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Authentication through web.config not authenticating in ASP.net 3.5

Answer 1

+6 A:

I'm not sure if this has changed in .NET 3.5, but the <credentials> element has an attribute passwordFormat that defines the format for passwords in the web.config. From the MSDN documentation for .NET 3.5, the default format is SHA1.

If you're using cleartext usernames and passwords in your web.config, you should use:

...
<credentials passwordFormat="Clear">
...

Event though this is an internal application I'd still recommend at least hashing the password instead of leaving it in clear text.

dariom 2009-07-17 12:37:41

Magic, that was it! Good bit of forehead-meets-palm when I read that. Amazing what you forget on a Friday afternoon. Many thanks!

Kevin Wilson 2009-07-17 12:46:45

Answer 2

+2 A:

I think the reason is because you did not indicate the passwordFormat. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/e01fc50a.aspx

Default is SHA1, hence your clear text in fact not used properly.

o.k.w 2009-07-17 12:41:23

Answer 3

+1 A:

You have to specify <credentials passwordFormat="Clear"> when you store password in clear text.

The alternatives are encrypted passwords using MD5 or SHA1.

See http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.web.security.formsauthentication.hashpasswordforstoringinconfigfile.aspx for a function to encode a password.

You might also consider using some of the available user controls that does a lot for you automatically. Look under the "Login" section in the control toolbox in Visual Studio.

The following page will provide everything you need for this simple case, and the looks of the Login control is fully customizable:

<%@ Page Language="C#" %>

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"&gt;

<script runat="server">

    protected void Login1_Authenticate(object sender, AuthenticateEventArgs e)
    {
        e.Authenticated = FormsAuthentication.Authenticate(Login1.UserName, Login1.Password);
    }
</script>

<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"&gt;
<head runat="server">
    <title>Login</title>
</head>
<body>
    <form id="form1" runat="server">
    <div>
        <asp:Login ID="Login1" runat="server" onauthenticate="Login1_Authenticate">
        </asp:Login>
    </div>
    </form>
</body>
</html>

awe 2009-07-17 12:54:22

Answer 4

A:

Another possible pitfall that is that the user name "Admin" appears to be special and not honored if your testing a credential set in web.config

<credentials>
 <user name="Admin" password="somepassword" />  //Authentication always returns false for me
</credentials>

<credentials>
 <user name="MyName" password="somepassword" />  //Authentication works normally 
</credentials>

The problem doesn't seem to apply in your case, but I just spent an hour figuring that out so I thought I'd record it here.

Glenn 2009-09-03 06:21:13

Answer 5

A:

Hello! i find that solution........first you have to get hashvalue by using FormsAuthentication.HashPasswordForStoringInConfigFile("abc","SHA1") in text box by running your program and then provide this value in

naval 2009-10-22 10:06:56

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Authentication through web.config not authenticating in ASP.net 3.5

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