PlatformID™ Apple's Platform SSO

Apple's Platform SSO: An independent status update

In a significant first for local innovation, Cloudwork® is proud to advise the availability of Cloudwork PlatformID™ v1 supporting Apple Mac's Extensible SSO and Platform SSO v1.

Schools planning their 2024 device management need to know more about the status and relevance of this announcement.

Let's start with a quick re-cap:

Apple announced both Extensible SSO and Platform SSO v1 at their June, 2022 WWDC. The announcement stated:

• Extensible SSO will allow seamless single sign-on for users, instead of separate sign-ons for device access, apps and websites.
• Platform SSO allows school administrators to use identity provider (IdP) credentials to centrally manage passwords, permissions and group memberships.
• To support these new features, Identity Providers needed to build an installable extension for the managed Mac devices.
• At the time of announcement, very scant details or documentation were available to Identity Providers to build this new extension.
• Cloudwork responded to these announcements by committing to providing support for both Extensible and Platform SSO.

In a significant first for local innovation, Cloudwork® is proud to advise the availability of Cloudwork® PlatformID™ v1 supporting Apple Mac's Extensible SSO and Platform SSO v1.

Using Jamf Pro as the Mobile Device Manager (MDM) and Cloudwork® as the Identity Provider we'd like to walk you through an end-to-end experience starting from a clean Mac moving on to password synchronisation and desktop and web sign-on integration. The walk through can be experienced via these four videos:

• CloudworkPlatformIDv1-Step1-EnrolDevice
• CloudworkPlatformIDv1-Step2-RegisterUser
• CloudworkPlatformIDv1-Step3-PasswordSync
• CloudworkPlatformIDv1-Step4-MacExtensibleSSO

But the story does not end there.

At the June 2023 WWDC Apple announced the availability of Platform SSO v2, significantly enhancing its functional range and value:

• Supports local accounts: Platform SSO is designed to be a modern replacement for binding to directory services.
• Integrates into macOS: Platform SSO is integrated with macOS and doesn't use JavaScript or render webpages for authentication.
• Creating users on demand: New local user accounts can be created on demand at the login window using IdP credentials.
• Integrates IdP group membership with macOS: Mobile device management (MDM) configurable groups can be used to manage account permissions.
• Enables the use of network accounts for Authorization: Groups can also be used to authorize network accounts.
• Supports multiple authentication methods: Platform SSO supports many different authentication methods with an IdP.

Cloudwork® has committed to building support for v2 into Cloudwork's PlatformID™ feature.

Our target is to have v2 available this year for testing in Q4 2023, in time to support schools for the 2024 academic year.

There's a lot in this announcement.

Start your 2024 planning process now! Contact us to arrange a planning session to work through the best options for your school community.