Duo Single Sign-On for Amazon AppStream 2.0

Overview

As business applications move from on-premises to cloud hosted solutions, users experience password fatigue due to disparate logons for different applications. Single sign-on (SSO) technologies seek to unify identities across systems and reduce the number of different credentials a user has to remember or input to gain access to resources.

While SSO is convenient for users, it presents new security challenges. If a user's primary password is compromised, attackers may be able to gain access to multiple resources. In addition, as sensitive information makes its way to cloud-hosted services it is even more important to secure access by implementing two-factor authentication and zero-trust policies.

About Duo Single Sign-On

Duo Single Sign-On is our cloud-hosted SSO product which layers Duo's strong authentication and flexible policy engine on top of Amazon AppStream 2.0 logins. Duo Single Sign-On acts as an identity provider (IdP), authenticating your users using existing on-premises Active Directory (AD) or another SSO IdP. Duo SSO prompts users for two-factor authentication and performs endpoint assessment and verification before permitting access to Amazon AppStream 2.0.

Duo Single Sign-On is available in Duo Premier, Duo Advantage, and Duo Essentials plans, which also include the ability to define policies that enforce unique controls for each individual SSO application. For example, you can require that Salesforce users complete two-factor authentication at every login, but only once every seven days when accessing Amazon AppStream 2.0. Duo checks the user, device, and network against an application's policy before allowing access to the application.

Configure Single Sign-On

Before configuring Amazon AppStream 2.0 with Duo SSO using Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) 2.0 authentication you'll first need to enable Duo Single Sign-On for your Duo account and configure a working authentication source.

Once you have your SSO authentication source working, continue to the next step of creating the Amazon AppStream 2.0 application in Duo.

Create the Amazon AppStream 2.0 Application in Duo

1. Log on to the Duo Admin Panel and navigate to Applications.

2. Click Protect an Application and locate the entry for Amazon AppStream 2.0 with a protection type of "2FA with SSO hosted by Duo (Single Sign-On)" in the applications list. Click Protect to the far-right to start configuring Amazon AppStream 2.0. See Protecting Applications for more information about protecting applications in Duo and additional application options. You'll need the information on the Amazon AppStream 2.0 page under Downloads later.

3. Amazon AppStream 2.0 uses the Mail attribute when authenticating. We've mapped the <Email Address> bridge attribute to Duo Single Sign-On supported authentication source attributes as follows:

   Bridge Attribute	Active Directory	SAML IdP
   <Email Address>	mail	Email

4. If you are using a SAML authentication source, then Amazon AppStream 2.0 also requires the Security identifier attribute when authenticating. This needs to be set up as a claims attribute in the authentication source, and is mapped to Duo Single Sign-On supported authentication source attributes as follows:

   Bridge Attribute	Active Directory	SAML IdP
   <Security Identifier>	objectSid	cip_sid

5. If you are using non-standard attributes for your authentication source, check the Custom attributes box and enter the name of the attributes you wish to use instead.

   

6. The SAML IdP cip_sid attribute can be customized to match what your SAML authentication source is mapping them to. Click the attribute to open the drop-down menu, and then click Enter custom value. Enter your SAML IdP custom attribute name.

   

7. You can adjust additional settings for your new SAML application at this time — like changing the application's name from the default value, enabling self-service, or assigning a group policy.

8. Keep the Duo Admin Panel tab open. You will come back to it later.

Duo Universal Prompt

The Duo Universal Prompt provides a simplified and accessible Duo login experience for web-based applications, offering a redesigned visual interface with security and usability enhancements.

Universal Prompt	Traditional Prompt

We've already updated the Duo Amazon AppStream 2.0 application hosted in Duo's service to support the Universal Prompt, so there's no action required on your part to update the application itself. If you created your Amazon AppStream 2.0 application before March 2024, you can activate the Universal Prompt experience for users from the Duo Admin Panel. Amazon AppStream 2.0 applications created after March 2024 have the Universal Prompt activated by default.

If you created your Amazon AppStream 2.0 application before March 2024, it's a good idea to read the Universal Prompt Update Guide for more information, about the update process and the new login experience for users, before you activate the Universal Prompt for your application.

Activate Universal Prompt

Activation of the Universal Prompt is a per-application change. Activating it for one application does not change the login experience for your other Duo applications.

The "Universal Prompt" area of the application details page shows that this application is "Ready to activate", with these activation control options:

• Show traditional prompt: Your users experience Duo's traditional prompt via redirect when logging in to this application.
• Show new Universal Prompt: (Default) Your users experience the Universal Prompt via redirect when logging in to this application.

The application's Universal Prompt status shows "Activation complete" here and on the Universal Prompt Update Progress report.

Should you ever want to roll back to the traditional prompt, you can return to this setting and change it back to Show traditional prompt. However, this will still deliver the Duo prompt via redirect, not in an iframe. Keep in mind that support for the traditional Duo prompt ended for the majority of applications in March 2024.

Universal Update Progress

Click the See Update Progress link to view the Universal Prompt Update Progress report. This report shows the update availability and migration progress for all your Duo applications. You can also activate the new prompt experience for multiple supported applications from the report page instead of visiting the individual details pages for each application.

Enable Amazon AppStream 2.0 for SSO

To enable Amazon AppStream 2.0 for SSO, do the sections below in the order they appear.

Create a Stack

A stack is a prerequisite and is required before you create a policy. If you did not create a stack yet, refer to the "Create a Stack" section in the Create an AppStream 2.0 Fleet and Stack document for instructions.

Add an Identity Provider

1. In your Amazon console, type IAM into the Search bar at the top of the page.

2. In the search results, click IAM. The "IAM Dashboard" opens.

3. In the left menu sidebar, click Identity providers. The "Identity providers" page opens.

4. Click Add provider. The "Add an Identity provider" page opens.

5. In the "Configure provider" section, click the SAML radio button.

6. Enter a unique name for your provider into the Provider name field.

7. Copy your provider name and paste it into the Duo Admin Panel Provider name field, under "Service Provider".

   

8. In the Duo Admin Panel, under "Downloads", click Download XML.

9. Return to the Amazon AppStream 2.0 "Add an Identity provider" page. Click Choose file and open the XML file you downloaded from Duo earlier.

10. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Add provider.

Create a Role

1. In the left menu sidebar, click Roles. The "Roles" page opens.

2. Click Create role. The "Select trusted entity" page opens.

3. In the "Trusted entity type" section, click the SAML 2.0 federation radio button.

4. In the "SAML 2.0 federation" section, click the SAML 2.0-based provider drop-down menu and select the identity provider you created earlier.

5. Click the Allow programmatic access only radio button.

6. Click the Attribute drop-down menu and select SAML:sub_type.

7. Enter persistent into the Value field.

8. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Next. The "Add permissions" page opens.

9. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Next. The "Name, review, and create" page opens.

10. In the "Role details" section, enter a unique name for your role into the Role name field.

11. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Create role.

Create a Policy

1. On the "Roles" page, in the Role name column, click the role you created earlier. Your role page opens.

2. In the "Permissions policies" section, click the Add permissions drop-down menu and select Create inline policy. The "Specify permissions" page opens.

3. In the "Policy editor" section, click JSON. The "Policy editor" section opens.

4. Open the Setting Up SAML document. Scroll down to "Step 3: Embed an Inline Policy for the IAM Role".

5. In "Step 3: Embed an Inline Policy for the IAM Role", copy the code block that follows step 3 and paste it into the "Policy editor" section on the Amazon "Specify permissions" page.

   

6. Enter AppStream into the search bar at the top of the page. In the search results, right-click AppStream 2.0 and click Open Link in New Tab. The "AppStream 2.0" page opens in a new tab.

7. Go to the "AppStream 2.0" tab. In the upper right corner of the "AppStream 2.0" page, click the region drop-down menu and copy your region code, as highlighted in the image below. Keep the tab with the "AppStream 2.0" page open. You will come back to it later.

   

8. Paste your region code over the REGION-CODE text on line 7 of the Policy editor field on the "Specify permissions" page.

9. Return to the Duo Admin Panel. Paste your region code into the Region ID field, under "Service Provider".

   

10. Return to the "AppStream 2.0" tab. In the left menu sidebar, click Stacks. The "Stacks" page opens.

11. In the Name column, copy your stack name and paste it over the STACK-NAME text on line 7 of the Policy editor field on the "Specify permissions" page.

12. Return to the Duo Admin Panel. Paste your stack name into the Stack Name field, under "Service Provider".

    

13. Return to the "Specify permissions" page. In the upper left corner of the page, right-click the IAM link and select Open Link in New Tab. The "IAM Dashboard" opens in the new tab.

14. Go to the "IAM Dashboard" tab. In the "Amazon Account" section, copy your Account ID and paste it over the ACCOUNT-ID-WITHOUT-HYPHENS text on line 7 of the Policy editor field on the "Specify permissions" page. The code block should now match the image below.

    

15. Return to the Duo Admin Panel. Paste your account ID into the Account number field, under "Service Provider".

    

16. Return to the "Specify permissions" page. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Next. The "Review and create" page opens.

17. In the "Policy details" section, enter a unique name for your policy into the Policy name field.

18. Click Create policy.

Group Mapping

1. In the left menu sidebar, click Roles. The "Roles" page opens.

2. In the Role name column, copy the role you created earlier and paste it into the Duo Admin Panel AWS role field, under "Service Provider".

3. In the Duo Admin Panel, click the Duo groups drop-down menu and select the applicable group to map.

   

4. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click Save.

Learn more about Amazon AppStream 2.00 SSO at AWS Documentation.

Add a Tile to Duo Central

Duo Central is our cloud-hosted portal which allows users to access all of their applications in one spot. Amazon AppStream 2.0 requires IdP-initiated sign-on, so you must add an application tile for it to Duo Central for your users to access the application. To add a tile for Amazon AppStream 2.0 to Duo Central, do the following:

1. In the Duo Admin Panel, navigate to Single Sign-On → Duo Central.

2. If you have not already enabled Duo Central, review the information on the page and click Get Started. Complete the initial Duo Central configuration before proceeding to the next step.

3. Click Add tile and then click Add application tile.

4. Click the checkbox next to "Amazon AppStream 2.0 - Single Sign-On".

5. Click Add tile.

See Duo Central to learn more about adding an application tile.

Using SSO

Log into Duo Central with your custom URL, and then click the Amazon AppStream 2.0 - Single Sign-On tile to be redirected to Duo Single Sign-On to begin authentication.

If you do not know your Duo Central custom URL, you can find it in the Duo Admin Panel by navigating to Single Sign-On → Duo Central. In the upper right corner of the page, click your Duo Central custom URL to access the Amazon AppStream 2.0 tile.

Active Directory Login

With Active Directory as the Duo SSO authentication source, enter the primary username (email address) on the Duo SSO login page and click or tap Next.

Enter the AD primary password and click or tap Log in to continue.

Enable Duo Passwordless to log in to Duo SSO backed by Active Directory authentication without entering a password in the future.

SAML Login

With another SAML identity provider as the Duo SSO authentication source, Duo SSO immediately redirects the login attempt to that SAML IdP for primary authentication. Users do not see the Duo SSO primary login screen.

Duo Authentication

Successful verification of your primary credentials by Active Directory or a SAML IdP redirects back to Duo. Complete Duo two-factor authentication when prompted and then you'll return to Amazon AppStream 2.0 to complete the login process.

* Universal Prompt experience shown.

Congratulations! Your Amazon AppStream 2.0 users now authenticate using Duo Single Sign-On.

See the full user login experience, including expired password reset (available for Active Directory authentication sources) in the Duo End User Guide for SSO.

Enable Remembered Devices

To minimize additional Duo two-factor prompts when switching between Amazon AppStream 2.0 and your other Duo Single Sign-On SAML applications, be sure to apply a shared "Remembered Devices" policy to your SAML applications.

Troubleshooting

Need some help? Try searching our Knowledge Base articles or Community discussions. For further assistance, contact Support.