RB-WAC: New approach for access control in workflows

Today, workflow systems which aim the automation of a business process involving the coordinated execution of multiple tasks performed by different entities have experienced an increase use. Unfortunately, little workflow management systems (WFMS) take into account access control constraints such as separation of duties (SoD). In this paper, we present a new approach, RB-WAC (role-based workflow access control), to participate in amending the above shortcomings. This approach which is based on the standard of access control RBAC, introduces new rules to detect potential conflicts related to a workflow instance and also suggests the use of the concept of priority in order to resolve these conflicts.