4 ms·

It doesn't, according to Moxie Marlinspike and others. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/11/state_of_ssl_analysis/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/11/s

It doesn't, according to Moxie Marlinspike and others. http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/11/state_of_ssl_analysis/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/11/state_of_ssl_analysi... If you haven't seen any of Marlinspikes presentations, you are missing out on some fascinating stuff. Moxie @ Defcon 19: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIiklPyS8MU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIiklPyS8MU

tptacek 14y ago
That's a misstatement of Moxie's position, which is unfortunate because Moxie's position is important, probably correct, and needs all the credibility it can get. What's broken about SSL/TLS is the current CA model. Since SSL/TLS was introduced, we've been running with almost exactly the same trust "UX": a hidden browser config panel listing a series of complicated-sounding trusted root CAs, each with the authority to sell or transfer their business to some other entity, or even to delegate the authority to sign certificates to other organizations. That's absurd; it's a security model that clearly can't work in the real world --- and, more, demonstrably hasn't worked. SSL CA's have been caught red-handing selling their authority for dubious reasons. For instance, Trustwave sold a CA=YES certificate to an undisclosed third-party corporation solely for the purpose of making it easier (not "possible" but merely easier) for that corporation to monitor their own users. We need a radical rethinking of the UI/UX and trust model behind SSL/TLS, and Moxie's idea of decentralizing that trust --- so that, say, the ACLU could operate a sort of CA root that would vouch for Verisign's signatures on core ecommerce sites but not accept a crazy delegation from Iran. The protocol, on the other hand, is for all its warts the best-tested crypto protocol in possibly the history of computing. Baby & bathwater, and all that.
- StavrosK 14y ago
  I remember seeing an interview where someone asked a Chrome team member if they had plans to support Moxie's idea. They said, roughly, that if Chrome supported it, Google would have to run some notary servers, and people would rest assured that Google is running them and not be bothered to run their own, leaving Google with having to support this for the entire internet. It's too bad, it sounds like a very good idea.
  - tptacek 14y ago
    Thankfully, the world does not depend on Google to move decentralized trust for TLS forward; since it's mostly a UX change, and it's confined to a very small part of the TLS stack (the verification of server certificates), it can be retrofit over existing infrastructure with neither changes in server software nor major changes to browsers. We can probably do it via plugins.
    - StavrosK 14y ago
      That's what the Perspectives plugin for Firefox (http://perspectives-project.org/ http://perspectives-project.org/) does, but, as with all these things, it probably won't see wide adoption until it's implemented in a browser by default (and it's good enough that it will have very few false positives or negatives).
      - andrewcooke 14y ago
        just to add that perspectives also has a chrome alpha - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lnppfgdnjafeikakadfopejdpglpiahn https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lnppfgdnjafeikakad... [kinda frustrating that the solution to many of these issues is sitting here at the bottom of the thread!]
        StavrosK 14y ago
        Oh, thanks, I looked for that on the site but didn't spot it.
    - stanleydrew 14y ago
      What can those of us who like this decentralized CA whitelist idea do to help it gain adoption? Can I start telling Chrome right now to use a whitelist maintained by an external source? Should I just pick someone's whitelist (e.g. ACLU, EFF, yours) and trim my browser and OS whitelists to only use those? Also how does this affect SSL certificiate "pinning" as implemented in Chrome? I guess it doesn't since even if you have a pinned cert for a specific domain Chrome will still verify the trustworthiness of the CA that signed it?

tptacek 14y ago

That's a misstatement of Moxie's position, which is unfortunate because Moxie's position is important, probably correct, and needs all the credibility it can get. What's broken about SSL/TLS is the current CA model. Since SSL/TLS was introduced, we've been running with almost exactly the same trust "UX": a hidden browser config panel listing a series of complicated-sounding trusted root CAs, each with the authority to sell or transfer their business to some other entity, or even to delegate the authority to sign certificates to other organizations. That's absurd; it's a security model that clearly can't work in the real world --- and, more, demonstrably hasn't worked. SSL CA's have been caught red-handing selling their authority for dubious reasons. For instance, Trustwave sold a CA=YES certificate to an undisclosed third-party corporation solely for the purpose of making it easier (not "possible" but merely easier) for that corporation to monitor their own users. We need a radical rethinking of the UI/UX and trust model behind SSL/TLS, and Moxie's idea of decentralizing that trust --- so that, say, the ACLU could operate a sort of CA root that would vouch for Verisign's signatures on core ecommerce sites but not accept a crazy delegation from Iran. The protocol, on the other hand, is for all its warts the best-tested crypto protocol in possibly the history of computing. Baby & bathwater, and all that.

StavrosK 14y ago
I remember seeing an interview where someone asked a Chrome team member if they had plans to support Moxie's idea. They said, roughly, that if Chrome supported it, Google would have to run some notary servers, and people would rest assured that Google is running them and not be bothered to run their own, leaving Google with having to support this for the entire internet. It's too bad, it sounds like a very good idea.
- tptacek 14y ago
  Thankfully, the world does not depend on Google to move decentralized trust for TLS forward; since it's mostly a UX change, and it's confined to a very small part of the TLS stack (the verification of server certificates), it can be retrofit over existing infrastructure with neither changes in server software nor major changes to browsers. We can probably do it via plugins.
  - StavrosK 14y ago
    That's what the Perspectives plugin for Firefox (http://perspectives-project.org/ http://perspectives-project.org/) does, but, as with all these things, it probably won't see wide adoption until it's implemented in a browser by default (and it's good enough that it will have very few false positives or negatives).
    - andrewcooke 14y ago
      just to add that perspectives also has a chrome alpha - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lnppfgdnjafeikakadfopejdpglpiahn https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/lnppfgdnjafeikakad... [kinda frustrating that the solution to many of these issues is sitting here at the bottom of the thread!]
      - StavrosK 14y ago
        Oh, thanks, I looked for that on the site but didn't spot it.
  - stanleydrew 14y ago
    What can those of us who like this decentralized CA whitelist idea do to help it gain adoption? Can I start telling Chrome right now to use a whitelist maintained by an external source? Should I just pick someone's whitelist (e.g. ACLU, EFF, yours) and trim my browser and OS whitelists to only use those? Also how does this affect SSL certificiate "pinning" as implemented in Chrome? I guess it doesn't since even if you have a pinned cert for a specific domain Chrome will still verify the trustworthiness of the CA that signed it?