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0D50Z00008C3jSZSAZOkta Classic EngineAdministrationAnswered2020-07-23T18:46:28.000Z2018-08-05T13:39:59.000Z2018-08-12T04:14:08.000Z
Practical differences with Network Zone-based blocking

Apologies for the wall of text before the question, but context is important here.

 

I've discovered some differences with functionality in terms of network zone blocking.  I've been experiencing frequent bot-like attempts to access a specific user from what reports as a Chinese IP Address.  I'm not located in China, but block all traffic from outside my country.  To accomplish this, I set up dynamic zones of the entire world except my country and set it to block.  Then, I set my country as allow to then apply behavioral capability.

 

 

What I find is that from a user-perspective, the behavior is different when using dynamic zone blocking as opposed to static zones (specific IPs, IP Ranges, or CIDR Ranges).  When blocking with static zones, the end user sees 403 errors when attempting to browse to the Okta login page.  When using dynamic zones, the end user always sees the same "login failed" message regardless of what is typed for authentication (wording is slightly different - maybe sign-in failed, etc.)  However, one difference is that while users cannot log in, their sign-in attempts are weighed against at least some policy.  One area that's troublesome to me is bad password attempts are logged in Okta.  It's not reported to the user, but it is still logged.  This means that a denial of service attack is still possible against Okta users when using dynamic zone blocking (which is the only real option for effective geolocational / network-based authentication security.)

 

Now to my question:  How are the other Okta admins / security architects effectively blocking country / region in Okta Network Zones? 


  • The issue was that "blacklisting" wasn't actually available in Dynamic Zones for my Org.  I had the EA feature enabled by Support and now I'm able to use dynamic zones to actually blacklist and give the 403 error.  I was simply missing the checkbox for Dynamic.
    Selected as Best
  • Benjamin -

    The difference is in how the zone is used, regardless if it is dynamic or address-based.

     

    Blacklisting a zone will block all traffic from that zone and will result in the expected 403 message, regardless of whether the zone is dynamic or address-based.

     

    If a zone is employed a part of a sign on policy (and not blacklisted), it will be evaluated after a successful authentication. To your point, if the authentication attempt is not blocked by blacklisting, then an authentication attempt can be made, even if it is unsuccessful.

     

    To your question, the recommended practice when blocking access from a country or region is to blacklist a dynamic zone.

     

    If you have done this already, and you still see authentication attempts from blacklisted locations, please open a support case so we can troubleshoot.

     

    Thanks.

     

    Evan

     

    Evan Alter

    Technical Support Engineer

    Okta Global Customer Care
    Expand Post
  • mike.davie1.5312945692819849E12 (Customer First Programs)

    Hello Benjamin,

    Thank you for posting your question into the Okta Community Portal! 😀

     

    If you receive a great answer to your question(s), help the community find it by marking it the best answer. Hover over the answer and click "Best Answer." 

     

     

    Thanks for participating in the Okta Community.  👍

     

    Mike Davie

    Okta Help Center Team

     

    Expand Post
  • The issue was that "blacklisting" wasn't actually available in Dynamic Zones for my Org.  I had the EA feature enabled by Support and now I'm able to use dynamic zones to actually blacklist and give the 403 error.  I was simply missing the checkbox for Dynamic.
    Selected as Best
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Practical differences with Network Zone-based blocking