Duo Protection for Google Workspace (Google G Suite) with Duo Access Gateway

These same instructions provide SAML SSO to Google Cloud Platform (GCP) as well, as Google Workspace and GCP share the underlying domain's authentication configuration. Learn more about SSO and GCP.

Overview

As business applications move from on-premises to cloud hosted solutions, users experience password fatigue due to disparate logons for different applications. Single sign-on (SSO) technologies seek to unify identities across systems and reduce the number of different credentials a user has to remember or input to gain access to resources.

While SSO is convenient for users, it presents new security challenges. If a user's primary password is compromised, attackers may be able to gain access to multiple resources. In addition, as sensitive information makes its way to cloud-hosted services it is even more important to secure access by implementing two-factor authentication and zero-trust policies.

Duo Access Gateway

Duo Access Gateway (DAG), our on-premises SSO product, layers Duo's strong authentication and flexible policy engine on top of Google Workspace logins using the Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) 2.0 authentication standard. Duo Access Gateway acts as an identity provider (IdP), authenticating your users using existing on-premises or cloud-based directory credentials and prompting for two-factor authentication before permitting access to Google Workspace.

Duo Access Gateway is included in the Duo Premier, Duo Advantage, and Duo Essentials plans, which also include the ability to define policies that enforce unique controls for each individual SSO application. For example, you can require that Salesforce users complete two-factor authentication at every login, but only once every seven days when accessing Google Workspace. Duo checks the user, device, and network against an application's policy before allowing access to the application.

Deploy or Update Duo Access Gateway

1. Install Duo Access Gateway on a server in your DMZ. Follow our instructions for deploying the server and configuring DAG settings. Note that it is not possible to use Google OpenID Connect or Google Workspace as a SAML IdP as the DAG authentication source for Google Workspace application logins.

2. Add the attributes from the table below that correspond to the Duo attributes Mail attribute and Username attribute in the "Attributes" field when configuring your Active Directory or OpenLDAP authentication source in the DAG admin console, separated by a comma. For example, if Active Directory is your authentication source, enter mail,sAMAccountName in the "Attributes" field.

   Duo Attribute	Active Directory	OpenLDAP
   Mail attribute	mail	mail
   Username attribute	sAMAccountName	uid

   If your organization uses other directory attributes than the ones listed here then enter those attribute names instead. If you've already configured the attributes list for another cloud service provider, append the additional attributes not already present to the list, separated by a comma.

3. After completing the initial DAG configuration steps, click Applications on the left side of the Duo Access Gateway admin console.

4. Scroll down the Applications page to the Metadata section. This is the information you need to provide to Google Workspace when configuring SSO. Click the Download Certificate link to obtain the token signing certificate (the downloaded file is named "dag.crt").

   

Enable Google Workspace SSO

Add the Duo Access Gateway as a new single sign-on provider for Google Workspace.

1. Log on to the Google Admin console and navigate to Security > Overview.

2. In Third-party SSO profile for your organization, click Add SSO profile.

3. Check the Set up SSO with third-party identity provider box.

4. Copy the SSO URL information from the Duo Access Gateway admin console Metadata display and paste it into the Google Workspace Sign-in page URL field.

   Example: https://yourserver.example.com/dag/saml2/idp/SSOService.php

5. Copy the Logout URL information from the Duo Access Gateway admin console Metadata display and paste it into the Google Workspace Sign-out page URL field.

   Example: https://yourserver.example.com/dag/saml2/idp/SingleLogoutService.php

6. The "Verification certificate" is the DAG Metadata certificate supplied by Duo Access Gateway. Click the link to select the dag.crt file you downloaded from the DAG admin console "Application" page earlier.

7. Check the Use a domain-specific issuer box if your users access Google Workspace using your own domain name (such as google.com/a/yourworkspacedomain.com).

8. If your organization has a web service for Active Directory password changes enter that URL into the "Change password URL" field. Otherwise, copy the Logout URL into the "Change password URL" field as well.

9. After you've entered all the required information click SAVE.

   

Learn more about Google Workspace SSO at the Google Workspace Help site.

Create the Google Workspace Application in Duo

1. Log on to the Duo Admin Panel and navigate to Applications → Protect an Application.

2. Locate the entry for Google Workspace with a protection type of "2FA with SSO self-hosted (Duo Access Gateway)" in the applications list. Click Protect to the far-right to start configuring Google Workspace . See Protecting Applications for more information about protecting applications in Duo and additional application options.

3. Enter your Google Workspace domain name in the Domain name field.

4. Google Workspace uses the Mail attribute when authenticating. We've mapped Mail attribute to DAG supported authentication source attributes as follows:

   Duo Attribute	Active Directory	OpenLDAP	SAML IdP	Google	Azure
   Mail attribute	mail	mail	mail	email	mail

   If you are using a non-standard email attribute for your authentication source, check the Custom attributes box and enter the name of the attribute you wish to use instead.

5. Click Save Configuration to generate a downloadable configuration file.

   

6. You can adjust additional settings for your new SAML application at this time — like changing the application's name from the default value, enabling self-service, or assigning a group policy — or come back and change the application's policies and settings after you finish SSO setup. If you do update any settings, click the Save Changes button when done.

7. Click the Download your configuration file link to obtain the Google Workspace application settings (as a JSON file).

   Important: This file contains information that uniquely identifies this application to Duo. Secure this file as you would any other sensitive or password information. Don't share it with unauthorized individuals or email it to anyone under any circumstances!

Add the Google Workspace Application to Duo Access Gateway

Before you do this, verify that you updated the "Attributes" list for your Duo Access Gateway authentication source as specified here.

1. Return to the Applications page of the DAG admin console session.

2. Click the Choose File button in the "Add Application" section of the page and locate the Google Workspace SAML application JSON file you downloaded from the Duo Admin Panel earlier. Click the Upload button after selecting the JSON configuration file.

3. The Google Workspace SAML application is added.

Google Workspace Session Duration

Google Workspace Business, Education, and Enterprise editions have the ability to customize how long a session remains valid after logging in with a third-party SAML IdP (like Duo Access Gateway). Set this in the Google Admin console under Security → Session Control. Be sure not to change the session duration to a length that is less than the Duo Access Gateway's Session Duration (found under Settings in the Access Gateway admin console) if you want to always force users to login and complete Duo MFA again when the Google Workspace session expires. Learn more about this Google Workspace option at the Google support site.

Verify SSO

You can log on to Google Workspace using your organization's domain login page e.g. https://mail.google.com/a/yourworkspacedomain.com for Gmail. This redirects to the Duo Access Gateway login page. Enter your primary directory logon information, approve Duo two-factor authentication, and get redirected back to the Google Workspacesite after authenticating.

Users can also enter the email address that is mapped to name ID on the main Google Workspace login page https://accounts.google.com) or any and click the Sign In button (with a blank password) to be forwarded to the DAG logon site.

Congratulations! Your Google Workspace users now authenticate using Duo Access Gateway.

Microsoft AD FS

Microsoft's Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) is a popular choice for SSO because it easily integrates with the AD identity store many organizations already have deployed. Duo's support for cloud applications and SSO drops in to an existing AD FS installation to provide secondary authentication after a user passes primary authentication (successful Active Directory logon).

If you don't already have AD federation running the first step is to install and configure Microsoft AD FS in your organization. Deployment Guides for AD FS versions 2.1, and 3.0/4.0 are available from Microsoft.

Once your AD FS services are up and running, the second step is to configure the SSO partnership between your AD FS service and the external cloud resource, in this case Google Workspace. Learn more about configuring Google Workspace SSO with AD FS at the Google Workspace Help site.

After you have successfully configured and tested AD FS SSO login to Google Workspace using your AD domain credentials, you can then install the Duo AD FS integration. AD FS protection is included with Duo's paid plans.

With the Duo integration for AD FS installed, users pass primary authentication to the AD FS service as usual. Once primary authentication succeeds, users are forwarded to the Duo service for secondary authentication. After approving logon using one of Duo's authentication methods, the user is fully logged in to Google Workspace.

Other Identity Partners

Using a third-party SSO provider for cloud application access? Duo partners with leading cloud SSO providers like Okta and OneLogin to secure access with our strong and flexible authentication platform.

You can also use Duo two-factor authentication with CAS and Shibboleth on-premises IdPs.

Troubleshooting

Need some help? Try searching our Knowledge Base articles or Community discussions. For further assistance, contact Support.