Using SESAME's GSS-API to add Security to Unix Applications

SESAME is a security architecture that starts from the Kerberos protocol and adds to it public-key based authentication, role based access control, delegation of rights and an extensive auditing facility. SESAME provides the GSSAPI for securing applications and this paper describes our efforts in securing some of the most important Unix applications using SESAME: telnet, the BSD rtools and the remote procedure call. We have found the benefit of using SESAME is that the applications are secured in a uniform manner, additional security services are provided to the applications that are unavailable with other architectures, and the impact of SESAME on the application’s performance is not excessive.