ABSTRACT
The previous two chapters covered AAA authentication and authorization. These subjects are pretty intense. AAA accounting, the subject of this chapter, is not quite as intense.
The concept of AAA accounting is pretty straightforward. Your organization wishes to track which resources individuals or groups use. You might want to track this information because you charge back for network use. That is, the IS department charges other departments for access and resources consumed. You also might provide support to other departments and need the information on usage, dial-in access, and other data to do your job; or perhaps you are an ISP and you want to track dial-in access for billing. There are myriad reasons for accounting data. AAA accounting provides the capability to collect this data.
