Method and apparatus for identity federation gateway

An apparatus comprising:

• at least one processor;
• and
• at least one memory including computer program code,
• the at least one memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform at least the following:
• send a provisioning message from a user device over a communication network in response to a request at the user device to access a legacy authentication service of a network resource,
• wherein the provisioning message includes a request to determine whether to use the legacy authentication service of the network resource or a federated identity service to identify the user device
• when the user device is to be identified by the federated identity service, sending a service request message to access the network resource, form the user device, over the communication network, to an identifier federation gateway;
• receive an identification message at the user device from the identifier federation gateway with a redirect instruction to the federated identity service when the user device is to be identified by the federated identity service;
• receive an authentication results message from the legacy authentication service via the identifier federation gateway,
• wherein the authentication results message includes an indication that the user device is successfully identified by the federated identity service.

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium carrying one or more sequences of one or more instructions which, when executed by one or more processors, cause an apparatus to at least perform the following steps:

• sending a provisioning message from a user device over a communication network in response to a request at the user device to access a legacy authentication service of a network resource,
• wherein the provisioning message includes a request to determine whether to use the legacy authentication service of the network resource or a federated identity service to identify the user device
• when the user device is to be identified by the federated identity service, sending a service request message to access the network resource, from the user device, over the communication network, to an identifier federation gateway;
• receiving an identification message at the user device from the identifier federation gateway with a redirect instruction to the federated identity service when the user device is to be identified by the federated identity service;
• sending identification data that indicates an identity for the user device to the federated identity service;
• and
• receiving an authentication results message from the legacy authentication service via the identifier federation gateway,
• wherein the authentication results message includes an indication that the user device is successfully identified by the federated identity service.