Cisco – MAC address table in Cisco ASR1001

Is there a reliable way to infer the switch "Base ethernet MAC Address" from receiving such a CDP interface MAC Address, so that I can use that "Base ethernet MAC Address" as a globally unique identifier for the switch device equipment on the network?

You can't determine the base ethernet mac from CDP without guessing or assumptions about how Cisco behaves today (as well as future behavior). On the other hand, if all you want is a unique identifier, use the Chassis serial number; however, that would require polling the CDP source for entPhysicalSerialNum... a small price to eliminate guesswork.

entPhysicalSerialNum has the added bonus of working across many of Cisco's current platforms.

Sample SNMP walk of entPhysicalSerialNum:

[mpenning@tsunami ~]$ snmpbulkwalk -OXsq -v 2c -c ciscoro -m ENTITY-MIB \
  172.16.1.200 entPhysicalDescr
entPhysicalDescr[1] 2650 chassis
entPhysicalDescr[2] 2600 Chassis Slot
entPhysicalDescr[3] C2600 Mainboard
entPhysicalDescr[4] 2600 DaughterCard Slot
entPhysicalDescr[5] 2600 DaughterCard Slot
entPhysicalDescr[6] AIM Container Slot 0
entPhysicalDescr[7] 2600 Chassis Slot
entPhysicalDescr[8] One port Fastethernet TX
entPhysicalDescr[9] AmdFE
entPhysicalDescr[10] AmdFE
[mpenning@tsunami ~]$ snmpbulkwalk -OXsq -v 2c -c ciscoro -m ENTITY-MIB \
  172.16.1.200 entPhysicalSerialNum
entPhysicalSerialNum[1] JAB05290Z8Q
entPhysicalSerialNum[2]
entPhysicalSerialNum[3] yyyyyyyyyyy
entPhysicalSerialNum[4]
entPhysicalSerialNum[5]
entPhysicalSerialNum[6]
entPhysicalSerialNum[7]
entPhysicalSerialNum[8] 25809045
entPhysicalSerialNum[9]
entPhysicalSerialNum[10]
[mpenning@tsunami ~]$

I'm pretty sure you're thinking of 802.1x. You can use that to permit hosts based on MAC addresses.

This isn't the most secure way to authenticate hosts since spoofing a MAC address is fairly trivial and can be achieved with a single command, in most cases.