Amazon Cognito vs OpenID Connect

Overview

Amazon Cognito

Stacks616

Followers917

Votes34

OpenID Connect

Stacks233

Followers133

Votes0

Amazon Cognito vs OpenID Connect: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Amazon Cognito and OpenID Connect

Introduction:

In web development, two popular identity management services are Amazon Cognito and OpenID Connect. Both play a vital role in securing user authentication and authorization processes. However, they have distinct features and differences in their approach.

User Management: Amazon Cognito provides a comprehensive solution for user management, including sign-up, sign-in, and user data synchronization across devices. It offers built-in user databases, such as Amazon Cognito User Pools, or allows integration with existing identity providers like Facebook or Google. On the other hand, OpenID Connect is a protocol that focuses primarily on allowing web and mobile applications to authenticate users via trusted third-party identity providers. It does not provide its own user management system but relies on the identity provider for that.
Scalability and Cost: When it comes to scalability, Amazon Cognito is highly scalable as it is a fully managed service provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS). It can handle millions of users and scales automatically with demand. However, OpenID Connect does not provide any native scalability features as it is a protocol, not a service. The scalability of OpenID Connect largely depends on the implementation and infrastructure of the identity provider being used. In terms of cost, OpenID Connect does not have direct costs as it is a protocol. On the other hand, Amazon Cognito has pricing based on the number of users and their usage, including storage and data transfer.
Authentication Flows: Amazon Cognito supports multiple authentication flows, including user pools, social identity providers, and federated identity providers. It offers a range of options for authentication, including username/password, OAuth, and multi-factor authentication. OpenID Connect, being a protocol, defines a set of standard authentication flows and grants types, such as authorization code flow, implicit flow, and client credentials. It allows applications to leverage the authentication flows provided by the identity provider that supports OpenID Connect.
Authorization and Access Control: Amazon Cognito provides a fine-grained authorization and access control system through its user pools. It allows defining user roles, custom attributes, and group-based permissions. With Cognito, developers can control access to APIs, resources, and specific functionality within their applications. OpenID Connect, as a protocol, does not have built-in authorization and access control mechanisms. However, it can be combined with other authorization standards like OAuth 2.0 to enable fine-grained access control.
Integration with AWS Services: Amazon Cognito is tightly integrated with other AWS services, making it easy to authenticate and authorize access to AWS resources. It provides seamless integration with services like AWS Lambda, Amazon API Gateway, and Amazon S3. OpenID Connect, being a protocol, can be used to authenticate and authorize access to any service that supports the protocol, not limited to AWS services. It provides flexibility in integrating with various platforms and services.
Mobile Device Support: Amazon Cognito is designed with mobile applications in mind and provides SDKs and libraries for popular mobile development platforms like iOS and Android. It supports features like offline mobile access, user data synchronization, and push notifications. OpenID Connect, as a protocol, can also be used with mobile applications, but the level of mobile-specific features and support may vary depending on the identity provider and the implementation used.

In summary, Amazon Cognito is a comprehensive identity management service with built-in user management and seamless integration with AWS services, while OpenID Connect is a protocol that focuses on allowing applications to authenticate users through trusted identity providers. Both have their own strengths and differences in terms of user management, scalability, authentication flows, authorization, integration, and mobile support.

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Advice on Amazon Cognito, OpenID Connect

Brent

CEO at DEFY Labs

Mar 7, 2020

Decided

I started our team on Amazon Cognito because I was a Solutions Architect at AWS and found it really easy to follow the tutorials and get a basic app up and running with it.

When our team started working with it, they very quickly became frustrated because of the poor documentation. After 4 days of trying to get all the basic passwordless auth working, our lead engineer made the decision to abandon it and try Auth0... and managed to get everything implemented in 4 hours.

The consensus was that Cognito just isn't mature enough or well-documented, and that the implementation does not cater for real world use cases the way that it should. I believe Amplify has made some of this simpler, but I would still recommend Auth0 as it's been bulletproof for us, and is a sensible price.

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Detailed Comparison

Amazon Cognito	OpenID Connect
You can create unique identities for your users through a number of public login providers (Amazon, Facebook, and Google) and also support unauthenticated guests. You can save app data locally on users’ devices allowing your applications to work even when the devices are offline.	It is a simple identity layer on top of the OAuth 2.0 protocol. It allows Clients to verify the identity of the End-User based on the authentication performed by an Authorization Server, as well as to obtain basic profile information about the End-User in an interoperable and REST-like manner.
Manage Unique Identities;Work Offline;Store and Sync across Devices;Seamless Guest Access;Safeguard AWS Credentials;Control Access to AWS Resources	-
Statistics
Stacks 616	Stacks 233
Followers 917	Followers 133
Votes 34	Votes 0
Pros & Cons
Pros 14 Backed by Amazon 7 Manage Unique Identities 4 Work Offline 3 MFA 2 Store and Sync Cons 4 Massive Pain to get working 3 Documentation often out of date 2 Login-UI sparsely customizable (e.g. no translation) 1 Difficult to customize (basic-pack is more than humble) 1 MFA: there is no "forget device" function	No community feedback yet
Integrations
No integrations available	JSON Web Token Spring Security OAuth2

What are some alternatives to Amazon Cognito, OpenID Connect?

Auth0

A set of unified APIs and tools that instantly enables Single Sign On and user management to all your applications.

Stormpath

Stormpath is an authentication and user management service that helps development teams quickly and securely build web and mobile applications and services.

Keycloak

It is an Open Source Identity and Access Management For Modern Applications and Services. It adds authentication to applications and secure services with minimum fuss. No need to deal with storing users or authenticating users. It's all available out of the box.

Devise

Devise is a flexible authentication solution for Rails based on Warden

Firebase Authentication

It provides backend services, easy-to-use SDKs, and ready-made UI libraries to authenticate users to your app. It supports authentication using passwords, phone numbers, popular federated identity providers like Google,

WorkOS

Start selling to enterprise customers with just a few lines of code.

OAuth.io

OAuth is a protocol that aimed to provide a single secure recipe to manage authorizations. It is now used by almost every web application. However, 30+ different implementations coexist. OAuth.io fixes this massive problem by acting as a universal adapter, thanks to a robust API. With OAuth.io integrating OAuth takes minutes instead of hours or days.

OmniAuth

OmniAuth is a Ruby authentication framework aimed to abstract away the difficulties of working with various types of authentication providers. It is meant to be hooked up to just about any system, from social networks to enterprise systems to simple username and password authentication.

ORY Hydra

It is a self-managed server that secures access to your applications and APIs with OAuth 2.0 and OpenID Connect. It is OpenID Connect Certified and optimized for latency, high throughput, and low resource consumption.

Kinde

Simple, powerful authentication that you can integrate in minutes. Free your users from passwords with secure and frictionless one click sign up and sign in. Built from the ground up using the best in class security protocols available today.

Related Comparisons

Amazon Cognito vs OpenID Connect: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Amazon Cognito and OpenID Connect

Introduction:

User Management: Amazon Cognito provides a comprehensive solution for user management, including sign-up, sign-in, and user data synchronization across devices. It offers built-in user databases, such as Amazon Cognito User Pools, or allows integration with existing identity providers like Facebook or Google. On the other hand, OpenID Connect is a protocol that focuses primarily on allowing web and mobile applications to authenticate users via trusted third-party identity providers. It does not provide its own user management system but relies on the identity provider for that.
Scalability and Cost: When it comes to scalability, Amazon Cognito is highly scalable as it is a fully managed service provided by Amazon Web Services (AWS). It can handle millions of users and scales automatically with demand. However, OpenID Connect does not provide any native scalability features as it is a protocol, not a service. The scalability of OpenID Connect largely depends on the implementation and infrastructure of the identity provider being used. In terms of cost, OpenID Connect does not have direct costs as it is a protocol. On the other hand, Amazon Cognito has pricing based on the number of users and their usage, including storage and data transfer.
Authentication Flows: Amazon Cognito supports multiple authentication flows, including user pools, social identity providers, and federated identity providers. It offers a range of options for authentication, including username/password, OAuth, and multi-factor authentication. OpenID Connect, being a protocol, defines a set of standard authentication flows and grants types, such as authorization code flow, implicit flow, and client credentials. It allows applications to leverage the authentication flows provided by the identity provider that supports OpenID Connect.
Authorization and Access Control: Amazon Cognito provides a fine-grained authorization and access control system through its user pools. It allows defining user roles, custom attributes, and group-based permissions. With Cognito, developers can control access to APIs, resources, and specific functionality within their applications. OpenID Connect, as a protocol, does not have built-in authorization and access control mechanisms. However, it can be combined with other authorization standards like OAuth 2.0 to enable fine-grained access control.
Integration with AWS Services: Amazon Cognito is tightly integrated with other AWS services, making it easy to authenticate and authorize access to AWS resources. It provides seamless integration with services like AWS Lambda, Amazon API Gateway, and Amazon S3. OpenID Connect, being a protocol, can be used to authenticate and authorize access to any service that supports the protocol, not limited to AWS services. It provides flexibility in integrating with various platforms and services.
Mobile Device Support: Amazon Cognito is designed with mobile applications in mind and provides SDKs and libraries for popular mobile development platforms like iOS and Android. It supports features like offline mobile access, user data synchronization, and push notifications. OpenID Connect, as a protocol, can also be used with mobile applications, but the level of mobile-specific features and support may vary depending on the identity provider and the implementation used.

Amazon Cognito vs OpenID Connect

Overview

Amazon Cognito vs OpenID Connect: What are the differences?

Key Differences between Amazon Cognito and OpenID Connect