From 204732099bb98ebed02eee8b546a9f10de805b21 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Michael Telatynski <7t3chguy@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 9 Nov 2020 12:11:07 +0000
Subject: [PATCH] Multiple SSO Identity Providers

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+# MSC2857: Multiple SSO Identity Providers
+
+Matrix already has generic SSO support, but it does not yield the best user experience especially for
+instances which wish to offer multiple identity providers. This MSC provides a simple and fully
+backwards compatible way to extend the current spec which would allow clients to give users options
+like `Continue with Google` and `Continue with Github` side-by-side.
+
+
+## Proposal
+
+Currently, Matrix supports `m.login.sso`, `m.login.token` and `/login/sso/redirect` for clients to
+pass their user to the configured Identity provider and for them to come back with something which
+is exchangeable for a Matrix access token. This flow offers no insight to the user as to what
+Identity providers are available. It allows clients to offer a super generic `Sign in with SSO`
+button only.
+
+By augmenting the `m.login.sso` flow discovery definition to include metadata on the supported IDPs
+the client can show a button for each of the supported providers, yielding a much more usable
+experience. This would look like this:
+
+```json
+{
+    "flows": [
+        {
+            "type": "m.login.sso",
+            "identity_providers": [
+                {
+                    "id": "google",
+                    "name": "Google",
+                    "icon": "mxc://..."
+                },
+                {
+                    "id": "github",
+                    "name": "Github",
+                    "icon": "mxc://..."
+                }
+            ]
+        },
+        {
+            "type": "m.login.token"
+        }
+    ]
+}
+```
+
+A new endpoint would be needed to support redirecting directly to one of the IDPs:
+
+`GET /_matrix/client/r0/login/sso/redirect/{idp_id}`
+
+This would behave identically to the existing endpoint without the last argument
+except would allow the server to forward the user directly to the correct IDP.
+
+For the case of User Interactive Auth the server would just give the appropriate
+identity provider as an option, that being the same as the user used to login with.
+
+For the case of backwards compatibility the existing endpoint should remain,
+and if the server supports multiple SSO IDPs it should offer the user a page
+which lets them choose between the available IDP options as a fallback.
+
+
+## Potential issues
+
+None discovered at this time
+
+
+## Alternatives
+
+An alternative to the whole approach would be to allow `m.login.sso.$idp` but this forces
+treating an opaque identifier as hierarchical and offers worse backwards compatibility.
+
+An alternative to the proposed backwards compatibility plan where the server offers a
+fallback page which fills the gap and lets the user choose which SSO IDP they need is
+for the server to deterministically always pick one, maybe the first option and let
+old clients only auth via that one but that means potentially locking users out of their
+accounts.
+
+
+## Security considerations
+
+This could potentially aid phishing attacks by bad homeservers, where if the app says
+`Continue with Google` and then they are taken to a page which is styled to look like
+the Google login page they might be a tiny bit more susceptible to being phished as opposed
+as to when they click a more generic `Sign in with SSO` button, but this attack was possible
+anyhow using a different vector of a controlled Element/client instance which modifies
+the text.
+
+
+## Unstable prefix
+
+Whilst in development use `msc2857.identity_providers` for the flow discovery and `/unstable`
+for the new endpoints.
+