Question

I have an MVC3 webapplication which runs as a DOMAIN\USER1 account. This user has SPN in AD set and is trusted for delegation.

I want this application to access sharepoint server on behalf of the caller and upload the file for her/him. I use the following code

Dim request = HttpWebRequest.Create(http://sharepoint.domain.com)

request.Method = WebRequestMethods.Http.Head
request.PreAuthenticate = True
Dim identity = New WindowsIdentity(callerName & "@domain.com")
Dim impContext = identity.Impersonate()
'###### At this point identity.ImpersonationLevel is `Impersonate` not `Delegate`

request.Credentials = CredentialCache.DefaultNetworkCredentials
'###### DefaultNetworkCredentials is empty (Username, domain and password are all empty strings)

Dim response As HttpWebResponse

Try
    response = request.GetResponse()
    Return JsonSuccess()
Catch ex As WebException

    '###### I get 401 Unauthorized exception
    Return JsonError(ex.Message)
Finally
    impContext.Undo()
End Try

My question is. Should the impersonation level at this point be Impersonate or Delegate (Sharepoint runs on a different machine than IIS server)?
In AD I also configured protocol transition for the sharepoint and HTTP, so maybe Impersonate should change to Delegate after it makes the request? I have no idea, guidance will be appreciated.

Another question is – shouldn’t CredentialCache.DefaultNetworkCredentials contain at least the username of the impersonated user?

Answer 1

I found the answer here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/810572

“Kerberos does not work in a load-balanced architecture and IIS drops back to NTLM authentication. Because you cannot use NTLM for delegation, any applications or services that require delegation do not work. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft”

And that was exactly the case. I tried now with another machine that is not load-balanced and it works.

The only thing that still surprises me is that ImpersonationLevel of the identity is still Impersonate not Delegate…