How to integrate SAML authentication into WCF web service application

Question

I have a WCF web service application built and tested on IIS7. Regarding authentication I wanted to implement a sql server hosted userd id and password authentication for consum

Answer 1

I think SAML 2.0 is not provided by standard WCF. To make it work you must combine WCF with WIF (Windows identity foundation). Here you have very complex example of usage WCF with WIF and claim based authorization. The example uses SAML 1.1 but it is only configuration change to make it work with SAML 2.0.

Your problem is generally called Federated authentication or Federated identity where user authenticates against STS (service token service) and it receives security token (it can be for example SAML token). Than the client calls real service (RP - relaying party) where it passes its security token. So what are you going to build? If your company policy demands SAML usage they most probably already have STS and you just need to authenticate clients by SAML tokens as mentioned in the article.