Eddy Nigg wrote:
On 11/29/2008 02:37 PM, Eddy Nigg:
Which they are indeed permitted to do, as long as they state that in
their procedures, and their auditor agrees that they have met criteria.
Eddy, other than your need to be colourful, what was the point you were
trying to make?
Well, CAs MUSTN'T have private keys of end user certificates, except in
case of a properly implemented key escrow service and with the consent
of the user. But if you really have to ask this question I'm afraid that
the understandings about this and other subjects are probably too far
apart between us in order to have any fruitful discussion.
Perhaps I may add, that I'm not aware of any WebTrust, ETSI or similar
audit they (Skype) performed. Can you point me to it? Also where is
their (CA) policy?
Well, they are not a CA, or at least they don't see themselves as a CA,
and they did not conduct a CA style of audit. Hence, I said: "it bears
comparison to any CA which operates a closed/audited procedure" rather
than saying it is the same thing.
I spent some time looking for the audit, but did not find it - I
certainly understand your interest in finding out!
Here's what I recall: They requested an audit of their architecture and
protocols by a third party. The auditor was an experienced software guy
from Britain. I cannot recall his name. I discussed the audit with
him, and he said he was initially skeptical, but afterwards was
impressed. It was done under NDA, he had access to the entire
protocols, and did not report any "secret bits" or "worrying signs."
I understand your interest in making CAs superfluous,
My interest is in delivering some security to users. To the extent that
CAs can help that, then I'm interested. Making something superfluous
for the sake of it is not on the list.
however the CAs
perform various services only a third part is supposed to perform
(separation of different aspects which makes up good security):
- software (cryptography and usability)
- issuing and validating instance
- user (control over his private keys)
No, not at all. What you have described above is based on one
particular security model, that commonly known as PKI. In that model,
CAs form a service as written. It's not the only one.
In case of Skype they are the software vendor and control the software,
the issuing instance and also the user
Right, they do everything. One advantage for today: in the case of
Skype we (the user) only have to pay for one organisation. In the case
of CAs, we have to pay for four organisations. Imagine how much more
code Skype gets written... How unfair of them :)
(because they control what
apparently seems to be private keys of users?).
Well, sure, but you are applying PKI assumptions to something that
clearly isn't PKI. Why do that?
This is very similar to
dictatorship and similar regimes where no separation exists...
Ah, now we see why you take an assumption from one world to another :)
In the case of Skype, they just use the tools relatively wisely to solve
the problems they need to solve. Their particular design eliminates
many of the things that PKI does, but that is simply because their
design meets the security needs and addresses the threat model for their
given application and audience.
If there is anything "dictatorial" it is the claim that there is only
one true security model; instead, it is all architecture, and all the
time we are learning how to do things better.
(When was the last time your security model was updated?)
iang
_______________________________________________
dev-tech-crypto mailing list
dev-tech-crypto@lists.mozilla.org
https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-tech-crypto
