Administrator Guide

802.1X

802.1X is a method of port security.

A device connected to a port that is enabled with 802.1X is disallowed from sending or receiving packets on

the network until its identity can be verified (through a username and password, for example). This feature is

named for its IEEE specification.

802.1X employs extensible authentication protocol (EAP) to transfer a device’s credentials to an

authentication server (typically RADIUS) using a mandatory intermediary network access device, in this case, a

Dell Networking switch. The network access device mediates all communication between the end-user

device and the authentication server so that the network remains secure. The network access device uses

EAP-over-Ethernet (EAPOL) to communicate with the end-user device and EAP-over-RADIUS to

communicate with the server.

NOTE

: The Dell Networking operating system supports 802.1X with EAP-MD5, EAP-OTP, EAP-TLS, EAP-

TTLS, PEAPv0, PEAPv1, and MS-CHAPv2 with PEAP.

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