User experience when logging into a Splunk instance configured with RSA multifactor authentication

Depending on the method of access -- Splunk Web, CLI, or REST endpoint, the user enters RSA credentials using the login steps described below.

User experience when logging into Splunk Web

From Splunk Web, Splunk Enterprise with RSA Authentication Manager multifactor authentication requires the user to log into a secondary page or secondary method for each login.

1. The user logs into their Enterprise Splunk Web homepage using their login credentials. This is the primary login.

2. The user then sees an RSA login page. This is the secondary login.

3. The user enters their passcode. The passcode is a combination of the user's authentication PIN and the RSA-generated tokencode. For example, if the user's PIN is 1111 and RSA generates a tokencode of 2222, the passcode is 11112222.

4. In certain circumstances, the user may be required to enter their next token code. The user should not include their PIN for this page.

Multifactor authentication is logged in the debug log. Check the debug log if users encounter issues logging in.

Splunk does not support New PIN mode. In this case, the user should use an RSA client to configure the new PIN.

User experience when logging in via the CLI

If you have configured multifactor authentication for the management port, the user will need to use their passcode when logging into the CLI. The passcode is a combination of the user's authentication PIN and the RSA-generated tokencode. To authenticate, the user runs the login command with the -authparameter, and includes the passcode. For example, the following CLI sample shows the user logging in where the passcode is :676z=sl7.

./splunk login -auth user1:changed:676z=sl7

User experience when connecting to REST endpoints

If multifactor authentication is enabled for REST endpoints, and the user needs to access the UI endpoint login via https://localhost:8089/servicesNS/<user>/<app>. The user is prompted for a username and password. To login, the user will need to enter the password and passcode using the syntax of password:passcode to login.

The following command shows the user passing the passcode 11112222 to authenticate: curl -k -u user1:root_123:11112222 -X GET https://localhost:8090/services/saved/searches

You may also need to connect to the auth/login REST endpoint using the RSA tokencode to acquire a session key. For example:

curl -k https://localhost:8089/services/auth/login -d username=user1 -d password=changed -d passcode=11112222
<response>
<sessionKey>LfyRYqGEvt6aeOcotdBvqLBTDGG6Jk6HJEx56WqrhBYNrWrZRFrZ8XBgPRh4_kbrBMN4oJa2BF4dat7PjwB23Ebl6mmCYuGcXYJN4U1BJzCEviqVKKN</sessionKey>
<messages>
<msg code=""></msg>
</messages>
</response>

You cannot use the SDK to authenticate once the backend RSA multifactor authentication is enabled.