports the full workflow of authenticating to the AD/LDAP provider, generating temporary credentials using the MinIO AssumeRoleWithLDAPIdentity Security Token Service (STS) endpoint, and logging the user into the MinIO deployment.

Starting in RELEASE.2021-07-08T01-15-01Z, the MinIO Console is embedded in the MinIO server. You can access the Console by opening the root URL for the MinIO cluster. For example, https://minio.example.net:9000.

From the Console, click BUTTON to begin the Active Directory / LDAP authentication flow.

Once logged in, you can perform any action for which the authenticated user is authorized.

You can also create access keys for supporting applications which must perform operations on MinIO. Access Keys are long-lived credentials which inherit their privileges from the parent user. The parent user can further restrict those privileges while creating the service account.

4) Generate S3-Compatible Temporary Credentials using AD/LDAP Credentials

MinIO requires clients authenticate using AWS Signature Version 4 protocol with support for the deprecated Signature Version 2 protocol. Specifically, clients must present a valid access key and secret key to access any S3 or MinIO administrative API, such as PUT, GET, and DELETE operations.

Applications can generate temporary access credentials as-needed using the AssumeRoleWithLDAPIdentity Security Token Service (STS) API endpoint and AD/LDAP user credentials. MinIO provides an example Go application ldap.go with an example of managing this workflow.

POST https://minio.example.net?Action=AssumeRoleWithLDAPIdentity
&LDAPUsername=USERNAME
&LDAPPassword=PASSWORD
&Version=2011-06-15
&Policy={}

• Replace the LDAPUsername with the username of the AD/LDAP user.

• Replace the LDAPPassword with the password of the AD/LDAP user.

• Replace the Policy with an inline URL-encoded JSON policy that further restricts the permissions associated to the temporary credentials.

  Omit to use the policy whose name matches the Distinguished Name (DN) of the AD/LDAP user.

The API response consists of an XML document containing the access key, secret key, session token, and expiration date. Applications can use the access key and secret key to access and perform operations on MinIO.

See the AssumeRoleWithLDAPIdentity for reference documentation.