Subject: Re: [dnsext] draft-jabley-dnsop-validator-bootstrap-00

From: Ted Lemon <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 07:55:34 -0500

On Jan 31, 2011, at 11:25 PM, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
> I was going to reply to this post, then I read it and saw that you cannot converse in a civil fashion.

What's uncivil about calling balderdash poppycock?

But it's good that you didn't reply, because Paul is right.

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From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 08:44:57 -0500

Given that the chairs have asked me not to avoid making personal comments it
is not possible for me to respond appropriately to your post or Paul's that
followed.

As you both know I have professional experience and expertise in this
specific area. I have been thinking about this specific problem for over two
decades.

You have the right to think I am wrong. But until your system has functioned
in the real world for at least as long as mine you are going to have to
treat me with respect.

-- 
Website: http://hallambaker.com/
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From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 09:43:32 -0500

Not to pick on Paul, but again, I'd like to suggest a moderation of
tone.  I understand perfectly well that there are strong views here,
and I also think there is a perfectly legitimate technical dispute
here.  But let's go out of our collective way to keep our responses as
even as possible precisely so that we can get to a satisfying
conclusion for everyone.

Thanks,

A

On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 05:49:13PM -0800, Paul Hoffman wrote:
> On 1/31/11 4:40 PM, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
>> To be precise here, there is no difference in the likelihood that the
>> keys will be compromised.
>
> Quite right.
>
>> The difference is that the X.509 protocol is designed to support keys
>> that are persistent over long periods (decades) and DNSSEC is not.
>
> Poppycock. Both PKIX and DNSSEC are agnostic on how long the keys are  
> meant to last. Pretending that PKIX has some advantage here is nonsense.
>
>> In particular an X.509 self-signed certificate is an assertion that the
>> key holder will maintain and use the associated private key in
>> accordance with the specified practices for the specified length of time.
>
> Bosh. If you are talking about the "notAfter" field, it is defined as  
> the end of "the time interval during which the CA warrants that it will  
> maintain information about the status of the certificate"; that is quite  
> different than "maintain and use". If you are speaking of something  
> else, please quote from the PKIX spec.
>
>> You can easily find out how long Comodo or Symantec or whoever is going
>> to maintain their SSL CA roots, the information is right there in the
>> cert store and is irrevocable in that the CA can extend the time period
>> (through recertification) but cannot reduce it.
>
> Balderdash. When I look in Comodo's certificate in my "cert store", I  
> don't see anything about how long you are going to maintain your SSL CA  
> root. I see something that says you will maintain *information about the  
> status* of the certificate; note the difference. As for "irrevocable",  
> that's just silly: Comodo can revoke it at any time. There is no  
> contract here.
>
>> My advice to Cisco would be to use their existing root to sign the
>> published CSR for the DNS root KSK in the short term at least.
>
> Signing is the easy part: making their systems use that signed key is  
> much more difficult. That difficulty is what started this thread;  
> handwaving it away won't help Cisco or anyone.
>
>> In the longer term we are going to have to have a look at the problem at
>> a higher level and work out how we are going to solve it in a scalable
>> way across all the platforms that involve a root key.
>>
>> We are starting to make quite a little collection of industry forums
>> that are doing this root key management as a sideline.
>
> Now everyone can rest assured: industry forums to the rescue!

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
[email-masked]
Shinkuro, Inc.

---

From: Paul Hoffman <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 01 Feb 2011 09:07:39 -0800

> even as possible precisely so that we can get to a satisfying

Phill was making technical statements, not "views". His technical 
statements were wrong. I believe that saying "poppycock" and "bosh" and 
"balderdash" instead of repeating "this is demonstrably wrong" makes the 
writing more interesting, but I hear that others may not appreciate 
interesting writing.

Note that I did quote from the relevant RFC as I did so, and Phill has 
not responded on the technical merits (or lack thereof) of his statements.
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From: Andrew Sullivan <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 12:23:34 -0500

On Tue, Feb 01, 2011 at 09:07:39AM -0800, Paul Hoffman wrote:
> Phill was making technical statements, not "views". 

Perhaps you and I have different theories about the meanings of those
terms.  The point I'm trying to make is just that, the more
contentious the disagreement, the nastier discussions can get on
mailing lists.  So I'm trying to ask everyone to be even nicer than
usual.

> not responded on the technical merits (or lack thereof) of his 

I wish to be pefectly clear that plainly stated cases comparing one
person's argument against relevant RFC(s) are not, in my opinion, to
be moderated and are not personal attacks.  I'm only saying that, in
making an argument, one can either make that argument nicely or state
things in more colourful and stinging terms; and, I'd prefer that we
lean towards the former approach (particularly just now).

For the same reasons, if anyone wishes to argue exclusively from
appeals to authority on the basis of deployed systems, he or she will
need to address the complaints that the deployed systems have
something wrong with them, or else accept that such arguments will
continue to be made.  But we will all benefit if we try very hard to
be even more civil and dispassionate than usual in discussing these
matters.

Thanks,

A

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:09:34 -0500

The reason I took exception to your tone Paul is that I interpreted it as
implying that anyone who does not agree with you must do so from ignorance.

Many people, at least ten from the DNS and PKI fields have told me that they
do not see any point in participating in IETF because they find these
tactics unpleasant.

I know that my particular views are well founded in industry practice and
experience. I have worked on this particular problem for over fifteen years.
I have taught courses on how to manage offline keys.

I do not think that you can truthfully claim an equivalent level of
expertise. Thus for you to be using the language you do suggests that you
are attempting to bully my arguments away rather than answer them as I have
seen you do in other instances against other people who have subsequently
decided not to have anything to do with the IETF in future.

So that is the reason that I found your comments so unacceptable.

On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 12:07 PM, Paul Hoffman <[email-masked]> wrote:

> Note that I did quote from the relevant RFC as I did so, and Phill has not
> responded on the technical merits (or lack thereof) of his statements.

---

From: Paul Wouters <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:14:27 -0500 (EST)

On Tue, 1 Feb 2011, Andrew Sullivan wrote:

> continue to be made.

I'm not sure this parses right? Someone repeatedly stating unproven
generalities based on appeal of authority (or old age of the system)
is causing an effective denieal of service on the discussion forward.

You're telling people need to continiously argue against these claims
without merit? In that case I would like file my expenses with you :)

Perhaps you meant to say "Please don't use appeal of authority in your
argumentation"

Paul

---

From: Paul Wouters <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:20:29 -0500 (EST)

> experience. I have worked on this particular problem for over fifteen

This is an example of such an appeal to authority that some people keep
using, usually combined with general all-encompassing statements.

> expertise.

I am reminded of your claim of 20 years of DNSSEC experience at the
Toronto TASK meeting......

Paul

---

From: Paul Hoffman <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 01 Feb 2011 11:51:15 -0800

> So that is the reason that I found your comments so unacceptable.

I understand that you found my comments so unacceptable. It is still 
useful for you to comment on thread with technical justification for 
your statements. I quoted from the PKIX RFC showing, I believe, that you 
are factually wrong. If you can quote from that or a similar RFC showing 
that you are right, that would be helpful. If you can't, saying that you 
can't would also be helpful.
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From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 14:52:33 -0500

Appeal to personal authority is entirely appropriate when defending against
an attack on personal expertise.

I do not believe that I claimed twenty years experience in DNSSEC, but I
certainly have over twenty years experience in PKI.

I discussed DNSSEC with Don in 1995. That work was itself performed in the
aftermath of the collapse of the PEM root project. Given that my argument at
TASK was that we had been engaged in development of DNSSEC since the
incorporation date of VeriSign (1995) I am pretty sure that I gave the right
date.

I spoke on this issue at the second World Wide Web Conference in Chicago in
1994.

---

From: Tony Finch <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2011 20:40:19 +0000

On Mon, 31 Jan 2011, John Bashinski wrote:

> > A validator must confirm that its local clock is sufficiently
> > accurate before trust anchors can be established, and before
> > processing of DNSSEC signatures can proceed.
>
> How?

There are two possibilities here: you can't reach a time server because of
some screwup, or someone is deliberately lying to you about the time.

The latter for DNSSEC is a denial of service attack, and the other network
comms in the bootstrap process is similarly vulnerable to DoS.

I agree it is a concern but I'm not sure it needs to cause angst.

Tony.
-- 
f.anthony.n.finch  <[email-masked]>  http://dotat.at/
HUMBER THAMES DOVER WIGHT PORTLAND: NORTH BACKING WEST OR NORTHWEST, 5 TO 7,
DECREASING 4 OR 5, OCCASIONALLY 6 LATER IN HUMBER AND THAMES. MODERATE OR
ROUGH. RAIN THEN FAIR. GOOD.
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From: Masataka Ohta <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 02 Feb 2011 05:58:40 +0900

Paul Hoffman wrote:

> statements were wrong.

True.

But, the fundamental problem is that PKI, in general, is broken
and not really securely operational.

What you are seeing is desperate attempts to defend PKI by
believers in.

Of course, you can't expect religious statements technically
correct. But, it is hard, if not impossible, to convince believers
in of the technical reality, if a religion has decades of history
with a lot of believers in.

The believers in are well trained not to admit some technical
problems and won't accept proposals to solve the problems,
because they know the proposals cause other problems.

						Masataka Ohta

---

From: Jakob Schlyter <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 2 Feb 2011 11:06:46 +0100

On 1 feb 2011, at 01.40, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:

> My advice to Cisco would be to use their existing root to sign the published CSR for the DNS root KSK in the short term at least.

That's why we (the Root DNSSEC Design Team) included a CSR as one output from the key generation ceremony.

	jakob

---

From: Derek Atkins <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 02 Feb 2011 08:08:25 -0500

> Toronto TASK meeting......

Not to necessarily defend Phill, but that's certainly possible.  I was
working on a DNSSec implementation in 1995.  That was... 16 years ago.

> Paul

-derek

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
       [email-masked]                        PGP key available
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