Re: [Danish] Proposed WG Charter

[Viktor Dukhovni <[e-mail]>]

On Mon, Jun 14, 2021 at 02:13:10PM -0700, Ash Wilson wrote:

> Very often, mobile data used for IoT ends up going into a message broker
> or message queueing system, and the central application subscribes or
> otherwise consumes information from the messaging middleware. Without some
> sort of verifiable sender identity attached to the message itself, the
> identity of the sender and the integrity of the message is assumed based on
> the integrity of all middleware involved in passing messages. If we include
> the sender's DNS name in the message and protect it with a signature, then
> it may be verified by the central application, independent of the transport
> over which it arrives.

The encapsulation is then basically CMS I guess.  Which supports
attaching a signature and the signer's certificate chain to a message
(as well as encrypting the message to the recipient(s)).

> Consider that if a messaging middleware platform is trusted by
> multiple sophisticated smart cities applications, and none of those
> applications implement message authentication, the messaging
> middleware platform itself becomes an attractive target for a
> well-resourced adversary. Simply signing the messages passing through
> the system removes the pressure on the broker to ensure integrity, and
> reduces the value of a compromised broker.

And I guess the proposal on the table is to use DNS as the identity
database for clients, with TLSA records enabling the use of enterprise,
or vendor CAs client onboarding.

If the verifiers are then infrastructure services, they're more than
capable of running a validating resolver, and sites sophisticated enough
to operate a private CA are more than capable of signing their doain.

Working around DNSSEC in this design seems rather more complex than
just using it.

-- 
    Viktor.