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Extensible Authentication Protocol

aliases:

  • EAP

A framework for autonegotiation of secure authentication methods that use hardware identifiers like fingerprint readers or smart card scanners.

This autonegotiation happens before full connection in three scenarios:

  • when the user is accessing a wireless network and needs to access a network directory server (e.g. LDAP)
  • when a device is connecting to a network via a switch and network policies require the device to authenticate before full communications are established
  • when a user is connecting over a VPN

EAP is usually configured with a digital certificate to handle secure tunnel creation for credential transmission.

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