802.1X authentication procedures

802.1X authentication has two approaches: EAP relay and EAP termination. You choose either mode depending on the support of the RADIUS server for EAP packets and EAP authentication methods.

EAP relay is defined in IEEE 802.1X. In this mode, the network device uses EAPoR packets to send authentication information to the RADIUS server, as shown in Figure 24.

In EAP relay mode, the client must use the same authentication method as the RADIUS server. On the network access device, you only need to execute the dot1x authentication-method eap command to enable EAP relay.

Figure 24: EAP relay

Figure 25: EAP termination