"Client authentication failed" with Authelia

[mikew]

I'm trying to get Nextcloud + Authelia working, and this is the plugin recommended in their documentation

I've added this app to my Nextcloud installation (nextcloud-aio), and set up the Authelia side of things, but after logging in via Authelia, I just get an error:

Error
Client authentication failed (e.g., unknown client, no client authentication included, or unsupported authentication method).

I don't think the error is on the Authelia side of things, because:

• The URL of the page showing that error has a valid code from Authelia
• In Authelia, if I add https://openidconnect.net/callback to the list of valid callback urls, and test in https://openidconnect.net/ using the same client id and secret I've given Nextcloud, it works.

Relevant Nextcloud configuration:

    // Some Nextcloud options that might make sense here
    'allow_user_to_change_display_name' => false,
    'lost_password_link' => 'disabled',

    // URL of provider. All other URLs are auto-discovered from .well-known
    'oidc_login_provider_url' => 'https://auth.[REDACTED]',

    // Client ID and secret registered with the provider
    'oidc_login_client_id' => '[REDACTED]',
    'oidc_login_client_secret' => '[REDACTED]',

    // Automatically redirect the login page to the provider
    'oidc_login_auto_redirect' => false,

    // Redirect to this page after logging out the user
    // 'oidc_login_logout_url' => 'https://openid.example.com/thankyou',

    // If set to true the user will be redirected to the
    // logout endpoint of the OIDC provider after logout
    // in Nextcloud. After successfull logout the OIDC
    // provider will redirect back to 'oidc_login_logout_url' (MUST be set).
    'oidc_login_end_session_redirect' => false,

    // Quota to assign if no quota is specified in the OIDC response (bytes)
    //
    // NOTE: If you want to allow NextCloud to manage quotas, omit this option. Do not set it to
    // zero or -1 or ''.
    //'oidc_login_default_quota' => '1000000000',

    // Login button text
    'oidc_login_button_text' => 'Log in with Authelia',

    // Hide the NextCloud password change form.
    'oidc_login_hide_password_form' => false,

    // Use ID Token instead of UserInfo
    'oidc_login_use_id_token' => false,

    // Attribute map for OIDC response. Available keys are:
    //   * id:           Unique identifier for username
    //   * name:         Full name
    //                      If set to null, existing display name won't be overwritten
    //   * mail:         Email address
    //                      If set to null, existing email address won't be overwritten
    //   * quota:        Nextcloud storage quota
    //   * home:         Home directory location. A symlink or external storage to this location is used
    //   * ldap_uid:     LDAP uid to search for when running in proxy mode
    //   * groups:       Array or space separated string of Nextcloud groups for the user.
    //                   Note that the name here corresponds to the GID of the group and not the display name
    //                   In the admin panel, the GID may be obtained from the URL when editing a group
    //   * login_filter: Array or space separated string. If 'oidc_login_filter_allowed_values' is
    //                      set, it is checked against these values.
    //   * photoURL:     The URL of the user avatar. The nextcloud server will download the picture
    //                      at user login. This may lead to security issues. Use with care.
    //                      This will only be effective if oidc_login_update_avatar is enabled.
    //   * is_admin:     If this value is truthy, the user is added to the admin group (optional)
    //
    // The attributes in the OIDC response are flattened by adding the nested
    // array key as the prefix and an underscore. Thus,
    //
    //     $profile = [
    //         'id' => 1234,
    //         'attributes' => [
    //             'uid' => 'myuid',
    //             'abc' => 'xyz'
    //         ],
    //         'list' => ['one', 'two']
    //     ];
    //
    // would become,
    //
    //     $profile = [
    //         'id' => 1234,
    //         'attributes' => [
    //             'uid' => 'myuid',
    //             'abc' => 'xyz'
    //         ],
    //         'attributes_uid' => 'myuid',
    //         'attributes_abc' => 'xyz',
    //         'list' => ['one', 'two'],
    //         'list_0' => 'one',
    //         'list_1' => 'two',
    //         'list_one' => 'one',
    //         'list_two' => 'two',
    //     ]
    //
    // https://openid.net/specs/openid-connect-core-1_0.html#StandardClaims
    //
    // note: on Keycloak, OIDC name claim = "${given_name} ${family_name}" or one of them if any is missing
    //
    'oidc_login_attributes' => array (
        'id' => 'preferred_username',
        'name' => 'name',
        'mail' => 'email',
        'groups' => 'groups',
        'is_admin' => 'groups_admins',
    ),

    // Default group to add users to (optional, defaults to nothing)
    // 'oidc_login_default_group' => 'oidc',

    // DEPRECATED: This option will be removed in a future release. Use
    // 'login_filter' and 'oidc_login_filter_allowed_values' instead.
    //
    // Allow only users in configured group(s) to access Nextcloud. In case the user
    // is not assigned to this group (read from oidc_login_attributes) the login
    // will not be allowed for this user.
    //
    // Must be specified as an array of groups that are allowed to access Nextcloud.
    // e.g. 'oidc_login_allowed_groups' => array('group1', 'group2')
    'oidc_login_allowed_groups' => null,

    // Allow only users in configured value(s) to access Nextcloud. In case the user
    // is not assigned to this value (read from oidc_login_attributes) the login
    // will not be allowed for this user.
    //
    // Must be specified as an array of values (e.g. roles) that are allowed to
    // access Nextcloud. e.g. 'oidc_login_filter_allowed_values' => array('role1', 'role2')
    'oidc_login_filter_allowed_values' => null,

    // Use external storage instead of a symlink to the home directory
    // Requires the files_external app to be enabled
    'oidc_login_use_external_storage' => false,

    // Set OpenID Connect scope
    'oidc_login_scope' => 'openid profile email groups',

    // Run in LDAP proxy mode
    // In this mode, instead of creating users of its own, OIDC login
    // will get the existing user from an LDAP database and only
    // perform authentication with OIDC. All user data will be derived
    // from the LDAP database instead of the OIDC user response
    //
    // The `id` attribute in `oidc_login_attributes` must return the
    // "Internal Username" (see expert settings in LDAP integration)
    'oidc_login_proxy_ldap' => false,

    // Disable creation of users new to Nextcloud from OIDC login.
    // A user may be known to the IdP but not (yet) known to Nextcloud.
    // This setting controls what to do in this case.
    // - 'true' (default): if the user authenticates to the IdP but is not known to Nextcloud,
    //     then they will be returned to the login screen and not allowed entry;
    // - 'false': if the user authenticates but is not yet known to Nextcloud,
    //     then the user will be automatically created; note that with this setting,
    //     you will be allowing (or relying on) a third-party (the IdP) to create new users
    'oidc_login_disable_registration' => false,

    // Fallback to direct login if login from OIDC fails
    // Note that no error message will be displayed if enabled
    'oidc_login_redir_fallback' => false,

    // Use an alternative login page
    // This page will be php-included instead of a redirect if specified
    // In the example below, the PHP file `login.php` in `assets`
    // in nextcloud base directory will be included
    // Note: the PHP variable $OIDC_LOGIN_URL is available for redirect URI
    // Note: you may want to try setting `oidc_login_logout_url` to your
    // base URL if you face issues regarding re-login after logout
    // 'oidc_login_alt_login_page' => 'assets/login.php',

    // For development, you may disable TLS verification. Default value is `true`
    // which should be kept in production
    'oidc_login_tls_verify' => true,

    // If you get your groups from the oidc_login_attributes, you might want
    // to create them if they are not already existing, Default is `false`.
    'oidc_create_groups' => true,

    // Enable use of WebDAV via OIDC bearer token.
    'oidc_login_webdav_enabled' => false,

    // Enable authentication with user/password for DAV clients that do not
    // support token authentication (e.g. DAVx⁵)
    'oidc_login_password_authentication' => false,

    // The time in seconds used to cache public keys from provider.
    // The default value is 1 day.
    'oidc_login_public_key_caching_time' => 86400,

    // The minimum time in seconds to wait between requests to the jwks_uri endpoint.
    // Avoids that the provider will be DoSed when someone requests with unknown kids.
    // The default is 10 seconds.
    'oidc_login_min_time_between_jwks_requests' => 10,

    // The time in seconds used to cache the OIDC well-known configuration from the provider.
    // The default value is 1 day.
    'oidc_login_well_known_caching_time' => 86400,

    // If true, nextcloud will download user avatars on login.
    // This may lead to security issues as the server does not control
    // which URLs will be requested. Use with care.
    'oidc_login_update_avatar' => false,

    // If true, the default Nextcloud proxy won't be used to make internals OIDC call.
    // The default is false.
    'oidc_login_skip_proxy' => false,

    // Code challenge method for PKCE flow.
    // Possible values are:
    //  - 'S256'
    //  - 'plain'
    // The default value is empty, which won't apply the PKCE flow.
    'oidc_login_code_challenge_method' => '',

Relevant Authelia configuration:

identity_providers:
  oidc:
    clients:
      - description: Nextcloud
        id: ${OIDC_NEXTCLOUD_CLIENT_ID}
        secret: ${OIDC_NEXTCLOUD_CLIENT_SECRET}

        public: false
        authorization_policy: one_factor
        redirect_uris:
          - https://cloud-aio.${HOMELAB_BASE_DOMAIN}/apps/oidc_login/oidc
          - https://openidconnect.net/callback
        scopes:
          - openid
          - profile
          - email
          - groups
        userinfo_signing_algorithm: none

[mikew]

I also tried what was suggested in #63, but still just receive and error when logging in via OIDC. Nothing shows up in the nextcloud log file either, even with log_level set to 0.

The other user_oidc app worked right out of the gate.

[DimeOne]

Can you check what happens, if you set the scope to:

'oidc_login_scope' => 'profile email groups',

I had some issues with Keycloak because the redirect url contained openid twice.

[mikew]

Huh, thanks for the tip! I'll check that out over the weekend.

[jdancouga]

@mikew are you able to solve this problem. I have followed authelia's nextcloud openid connect guide to a t, and I end up with the same problem.

[jdancouga]

I figured it out. When following the guides on generating client_secret with command:
'authelia crypto hash generate pbkdf2 --variant sha512 --random --random.length 72 --random.charset rfc3986'

use the 'Digest" string for authelia's configuration.yml file
use the 'Random Password' string for nextcloud's config.php file

I was trying to use the digest string for both files, and it cause the client auth failed error.