JWT

Overview

A JSON Web Token (JWT) is a token containing three parts:

1. A header specifying metadata (e.g. the algorithm used to encode the token).
2. A payload containing key/value pairs.
3. A signature used to ensure integrity.

Claims

The payload contains a number of key/value pairs called claims. Certain claims are standard. These include (but are not limited to):

• iss. The identifier of the issuer of the JWT.
• aud. The identifier of the service provider the JWT is intended for.
• exp. When the JWT is set to expire.
• iat. When the JWT was issued.
• sub. An identifier used to specify the subject.

All times are numbers representing the number of seconds since the UNIX epoch.