Training-10-2023

OIDC (OpenID Connect) and SAML (Security Assertion Markup Language) are two different authentication and authorization protocols used in the field of identity and access management. They both serve the purpose of enabling secure and single sign-on (SSO) authentication for users across different applications and services. However, they have some key differences in terms of their design and use cases:

1. OIDC (OpenID Connect):
- OIDC is a relatively newer and more modern protocol compared to SAML.
- It is built on top of OAuth 2.0, which is an authorization framework, and adds an identity layer to it.
- OIDC provides a simple and standardized way for applications to verify the identity of users, obtain basic user profile information, and request user consent.
- It uses JSON Web Tokens (JWTs) for identity tokens, which are easy to work with and can contain user information in a structured format.
- OIDC is more suitable for modern web and mobile applications that require a lightweight and flexible identity solution.

2. SAML (Security Assertion Markup Language):
- SAML is an older protocol that was designed for exchanging authentication and authorization data between parties, primarily in web-based single sign-on scenarios.
- It uses XML-based assertions to communicate between the identity provider (IdP) and the service provider (SP).
- SAML is often used in enterprise settings, where there is a need to integrate with legacy systems and applications that may not support modern authentication protocols like OIDC.
- SAML is considered more heavyweight and complex compared to OIDC, which can make it less suitable for new, lightweight web and mobile applications.