OpenID Connect

aknAPI acts as an OpenID Connect provider for registered relying parties, and as a claims source for the upstream identity provider that fronts akn ID.

Property	Value
Issuer	https://api.akn.me.uk
Flow	Authorisation code
Signing algorithm	RS256
Client authentication	client_secret_post and client_secret_basic
PKCE	S256 and plain
Scopes advertised	openid, email, profile
Subject type	public
Refresh tokens	Not available
Dynamic client registration	Not available
End-session endpoint	Not available

Clients are registered by the site operator against a fixed redirect URI allowlist. A client may also carry a required project, in which case only people holding that grant, the * grant, or the admin role receive a code.

Endpoints

Method	Path	Credential
GET	/.well-known/openid-configuration	None
GET	/auth/oidc/.well-known/openid-configuration	None
GET	/auth/oidc/jwks	None
GET	/auth/oidc/authorize	None. The browser is redirected to sign in
GET	/auth/oidc/callback	Session cookie. Called by the sign-in page
POST	/auth/oidc/token	Client credentials
GET	/auth/oidc/userinfo	Access token

Discovery is served at both paths with identical content. A client that asserts the issuer matches the discovery host should use the root path.

GET /auth/oidc/authorize

Parameter	Required	Detail
response_type	Yes	Must be code
client_id	Yes	Registered client
redirect_uri	Yes	Must match the client’s allowlist exactly
state	No	Returned on the redirect back
nonce	No	Copied into the ID token
code_challenge	No	PKCE challenge
code_challenge_method	No	S256 or plain

A valid request answers 302 to https://id.akn.me.uk to sign in, and the browser returns to /auth/oidc/callback.

Condition	Status	Body
response_type is not code	400	{"error":"unsupported_response_type"}
Client not registered	401	{"error":"invalid_client"}
redirect_uri missing	400	{"error":"invalid_request","error_description":"redirect_uri required"}
redirect_uri not on the allowlist	400	{"error":"invalid_request","error_description":"redirect_uri not registered"}

Errors are returned to the caller, never delivered to the requested redirect_uri. A relying party that only inspects its callback sees nothing at all when a request is rejected here.

The pending request expires five minutes after /auth/oidc/authorize is called. A sign-in that takes longer returns Login session expired. Please try again. as plain text with status 400.

GET /auth/oidc/callback

Called with the state issued at /auth/oidc/authorize once the session cookie is set. Issues the authorisation code and answers 302 to the relying party’s redirect_uri with code, and state when one was supplied.

Condition	Result
No valid session	302 back to the sign-in page
Signed in without the client’s required project	403 with an HTML page naming the missing project
Signed in and permitted	302 to redirect_uri

An unauthorised person is not redirected to the relying party. The refusal is shown on this page.

POST /auth/oidc/token

Accepts application/x-www-form-urlencoded or JSON.

Field	Required	Detail
grant_type	Yes	Must be authorization_code
code	Yes	Code from the callback redirect
redirect_uri	Yes	Must equal the value used at /auth/oidc/authorize
client_id	Conditional	Omit when using Basic authorisation
client_secret	Conditional	Omit when using Basic authorisation
code_verifier	Conditional	Required when a challenge was sent and the client has a registered allowlist

Response, 200.

{
  "access_token": "…",
  "token_type": "Bearer",
  "expires_in": 3600,
  "id_token": "…"
}

Condition	Status	Body
Client unknown, or the secret does not match	401	{"error":"invalid_client"}
grant_type is not authorization_code	400	{"error":"unsupported_grant_type"}
Code unknown, already redeemed, or older than two minutes	400	{"error":"invalid_grant"}
redirect_uri differs from the authorise request	400	{"error":"invalid_grant"}
Code redeemed by a different client	400	{"error":"invalid_grant"}
PKCE verifier missing	400	{"error":"invalid_grant","error_description":"code_verifier required"}
PKCE verifier does not match	400	{"error":"invalid_grant","error_description":"PKCE verification failed"}
Signing failed	500	{"error":"server_error"}

ID token claims

Claim	Detail
iss	https://api.akn.me.uk
aud	The client id
sub	Sign-in identity of the person
email	Address on the session, or on the person record
email_verified	True only when the address was proved
phone_number	Present only when a number is held
phone_number_verified	Present alongside phone_number
name	Display name, falling back to the address
akn_role	user or admin
akn_projects	Array of project grants
nonce	Present when supplied at the authorise request

email_verified reflects the real state. Do not key an account on email alone when the claim is false.

GET /auth/oidc/userinfo

Requires Authorization: Bearer <access_token>.

{
  "sub": "…",
  "email": "person@example.com",
  "email_verified": true,
  "name": "…",
  "akn_role": "user",
  "akn_projects": ["startpage"]
}

Condition	Status	Body
No bearer header	401	{"error":"invalid_token"} with WWW-Authenticate: Bearer
Token unknown or older than one hour	401	{"error":"invalid_token"}

Lifetimes

Item	Lifetime	Reuse
Pending authorise request	5 minutes	Single use
Authorisation code	2 minutes	Single use
Access token	1 hour	Reusable until expiry
ID token	1 hour	Not accepted back by this service

Pending requests, codes and access tokens are held for the life of the process. A restart invalidates every one of them: sign-ins in flight fail, and calls to /auth/oidc/userinfo with a previously valid token answer 401. ID tokens already issued remain valid until they expire, since they are verified against the published key.

Claims target

POST /auth/zitadel/claims supplies akn ID authorisation to the upstream identity provider while it mints a token. It is not a general-purpose endpoint.

Property	Detail
Credential	ZITADEL-Signature: t=<unix>,v1=<hex> over the exact request body
Replay window	300 seconds either side of the timestamp
Refused	403 with {"error":"invalid_signature"}

Response, 200.

{
  "append_claims": [ { "key": "urn:akn:role", "value": "user" } ],
  "append_log_claims": ["akn: matched person … on email"]
}

Claim	Detail
email, email_verified	Appended when the caller proved a verified address
phone_number, phone_number_verified	Appended when a verified number was proved
urn:akn:person_id	The person the identifiers resolved to
urn:akn:status	pending, approved or rejected
urn:akn:role	user or admin
urn:akn:projects	Array of project grants

A signed call that resolves no person still answers 200, with the urn:akn: claims absent. A relying party must treat a missing urn:akn:projects as no access rather than as an error, because a lookup failure produces the same result.

Related

• Authentication covers the session that /auth/oidc/callback reads.
• Errors covers the difference between OAuth error codes and the rest of the API.
• Diagnostics covers failed relying party integrations.