Book Image

Azure Active Directory for Secure Application Development

By : Sjoukje Zaal
Book Image

Azure Active Directory for Secure Application Development

By: Sjoukje Zaal

Overview of this book

Azure Active Directory for Secure Application Development is your one-stop shop for learning how to develop secure applications using modern authentication techniques with Microsoft Azure AD. Whether you’re working with single-tenant, multi-tenant, or line-of-business applications, this book contains everything you need to secure them. The book wastes no time in diving into the practicalities of Azure AD. Right from the start, you’ll be setting up tenants, adding users, and registering your first application in Azure AD. The balance between grasping and applying theory is maintained as you move from the intermediate to the advanced: from the basics of OAuth to getting your hands dirty with building applications and registering them in Azure AD. Want to pin down the Microsoft Graph, Azure AD B2C, or authentication protocol best practices? We’ve got you covered. The full range of Azure AD functionality from a developer perspective is here for you to explore with confidence. By the end of this secure app development book, you’ll have developed the skill set that so many organizations are clamoring for. Security is mission-critical, and after reading this book, you will be too.
Table of Contents (14 chapters)
1
Part 1: Getting Started with the Microsoft Identity Platform
5
Part 2: Authentication and Protocols
9
Part 3: Azure AD B2C

Understanding the authorization code flow

Before we dive into the code, some basics around application sign-in flows need to be covered. As we have mentioned in the previous chapters, the Microsoft identity platform supports authentication for different types of application architectures. All these architectures are fully based on industry standards, such as OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect. On top of that, Microsoft has released a set of client libraries that can be used inside your applications to authenticate identities and acquire tokens to access protected APIs. These libraries are part of the MSAL.

Important Note

OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, and MSAL are covered in detail in Part 2 of this book.

Multiple types of flows are supported in OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect, as well as the Microsoft identity platform. In Chapter 5, Securing Applications with OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, and MSAL, we will cover them in more detail. In this chapter, we want to cover the most used flow...