User Guide for Cisco Secure Access Control Server - Stewing Home

OL-14386-02
Posture Validation
CHAPTER
13
The Cisco Secure Access Control Server Release 4.2, hereafter referred to as ACS, supports posture
validation when ACS is deployed as part of a broader Cisco Network Access Control (NAC) solution.
This chapter contains:
What is Posture Validation?, page 13-1
Posture Validation in Network Access Control, page 13-2
Posture Validation and Network Access Profiles, page 13-3
Posture Tokens, page 13-3
The Posture Validation Process, page 13-4
Policy Overview, page 13-5
Internal Policies, page 13-7
External Policies, page 13-8
External Posture Validation Audit Servers, page 13-9
Configuring NAC in ACS, page 13-13
Configuring ACS in a NAC/NAP Environment, page 13-15
Configuring Policies, page 13-15 (including internal, external, and audit server)
Posture Validation Pages Reference, page 13-30
What is Posture Validation?
The term posture refers to the collection of attributes that play a role in the conduct and “health” of an
endpoint device that is seeking access to the network. Some of these attributes relate to the endpoint
device-type and operating system; other attributes belong to various security applications that might be
present on the endpoint, such as antivirus (AV) scanning software.
Posture validation applies a set of rules to the posture data associated with an endpoint. The result is an
assessment of the level of trust associated with the endpoint. A posture token, such as Healthy or
Infected, represents the state of the endpoint.
The posture token becomes one of the conditions in the authorization rules for network access. Posture
validation, together with the traditional user authentication, provides a complete security assessment of
the endpoint and the user.
User Guide for Cisco Secure Access Control Server 4.2
13-1