Client authentication in PI when SAP Web dispatcher terminates SSL

Question

PI Security Experts,
Here is our design for Third-party Peoplesoft system initiating SOAP Call to PI Web Service created on our PI server.
1) Third-party Peoplesoft Application server initiates a SOAP call.
2) Third-party Network Gateway has a URL server certificate from our gateway and our gateway server has a root certificate from the CA used by third-party gateway. this will be used to establish the SSL tunnel between gateway.
3) SOAP request in our network will be routed through load balancer to SAP web dispatcher.
4) SAP web dispatcher terminates SSL connection
5) We will generate client cert for authentication and pass it onto third-party which they will load onto their PeopleSoft application server. SOAP call initiating from the PeopleSoft server will pass the client cert along with the message (My understanding is that the client cert will not be a part of SOAP message body. Ina other words we are not implementing message-level security. Is that true? How will the client cert be passed? How and where will a client attach the client cert with message?My understanding is that this is a network layer security and client certificate will be authenticated on PI J2ee server at SSL protocol level..Is my understanding correct?)
6) We will also load client certificate generated for client onto J2EE server using Visual Admin and map it to PI user for authentication.
7) SAP web dispatcher terminates SSL and passes the SOAP message to PI (J2EE) along with client cert in a http header variable.
There is some conflicting SAP documents. some say that client cert can't be used for PI authentication if Web Dispatcher terminates SSL connection (http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04s/helpdata/en/ea/301e3e6217b40be10000000a114084/frameset.htm). There is some other documents that say that authentication using client cert is possible by having J2EE trusting Web Dispatcher and by passing client cert from Web Dispatcher to J2EE in a httpheader variable (http://help.sap.com/saphelp_erp2005/helpdata/en/ea/301e3e6217b40be10000000a114084/content.htm).
Now if client cert authentication is possible even if Web dispatcher terminates SSL, what cert do we need on J2EE, a cert from Web dispatcher or a client cert that's coming in from the client appication (the one that we created and provided to our third-party)?
If we install a cert from web dispatcher on J2EE then do we need a client cert on Web dispatcher instead of on J2EE? If so how and where do we map client cert to PI User?
I will really appreciate any advise on whether we are going down the right path and any pointers to my questions.
Thanks,
Saurabh

Answer 1

Hi,
May be below links will be helpful
Check the following links.. you will get the information all about the securities...
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/f7/c2953fc405330ee10000000a114084/content.htm
Also read thru this link for message level security - https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/go/portal/prtroot/docs/library/uuid/d024ca8e-e76e-2910-c183-8ea4ba681c51
Also find soeminformation in these links
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw2004s/helpdata/en/a8/882a40ce93185de10000000a1550b0/frameset.htm
/people/aparna.chaganti2/blog/2007/01/23/how-xml-encryption-can-be-done-using-web-services-security-in-sap-netweaver-xi
Step by step guide for SSL security
step by step guide to implement SSL
Please go through below link for referance (above information is from below link)
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/14/ef2940cbf2195de10000000a1550b0/frameset.htm
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/ff/7932e4e9c51c4fa596c69e21151c7d/content.htm
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/13/4a3ad42ae78e4ca256861e078b4160/content.htm
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/3a/7cddde33ff05cae10000000a128c20/content.htm
http://help.sap.com/saphelp_nw04/helpdata/en/0a/0a2e0fef6211d3a6510000e835363f/content.htm
General guide
https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/go/portal/prtroot/docs/library/uuid/a09f3d8e-d478-2910-9eb8-caa6516dd7d9
Message level security
https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/go/portal/prtroot/docs/library/uuid/d024ca8e-e76e-2910-c183-8ea4ba681c51
Regarding message level you can encrypt the message using certificates.
For both of this basis team has to deploy the releavant certificates in XI ABAP Stack or Java stack.
Generally if the scenarios are intra company we dont use any transport level or message level security since the network is already secured.
Thanks
Swarup