IKEv2

Phase 1

Unlike Phase 1 of IKEv1, IKEv2 does not provide options for Aggressive or Main mode. Furthermore, Phase 1 of IKEv2 begins immediately with an IKE SA initiation, consisting of only two packets (containing all the information typically contained in four packets for IKEv1), securing the channel such that all following transactions are encrypted (see Phase 1 parameters on page 46).

The encrypted transactions contain the IKE authentication, since remote peers have yet to be authenticated. This stage of IKE authentication in IKEv2 can loosely be called Phase 1.5.

Phase 1.5

As part of this phase, IKE authentication must occur. IKE authentication consists of the following:

• The authentication payloads and Internet Security Association and Key Management Protocol (ISAKMP) identifier. l The authentication method (RSA, PSK, ECDSA, or EAP).
• The IPsec SA parameters.

Due to the number of authentication methods potentially used, and SAs established, the overall IKEv2 negotiation can range from 4 packets (no EAP exchange at all) to many more.

At this point, both peers have a security association complete and ready to encrypt traffic.

Phase 2

In IKEv1, Phase 2 uses Quick mode to negotiate an IPsec SA between peers. In IKEv2, since the IPsec SA is already established, Phase 2 is essentially only used to negotiate “child” SAs, or to re-key an IPsec SA. That said, there are only two packets for each exchange of this type, similar to the exchange at the outset of Phase 1.5.

IKE and IPsec packet processing

The entire IKEv2 process is demonstrated in the following diagram:

Support for IKEv2 session resumption

If a gateway loses connectivity to the network, clients can attempt to re-establish the lost session by presenting the ticket to the gateway (as described in RFC 5723). As a result, sessions can be resumed much faster, as DH exchange that is necessary to establish a brand new connection is skipped. This feature implements “ticket-byvalue”, whereby all information necessary to restore the state of a particular IKE SA is stored in the ticket and sent to the client.

IKEv2 asymmetric authentication

Asymmetric authentication allows both sides of an authentication exchange to use different authentication methods, for example the initiator may be using a shared key, while the responder may have a public signature key and certificate.

The command authmethod-remote is avilable under config vpn ipsec phase1-interface.

For more detailed information on authentication of the IKE SA, see RFC 5996 – Internet Key Exchange Protocol Version 2 (IKEv2).

IKEv2 Digital Signature Authentication support

FortiOS supports the use of Digital Signature authentication, which changes the format of the Authentication Data payload in order to support different signature methods.

Instead of just containing a raw signature value calculated as defined in the original IKE RFCs, the Auth Data now includes an ASN.1 formatted object that provides details on how the signature was calculated, such as the signature type, hash algorithm, and signature padding method.

For more detailed information on IKEv2 Digital Signature authentication, see RFC 7427 – Signature Authentication in the Internet Key Exchange Version 2 (IKEv2).

Unique IKE identifiers

When enabled, the following phase1 CLI command (enforce-unique-id) requires all IPsec VPN clients to use a unique identifer when connecting.

CLI syntax

config vpn ipsec phase1 edit <name> set enforce-unique-id {keep-new | keep-old | disable} Default is disable. next

end

Use keep-new to replace the old connnection if an ID collision is detected on the gateway. Use keep-old to reject the new connection if an ID collision is detected.

IKEv2 ancillary RADIUS group authentication

This feature provides for the IDi information to be extracted from the IKEv2 AUTH exchange and sent to a RADIUS server, along with a fixed password (configurable via CLI only), to perform an additional group authentication step prior to tunnel establishment. The RADIUS server may return framed-IP-address, framed-ipnetmask, and dns-server attributes, which are then applied to the tunnel.

It should be noted, unlike Xauth or EAP, this feature does not perform individual user authentication, but rather treats all users on the gateway as a single group, and authenticates that group with RADIUS using a fixed password. This feature also works with RADIUS accounting, including the phase1 acct-verify option.

Syntax

config vpn ipsec phase1-interface edit <name> set mode-cfg enable set type dynamic set ike-version 2 set group-authentication {enable | disable} set group-authentication-secret <password>

next end

 

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