New Kid on the Block — Captivate Captive Portals for ISA Firewalls


ISA Captive Portal
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You might have noticed a new advertisement appearing on the left side of our pages here on ISAserver.org. That advertisement is for a new product from Collective Software called Captivate. Captivate responds to a frequently made request here on ISA server.org, where people have been asking for years for an easy way to create a captive portal using the ISA firewall. Yes! This product will allow you to configure the ISA firewall to act like the type of captive portals that you see in Hotels. And with a little work or with a little consultative input from Collective, you can integrate these portals into your charge and accounting system.

Here’s Collectives description of Captivate:

“There are many scenarios where a web proxy provider wishes to inject a special process before allowing access to the Internet. Some simple examples are:

  • Display a “Terms of Service” screen or policy page which the user must read and acknowledge.
  • On a wireless network segment, always direct the user to a custom start page first, before allowing other browsing. This could be a home page, or an external web app that collects information or payment.
  • On a wireless network segment, track and log new users by IP and MAC address.
  • Require users to authenticate to ISA with a web form before allowing browsing. This is useful when you cannot control the browser proxy settings, but your users will still have accounts that are known to ISA.
  • Block access to other protocols (such as FTP, SSH, etc.) until a user passes the authorization process, then allow those protocols.

Solution
Captivate for ISA Server from Collective Software is a filter for ISA 2006 and 2004 that adds flexible captive portal functionality to your proxied networks. It directly supports all of the above scenarios, and has scriptable features to extend and enhance its functionality.”

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I’ve had a chance to play with Captivate for ISA and I’ve written up a two part article series for you so that you can get to know what the end user experience is like and to get you up to speed on some of it’s more interesting and valuable capabilities. You can find part 1 of the two part series at http://www.isaserver.org/tutorials/Authenticate-Guest-Users-Collective-Softwares-Captivate-Part1.html

To learn more and to download a copy of Captivate for ISA, check out the Captivate page on the Collective Web site at:

http://www.collectivesoftware.com/Products/Captivate

Tom

Thomas W Shinder, M.D., MCSE
Sr. Consultant / Technical Writer
Prowess Consulting www.prowessconsulting.com

PROWESS CONSULTING documentation | integration | virtualization
Email: [email protected]
MVP — Forefront Edge Security (ISA/TMG/IAG)

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