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How to Setup MFA for Fortinet Fortigate VPN?

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Multi-factor authentication or MFA provides an extra authentication layer on the top of your Fortinet Fortigate SSL VPN to provide security to your Fortinet client VPN access. Various authentication methods are available with miniOrange Fortinet FortiGate MFA to secure user account access.

Fortinet VPN provides network security to your user’s systems and brings in safer remote access to your internal network. Two-factor authentication used with Fortinet VPN provides highly reliable security using miniOrange MFA product for safe remote access. RADIUS in Fortinet is used to communicate with miniOrange. Applying FortiClient MFA while setup Fortinet VPN is easy with this detailed guide.

miniOrange MFA/2FA authentication for Fortinet Login

miniOrange accomplishes this by acting as a RADIUS server that accepts the username/password of the user entered as a RADIUS request and validates the user against the user store as Active Directory (AD). After the first level of authentication, miniOrange prompts the user with 2-factor authentication and either grants/revokes access based on the input by the user.

1. Primary authentication initiates with the user submitting his Username and Password for Fortinet.
2. User request acts as an authentication request to RADIUS Server(miniOrange).
3. miniOrange RADIUS server passes user credentials to validate against the credentials stored in AD (Active Directory) / Database.
4. Once the user's first level of authentication gets validated AD sends the confirmation to RADIUS Server.
5. Now miniOrange RADIUS Server asks for a 2-factor authentication challenge to the user.
6. Here user submits the response/code which he receives on his hardware/phone.
7. User response is checked at miniOrange’s RADIUS Server side.
8. On successful 2nd factor authentication the user is granted access to login.

Enable Multi Factor Authentication MFA/2FA for Fortinet

1. Configure Fortinet in miniOrange

• Login into miniOrange Admin Console.
• Click on Customization in the left menu of the dashboard.
• In Basic Settings, set the Organization Name as the custom_domain name.
• Click Save. Once that is set, the branded login URL would be of the format https://<custom_domain>.xecurify.com/moas/login



• Go to Apps Click on Add Application button.



• In Choose Application, select RADIUS (VPN) from the application type dropdown.



• Click on Fortinet application tab. If you don't find your application click on Radius Client application tab.



• Click on "Click here" to get the Radius server IPs.



• Copy and save the Radius server IP which will be required to configure your Radius client.



• Configure the below details to add Radius Client.




Client Name:	Any name for your reference.
Client IP:	IP address of VPN server which will send Radius authentication request.
Shared Secret:	Security key. For Eg. "sharedsecret" (Keep this with you, you will need to configure same on VPN Server).

• Click Next.
• Under the Attribute Mappings tab, enable the toggle if you want to Send Custom Attributes in response.



• To send groups in response, you can refer the below table for Vendor group attributes id.
  

  Vendor Name	Vendor Attribute	Value Type	Attribute
  Cisco ASA	ASA-Group_policy	User	Groups
  Fortinet	Fortinet-Group-Name	User	Groups
  Palo Alto	PaloAlto-user-Group	User	Groups
  SonicWall	Sonicwall-user-group	User	Groups
  Citrix	Citrix-user-groups	User	Groups
  Default(Can be used if your vendor is not in the list)	Filter-Id	User	Groups

• Value Type and Attribute can be changed based on the requirement.
• Click on Next to proceed.
• Configure the following Policy details for the Radius Client.




Group Name:	Group for which the policy will apply.
Policy Name:	Any Identifier that specifies policy name.
Login Method	Login Method for the users associated with this policy.
Enable 2-Factor Authentication	Enables Second Factor during Login for users associated with this policy.
Enable Adaptive Authentication	Enables Adaptive Authentication for Login of users associated with this policy.

• After configuring the given above details, Click on Save button.
Note: You can follow this guide, if you want to configure Radius MFA using MSCHAPv2 protocol.

NOTE: For On-Premise version follow the below steps before testing the connectivity.



Only For On-Premise Version

Open Firewall Ports.

• In order to receive the RADIUS request, it is necessary to open UDP traffic on ports 1812 and 1813 for the machine where On-Premise IdP is deployed.
• If the hosting machine is a Windows Machine then you can follow this document.
• If the hosting machine is a Linux Machine then you can follow this document.

NOTE: If your machine is hosted on AWS, then enable the ports from the AWS panel.

2. Configure RADIUS in Fortinet

• Login to Fortinet FortiGate Admin console for the VPN application.
• Go to User & Device >> RADIUS Servers in left navigation bar and click on Create New.



• Here you need to configure the RADIUS Server.



• Configure details below to add Radius Server.

Name	Appropriate nameEg: mo-radius-server
Authentication Method	Click on Specify and then select PAP in the Dropdown.
Primary Server IP / Name	For on-premise version: IP of server where IDP(miniOrange) is installed For cloud version: Use the Radius Server IPs which you got from Step1.
Primary Server Secret	Secret Key for the Fortinet (RADIUS) App defined in step 1
Secondary Server IP / Name	Optional
Secondary Server Secret	Optional

• To Save these settings click OK.

Test Fortinet Fortigate Connectivity

• You can now verify the connectivity by clicking on Test Connectivity.

Create a User Group in Fortinet Fortigate

• NOTE: If you have a existing User Group then just add miniOrange Radius Server as the Remote Server. If not, then follow the below steps.
• Select User & Device >> User >> User Groups.
• To Create New group, Click on Create New.



• Select Firewall in Type. Click on Add in the Remote Group Section and select miniOrange Radius Server as the Remote Server.



• Click on Ok.

Set Up VPN in Fortigate Admin Console.

IPSec VPN

SSL VPN

• Create a IPSec Tunnel using IPSec Wizard if you have no Tunnel Configured. Click Here to learn more.
• Select VPN >> IPSec Tunnels and select the IPSec Tunnel you have configured.



• Click on Convert To Custom Tunnel if the tunnel is not Custom Tunnel.



• Click on Edit button for XAuth section.
• Select PAP Server in the Type Dropdown.



• Select the User Group configured in Step 4 in User Group Dropdown.



• Click on Ok.

• Firstly setup a SSL-VPN . Click here for more information.
• Navigate to Policy & Objects >> IPV4 Policy.
  NOTE: In some cases, there will only Firewall Policy option instead of IPV4 Policy
• Create/Edit the policy related to your SSL-VPN interface.
• Edit the Source, add the required address space and the Group that we configured in Step 4.



• Click OK to apply and save the settings.
• Next, we will define Authentication/Portal Mapping.
• Navigate to VPN >> SSL-VPN Settings, and then go to the Authentication/Portal Mapping section
• Create a new or edit an existing mapping to grant access to the Firewall User Group that we created in Step 4.



• Click Apply and save the settings.

Configure the Fortinet Timeout with miniOrange RADIUS server

• Fortinet Fortigate default timeout is 5 Seconds, which is insufficient while setting up MFA. We have to reconfigure the timeout to 30 Seconds.
• So connect to the appliance CLI.
• And execute below commands in command line: #config system global #set remoteauthtimeout 30 #end

3. Configure Your User Directory

miniOrange provides user authentication from various external sources, which can be Directories (like ADFS, Microsoft Active Directory, Microsoft Entra ID, OpenLDAP, Google, AWS Cognito etc), Identity Providers (like Okta, Shibboleth, Ping, OneLogin, KeyCloak), Databases (like MySQL, Maria DB, PostgreSQL) and many more. You can configure your existing directory/user store or add users in miniOrange.

Setup AD/LDAP as User Directory

Setup miniOrange as User Directory

Configure your existing directories such as Microsoft Active Directory, Microsoft Entra ID, OpenLDAP, etc.

• Click on External Directories >> Add Directory in the left menu of the dashboard.



• Select Directory type as AD/LDAP.



• STORE LDAP CONFIGURATION IN MINIORANGE: Choose this option if you want to keep your configuration in miniOrange. If the active directory is behind a firewall, you will need to open the firewall to allow incoming requests to your AD.
• STORE LDAP CONFIGURATION ON PREMISE: Choose this option if you want to keep your configuration in your premise and only allow access to AD inside premises. You will have to download and install miniOrange gateway on your premise.




• Enter LDAP Display Name and LDAP Identifier name.
• Select Directory Type as Active Directory.
• Enter the LDAP Server URL or IP Address against the LDAP Server URL field.
• Click on the Test Connection button to verify if you have made a successful connection with your LDAP server.



• In Active Directory, go to the properties of user containers/OU's and search for the Distinguished Name attribute. The bind account should have minimum required read privileges in Active Directory to allow directory lookups. If the use case involves provisioning (such as creating, updating, or deleting users or groups), the account must also be granted appropriate write permissions.



• Enter the valid Bind account Password.
• Click on the Test Bind Account Credentials button to verify your LDAP Bind credentials for LDAP connection.



• Search Base is the location in the directory where the search for a user begins. You will get this from the same place you got your Distinguished name.



• Select a suitable Search filter from the drop-down menu. If you use User in Single Group Filter or User in Multiple Group Filter, replace the <group-dn> in the search filter with the distinguished name of the group in which your users are present. To use custom Search Filter select "Write your Custom Filter" option and customize it accordingly.



• Click on the Next button, or go to the Authentication tab.
• You can also configure following options while setting up AD. Enable Activate LDAP in order to authenticate users from AD/LDAP. Click on the Next button to add user store.




Here's the list of the attributes and what it does when we enable it. You can enable/disable accordingly.

Attribute	Description
Activate LDAP	All user authentications will be done with LDAP credentials if you Activate it
Fallback Authentication	If LDAP credentials fail then user will be authenticated through miniOrange
Enable administrator login	On enabling this, your miniOrange Administrator login authenticates using your LDAP server
Show IdP to users	If you enable this option, this IdP will be visible to users
Sync users in miniOrange	Users will be created in miniOrange after authentication with LDAP

• Click on the Next button, or go to the Provisioning tab.

User Import and Provisioning from AD

• If you want to set up provisioning, click here for detailed information. For now, we are skipping this step by clicking Skip on Provisioning.

Attributes Mapping from AD

• By default userName, firstName, lastName, email are configured. Scroll down and click on Save Configurations. To fetch additional attributes from Active Directory, enable Send Configured Attributes. On the left side, enter the name that you wish to release to the applications. On the right side, enter the attribute name from Active Directory. E.g., if you wish to fetch company attribute from Active Directory, and send it as organization to configured applications, enter the following:

  Attribute Name sent to SP = organization
  Attribute Name from IDP = company

Test Connections

• You will see a list of directories in External Directories. Go to the directory you have configured, click Select, then go to Test Connections and click on it.



• Click on Test Connection to check whether you have enter valid details. For that, it will ask for username and password.



• On Successful connection with LDAP Server, a success message is shown.

Test Attribute Mapping

• You will see a list of directories in External Directories. Go to the directory you have configured, click Select, then go to Test Attribute Mapping and click on it.



• A pop-up will appear to add the username. After clicking Test, you will see the Test Attribute Mapping Result.

Set up AD as External Directory configuration is complete.

Note: Refer our guide to setup LDAP on windows server.

• To add your users in miniOrange there are 2 ways:

1. Create User in miniOrange

2. Bulk Upload Users

1. Create User in miniOrange

• Click on Users >> User List >> Add User.



• Here, fill the user details without the password and then click on the Create User button.



• After successful user creation a notification message "An end user is added successfully" will be displayed at the top of the dashboard.



• Click on Onboarding Status tab. Check the email, with the registered e-mail id and select action Send Activation Mail with Password Reset Link from Select Action dropdown list and then click on Apply button.



• Now, Open your email id. Open the mail you get from miniOrange and then click on the link to set your account password.
• On the next screen, enter the password and confirm password and then click on the Single Sign-On (SSO) reset password button.



• Now, you can log in into miniOrange account by entering your credentials.

2. Bulk Upload Users in miniOrange via Uploading CSV File.

• Navigate to Users >> User List. Click on Add User button.



• In Bulk User Registration Download sample csv format from our console and edit this csv file according to the instructions.



• To bulk upload users, choose the file make sure it is in comma separated .csv file format then click on Upload.



• After uploading the csv file successfully, you will see a success message with a link.
• Click on that link you will see list of users to send activation mail. Select users to send activation mail and click on Send Activation Mail. An activation mail will be sent to the selected users.

Creating User Groups (Recommended)

AD user group

miniOrange user group

• This step involves Importing the user group from the Active Directory and Provisioning them.
• Go to Provisioning. Switch to Setup Provisioning tab and select Active Directory from Dropdown menu.



• Select Group Provisioning/Deprovisioning tab, and toggle on Import Group option.
• Enter the Base DN for group sync and click Save.



• If you want to dynamically allocate users to the groups present in the miniOrange, then enable "Assign Users to groups"



• Now switch to Import Groups option and select Active Directory from which you want to import your users.
• Finally, click on Import button. Your group will be imported.




(The Active Directory Group Provisioning (Sync) setup is done. Now, whenever a user is created or modified in LDAP server and if the Assign Users to groups is enabled, then user group attribute from the LDAP server will be automatically synced and the user group will be assigned or changed accordingly in miniOrange.)

• Select Groups >> Manage Groups from left panel.
• Click on the Create Group button on the top.



• Enter an appropriate Group Name and click on Create Group.



• In this guide we have created a Group by name VPN_Group.
• Assign various members to the group using the Assign User option associated with the group in the groups list.



• Select the Users that are required to be assigned to this group. Then Select Assign to Group in Select Action Dropdown and click on Apply button.



• These groups will be helpful in adding multiple 2FA policies on the applications.

4. Setup MFA for Fortinet

• Here, we will configure a policy for the User Group that we created in this step and associate it with the Fortinet VPN Application.
• Click on Policies tab >> App Login Policy.



• Click on Add Policy tab.
• In Application section, select the RADIUS App that we configured earlier in Step 1.
• Select the required User Group in Group Name and enter the Policy name.
• In this guide, we will configure a Password Only policy for "VPN_Group", so that only the VPN_Group members can access VPN Services without a Second Factor.
• Once done with the policy settings, click on Save to Add Policy.

5. Test Fortinet MFA

• Download FortiClient from www.forticlient.com.
• Open the FortiClient Console and go to Remote Access > Configure VPN.
• Add a new connection:
• Set the connection name.
• Set Remote Gateway to <vpn_server_ip>.
• Select Customize Port and set it to 10443.
• Save your settings.
• Login to Forticlient and enter Username and Password.



• It will prompt for a Second Factor Code if you have Enabled 2-Factor Authentication in miniOrange Policy.



• Enter your 2-Factor Code and you should be connected to the VPN.
• NOTE: While configuring IPSec VPN connection in FortiClient make sure to use the Pre-Shared key of the IPSec Tunnel that was created LAST. Fortinet has issues if multiple IPSec Tunnels are present at FortiGate Server.
• On passing the valid credentials you can see the screen below:



• If you enter an incorrect value you will be redirected to the below screen.

Troubleshooting

Further References

• What is Two-Factor Authentication (MFA) security & How does it work?
• Secure Infrastructure Network Devices with MFA
• How miniOrange provides MFA for all VPN clients?
• What is Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication?
• What is LDAP MFA? How Does it Work?
• Essential 8 Security Compliance