Subject: certification for pki

From: "Jean Abraham" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 13:00:06 +0300

Hi,

Is there any internationally accredited certification for PKI

Jean

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 10:23:09 -0400

One internationally recognized avenue is an evaluation under the Common
Criteria/ISO 15408.  Such an evaluation up to EAL4 is automatically recognized
by the (currently) nine mutual recognition arrangement countries.  Two current
problems are (1) that the CC itself does not contain a crypto module evaluation
standard such as FIPS 140-1/2, and (2) there is not yet a consensus and
evaluated Protection Profile for PKI components.   Some product vendors have
undertanen evaluations without PPs.  FIPS 140-1 is officially US/Canada, but
also widely recognized.

There is a maturing draft PP sponsored/created by the (US) National Institute of
Science and Technology,  which offers a selection of four levels of assurance
for certificate issuing and management components (CIMC).  See
http://csrc.nist.gov/pki/documents/.  For specific crypto module validation, it
references FIPS 140-1, but also includes all the other system security funcional
and assurance requirements appropriate to CIMC.
-Gene Hilborn

[email-masked] on 06/21/2000 06:00:06 AM

To:   [email-masked]
cc:    (bcc: Gene Hilborn/DEF/CSC)
Subject:  certification for pki

Hi,

Jean

---

From: [email-masked] (Peter Gutmann)
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 03:11:43 (NZST)

[email-masked] writes:

>problems are (1) that the CC itself does not contain a crypto module
>evaluation standard such as FIPS 140-1/2, and (2) there is not yet a consensus
>and evaluated Protection Profile for PKI components.   Some product vendors
>have undertanen evaluations without PPs.  FIPS 140-1 is officially US/Canada,
>but also widely recognized.

A third problem with the CC, for those who haven't experienced it before, is
that it acts as a form of torture for companies to determine how badly they
need government (or whatever) contracts - the more pain you can stand, the
better you've demonstrated that you need the contract.  I'm not just saying
this for $generic_CC_bashing, from talking to people who have gone through it
it really sounds like an incredibly unpleasant experience (when I used the term
"torture" to describe it above this doesn't originate with me but with the
people I talked to).  In terms of achieving more or less the same effect (the
certification that is, not the torture :-) it looks like FIPS 140 is the easier
path, and it does constitute a de facto PP which the CC doesn't have yet.  I'd
go with FIPS 140.

Peter.

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 12:09:18 -0400

Gene,

However, the major drawback with the Certificate Issuing and Management
Component (CIMC) Protection Profile (PP) sponsored/created by the (US)
National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST) is that the current
version still specifies about 25 new security functional requirements (SFRs)
that are NOT included in the Common Criteria (CC)/ISO 15408 instead of using
the refinement and/or the iteration operations on existing CC security
functional requirements.

In addition, all these additional security functional requirements from the
NIST CIMC PP would probably not be recognised through the mutual recognition
arrangement (MRA).

Francois
___________________________________
Francois Rousseau
Director of Standards and Conformance
Chrysalis-ITS
1688 Woodward Drive
Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA, K2C 3R7
[email-masked]      Tel. (613) 723-5076 ext. 419
http://www.chrysalis-its.com     Fax. (613) 723-5078

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2000 10:23 AM
To: [email-masked]
Cc: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: certification for pki

One internationally recognized avenue is an evaluation under the Common
Criteria/ISO 15408.  Such an evaluation up to EAL4 is automatically
recognized
by the (currently) nine mutual recognition arrangement countries.  Two
current
problems are (1) that the CC itself does not contain a crypto module
evaluation
standard such as FIPS 140-1/2, and (2) there is not yet a consensus and
evaluated Protection Profile for PKI components.   Some product vendors have
undertanen evaluations without PPs.  FIPS 140-1 is officially US/Canada, but
also widely recognized.

There is a maturing draft PP sponsored/created by the (US) National
Institute of
Science and Technology,  which offers a selection of four levels of
assurance
for certificate issuing and management components (CIMC).  See
http://csrc.nist.gov/pki/documents/.  For specific crypto module validation,
it
references FIPS 140-1, but also includes all the other system security
funcional
and assurance requirements appropriate to CIMC.

-Gene Hilborn

To:   [email-masked]

Hi,

Jean

---

From: [email-masked] (Peter Gutmann)
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 04:47:52 (NZST)

[email-masked] writes:

>It is not a choice of CC vs. FIPS.  The FIPS 140-1 testing pertains narrowly
>to crypto modules.  The CC evaluation/"torture" process is about the
>system/components for certificate issuance and management meeting its security
>specification (security target and claimed PP(s)).

Oh, so the interest is in certifying the PKI process rather than machinery
which makes it possible?  In that case there's a whole host of standards to
choose from, from ISO there's ISO 15782-1, Banking - Certificate Management,
from ANSI theres X9.57 Certificate Management and ANSI X9.79, PKI Practices and
Framework, and from vendors there's both VISA and MC's SET PKI requirements
(which, while in some cases SET-specific), are well thought out.  Would any of
those be usable as a PP?

Peter.

---

From: "Morrill, Dan" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 10:04:13 -0700

I don't suppose that out there on the net or in committee, there is one
unifying document to take care of both the PKI process and the machinery
that it is stored on as a mutually agreed upon set of standards? If not,
maybe it would be good for this panel to make one?

Just a thought.
r/
Dan Morrill
CSC

-----Original Message-----
From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]]
Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2000 09:48 PM
To: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: certification for pki

Oh, so the interest is in certifying the PKI process rather than machinery
which makes it possible?  In that case there's a whole host of standards to
choose from, from ISO there's ISO 15782-1, Banking - Certificate Management,
from ANSI theres X9.57 Certificate Management and ANSI X9.79, PKI Practices
and
Framework, and from vendors there's both VISA and MC's SET PKI requirements
(which, while in some cases SET-specific), are well thought out.  Would any
of
those be usable as a PP?

Peter.

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 14:27:10 -0400

Peter,
I said nothing about "certifying the PKI process."  Rather I spoke of the
process of certifying the products  (CC and FIPS).
-Gene

[email-masked] on 06/22/2000 12:47:52 AM

Please respond to [email-masked]

To:   [email-masked]

Peter.

---

From: Russ Housley <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2000 22:48:08 -0400

Please take a look at the protection profiles being proposed by
SPYRUS.  You can find them at
http://www.spyrus.com/documents/cims.
We have released the Level 3 profile to ANSI X9 as a strawman for a
financial industry protection profile.

Russ

At 12:09 PM 06/21/2000 -0400, [email-masked] wrote:

Gene,

However, the major drawback with the Certificate Issuing and
Management Component (CIMC) Protection Profile (PP) sponsored/created by
the (US) National Institute of Science and Technology (NIST) is that the
current version still specifies about 25 new security functional
requirements (SFRs) that are NOT included in the Common Criteria (CC)/ISO
15408 instead of using the refinement and/or the iteration operations on
existing CC security functional requirements.

In addition, all these additional security functional requirements from
the NIST CIMC PP would probably not be recognised through the mutual
recognition arrangement (MRA).

Francois

Francois Rousseau

Chrysalis-ITS

1688 Woodward Drive

[email-masked]
Tel. (613) 723-5076 ext. 419

http://www.chrysalis-its.com
Fax. (613) 723-5078

-----Original Message-----

From: [email-masked]
[mailto:[email-masked]]

To: [email-masked]

One internationally recognized avenue is an evaluation under
the Common

Criteria/ISO 15408.  Such an evaluation up to EAL4 is
automatically recognized

by the (currently) nine mutual recognition arrangement
countries.  Two current

problems are (1) that the CC itself does not contain a
crypto module evaluation

standard such as FIPS 140-1/2, and (2) there is not yet a
consensus and

evaluated Protection Profile for PKI components.
Some product vendors have

undertanen evaluations without PPs.  FIPS 140-1 is
officially US/Canada, but

also widely recognized.

There is a maturing draft PP sponsored/created by the (US)
National Institute of

Science and Technology,  which offers a selection of
four levels of assurance

for certificate issuing and management components
(CIMC).  See

http://csrc.nist.gov/pki/documents/.
For specific crypto module validation, it

references FIPS 140-1, but also includes all the other
system security funcional

-Gene Hilborn

To:   [email-masked]

Hi,

Jean

---

From: "Farrukh Ahmad" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 12:34:54 +0100

FYI, under the CEN/ETSI standards work currently being carried out for use
with the European Directive on Digital Signatures, trustworthy system
standards are being written which include in their annex CC PPs for CAs and
RAs. These may be used by a Certification Service Provider (CSP) issuing
Qualified Certificates for compliance assessment. A public draft will be
available sometime in September and a complete standard by the end of the
year.

Regards
Farrukh Ahmad

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 10:04:10 -0400

Russ,

Thanks for the link. I had a quick look at them and I have noted that
contrary to the NIST CIMC PP, which as indicated in my previous Email
created new security functional requirements even for key management, the
SPYRUS CIMS PPs contain no security functional requirements whatsoever about
cryptographic functionality. Each SPYRUS's PP contains the same statement,
"I haven't got a clue" when addressing Common Criteria requirement
statements about cryptographic support. Does SPYRUS plan to add some
security functional requirements from the Class FCS on cryptographic support
in a future version of its PPs?

Reagards,

Francois

-----Original Message-----
From: Russ Housley [mailto:[email-masked]]
Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2000 10:48 PM
To: [email-masked]
Cc: [email-masked]; [email-masked]; [email-masked]
Subject: RE: certification for pki

Please take a look at the protection profiles being proposed by SPYRUS.  You
can find them at http://www.spyrus.com/documents/cims.  We have released the
Level 3 profile to ANSI X9 as a strawman for a financial industry protection
profile.

Russ

[snip]

---

From: "Bob Jueneman" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 22 Jun 2000 16:58:24 -0600

I attended the recent International Common Criteria conference in Baltimore,
mostly to learn the answers to these kinds of questions.

My assessment would be as follows:

1.  The Common Criteria, and the fact that 13 or so countries have agreed to
it, is not really a criteria at all, from the usual perspective, but rather a 
meta-criteria or specification language for laying out in some (excruciating) detail
what the requirements are, and how you have met them.  As a process for
convincing yourself, or your industry, that you have thought hard about the 
problem you are trying to solve, it is excellent.

2.  The real "guts" of the issue, however, is not how you specify the requirements,
but what the requirements really are.  And this is done through the Protection Profile.

3.  Unfortunately, there are as yet very few Protection Profiles that have been 
published, and even fewer, if any that have been widely vetted and accepted by a 
broad segment of the user community.

4.  One of the best examples of a good Protection Profile is being hammered out 
by the smart card industry, with the clout of the banks and credit card companies behind
it.  That will almost surely emerge as a almost universally accept PP.

5.  Some of the worst (from the standpoint of universality) Protection Profiles may
be in the area of PKI.  It should be obvious, but if there is substantial disagreement
as to the fundamentals of the digital signature law of the jurisdiction, there is not 
likely going to be any commonality regarding the Protection Profile.

As a result, I would expect that if say Siemens expects to sell a PKI for use in Germany,
they will eventually have to get it certified against the German Protection Profile.
But having done so, that may or may not carry any weight at all with respect to 
say the State of Utah's PKI requirement. And vice versa, for someone like 
Digital Signature Trust if they try to sell into Germany.

In other words, I wouldn't bet a whole lot of money on the Common Criteria being 
a roaring success, and especially in the PKI space.  And I say that, even though I'm 
a firm believer in the value of an independent evaluation of important software 
components.  Time will tell

bob

>>> <[email-masked]> 06/21/00 09:47AM >>>

It is not a choice of CC vs. FIPS.  The FIPS 140-1 testing pertains narrowly to
crypto modules.  The CC evaluation/"torture" process is about the
system/components for certificate issuance and management meeting its security
specification (security target and claimed PP(s)).  A crypto module is just an
embedded "engine" in the larger vehicle.   To continue with the automotive
metaphor, it is not a choice between auto emission testing vs. crash testing vs.
fuel economy vs. performance testing, etc.  All of these tests may be required
for the consumer to understand and compare what they are buying.  It may be
"torture" for the manufacturer, but when the market (or laws, regulations, etc.)
demand it, manufacturers do it.
-GH

[email-masked] on 06/21/2000 11:11:43 PM

To:   [email-masked] 

Peter.

---

From: [email-masked]
Date: Sat, 24 Jun 2000 17:37:11 EDT

Jean,

There is a process called WebTrust that is endorsed by the American Institute 
of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA) and the Canadian Institute of 
Chartered Accountants (CICA).  WebTrust offers several models of audit and 
certification guidance including one for Certificate Authorities (WebTrust 
Principles and Criteria for Certificate Authorities).  While this process 
does not currently have "international" acceptance, many past AICPA standards 
have gained that stature.  If you would like additional information, please 
go to: http://www.cpawebtrust.org.

Charlie

<[email-masked]>