WG Action: Formed Web Packaging (wpack)

[The IESG <[e-mail]>]

A new IETF WG has been formed in the Applications and Real-Time Area. For
additional information, please contact the Area Directors or the WG Chairs.

Web Packaging (wpack)
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Current status: BOF WG

Chairs:
  Sean Turner <[e-mail]>
  David Lawrence <[e-mail]>

Assigned Area Director:
  Alexey Melnikov <[e-mail]>

Applications and Real-Time Area Directors:
  Adam Roach <[e-mail]>
  Alexey Melnikov <[e-mail]>
  Barry Leiba <[e-mail]>

Mailing list:
  Address: [e-mail]
  To subscribe: https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/wpack
  Archive: https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/browse/wpack/

Group page: https://datatracker.ietf.org/group/wpack/

Charter: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/charter-ietf-wpack/

The WPACK working group will develop a specification for a web packaging
format that efficiently bundles multiple HTTP representations. It will also
specify a way for the publisher to authenticate these resources such that a
user agent can trust that they came from their claimed web origins. Key goals
for WPACK are:

* Efficient (binary) storage across a range of resource combinations. Three
use cases to be supported are: a client-generated snapshot of a complete web
page, a web page's tree of JavaScript modules, and a selection of the whole
web for peer-to-peer distribution in a country when access to authoritative
servers is unavailable.

* The ability to create a snapshot of a web page without the cooperation of
its publisher.

* The ability to receive a web package from an entity other than the origin
server and have continuity of experience and state (especially that created
by active content such as JavaScript) between the offline and online versions.

* When a bundle is streamed, the client must be able to start using a
subresource before the entire bundle is downloaded, and for large
subresources, before the entire subresource is downloaded.

* When a bundle is loaded from random-access storage, the client must be able
to use a subresource without necessarily reading the entire prefix of the
bundle before that subresource.

* When a bundle is authenticated, the client must be able to validate the
authentication without extra requests over the network.

* Being extensible and crypto agile.

* Security and privacy properties of using authenticated bundles as close as
practical to TLS 1.3 transport of the same resources. Where properties do
change, the group will document exactly what changed and how affected people,
including content publishers and users, can compensate. Part of this is
analyzing how the shift from transport security to object security changes
the security properties of the web's existing features.

* Specifying constraints on how clients load the formats without describing
specific loading algorithm to help achieve the above goals.

The packaging format will also aim to achieve the following secondary goals
as long as they don't compromise or delay the above properties.

* Optimizations in encoding and processing when only a single resource (as
opposed to a collection thereof) is being packaged

* Support signed statements about subresources beyond just assertions that
they're accurate representations of particular URLs.

* Address the threat model of a website's frontend compromised after a user
first uses the site.

* Support books being published in the format: support for bundles that have
no expiration date; ability to reference a resource withing a bundle (e.g.
chapter)

* Optimize storage of large numbers of small same-origin resources (e.g.
using compression)

* Allow publishers to efficiently combine sub-packages from other publishers.

The following goals are out of scope under this charter:

* DRM (Digital Rights Management)

* A way to distribute the private portions of a website. For example, WPACK
might define a way to distribute a messaging application but wouldn't define
a way to distribute individual messages without a direct connection to the
messaging application's origin server.

* A way to automatically discover the URL for an accessible (retrievable)
package that includes specific content.

Note that consensus is required both for changes to the initially proposed
protocol mechanisms and for their retention. In particular, because something
is in an initial working group draft does not imply that there is consensus
around the feature or around how it is specified.

Relationship to Other WGs and SDOs

WPACK will work with the W3C and WHATWG to identify the existing security and
privacy models for the web, and to ensure those SDOs can define how this
format is used by web browsers.

The WPACK working group will work closely with the HTTPbis working group, in
particular WPACK will attempt to reuse HTTPBIS work on HTTP signing.

Milestones:

  Jun 2020 - Working group adoption of use cases document (will not be
  published as an RFC)

  Jun 2020 - Working group adoption of bundling document

  Jun 2020 - Working group adoption of security analysis document

  Jun 2020 - Working group adoption of privacy analysis document

  Jun 2020 - Working group adoption of one or more signing document

  Sep 2021 - Submit the Bundling document to IESG

  Mar 2022 - Submit the Privacy analysis document to IESG

  Mar 2022 - Submit the Security analysis document to IESG

  Mar 2022 - Submit Signing document (this might just reference HTTPBIS work)
  to IESG