Authentication System Design
Ace your senior security engineer authentication system design interview with our AI-powered real-time coach. Get instant guidance on identity management, OAuth flows, secure authentication architectures, and zero trust implementation.
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Interviewer [00:00:05]: Design a secure authentication and identity management system for a large enterprise with 50,000 employees, 200+ applications, and strict compliance requirements including GDPR and SOC 2.
You [00:00:15]: I'd like to start by understanding the requirements better. What are the key authentication scenarios we need to support? Are there any specific security requirements like MFA or SSO? What's the current infrastructure like? And are there any performance or scalability constraints?
Interviewer [00:00:28]: Good questions. We need to support employee authentication, B2B partner access, and customer authentication. MFA is required for all employees and partners. SSO is essential for internal applications. The company uses a hybrid cloud environment with both on-premises and cloud applications. Authentication services should handle 1,000 logins per second at peak with sub-200ms latency.
AI Suggestion:
- Architecture Approach:
- Propose a centralized identity provider (IdP) architecture with federation capabilities
- Suggest separation of concerns: authentication, authorization, user management
- Recommend a zero trust security model with continuous verification
- Discuss hybrid deployment model spanning on-premises and cloud
- Authentication Components:
- Suggest OpenID Connect (OIDC) for authentication protocol
- Recommend OAuth 2.0 for authorization framework
- Discuss SAML for legacy application integration
- Explain JWT token architecture with short-lived access tokens and refresh tokens
- Suggest FIDO2/WebAuthn for passwordless authentication
- MFA Implementation:
- Discuss risk-based MFA with adaptive authentication
- Recommend multiple factor options (mobile app, hardware tokens, biometrics)
- Suggest TOTP as baseline with WebAuthn as preferred option
- Explain backup and recovery mechanisms
- Directory Services:
- Propose hybrid directory architecture with on-premises AD and cloud directory
- Discuss directory synchronization and federation
- Suggest SCIM for user provisioning across applications
- Explain role-based access control (RBAC) implementation
- Security & Compliance:
- Discuss encryption of credentials and PII for GDPR compliance
- Recommend comprehensive audit logging for SOC 2
- Suggest session management with secure cookie handling
- Explain brute force protection and account lockout policies
- Scalability & Reliability:
- Propose horizontally scalable architecture with load balancing
- Discuss caching strategies for token validation
- Suggest multi-region deployment for disaster recovery
- Explain high availability configuration with failover
🔐 Authentication Protocol Design
Get expert guidance on designing secure authentication protocols, including OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, SAML, and custom token-based systems with detailed security analysis and implementation considerations.
⚡ Identity Management Architecture
Receive instant recommendations on designing robust identity management systems, including user stores, directory services, federation patterns, and approaches for managing identities across complex enterprises.
🔄 Multi-Factor Authentication
Access real-time guidance on implementing secure MFA solutions, including time-based OTP, push notifications, biometrics, hardware tokens, and risk-based authentication strategies.
🔍 Zero Trust Implementation
Get instant suggestions for implementing zero trust security models, including continuous verification, least privilege access, and context-aware authentication policies for modern security architectures.
🔒 Compliance & Privacy
Receive guidance on designing authentication systems that meet regulatory requirements like GDPR, HIPAA, and SOC 2, including data minimization, consent management, and audit capabilities.
📈 Scalability & Performance
Access expert advice on scaling authentication systems to handle millions of users, including token validation optimization, caching strategies, and high-availability architectures for critical auth services.
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