Re: Bruce Schneier's Proposal to dedicate November meeting to savingthe Internet from the NSA

[John C Klensin <[e-mail]>]

--On Friday, September 06, 2013 07:38 -0700 Pete Resnick
<[e-mail]> wrote:

> Actually, I think the latter is really what I'm suggesting.
> We've got do the encryption (for both the minimal protection
> from passive attacks as well as setting things up for doing
> good security later), but we've also got to design UIs that
> not only make it easier for users to deal with encrpytion, but
> change the way people think about it.
> 
> (Back when we were working on Eudora, we got user support
> complaints that "people can read my email without typing my
> password". What they in fact meant was that if you started the
> application, it would normally ask for your POP password in
>...

Indeed.  And I think that one of the more important things we
can do is to rethink UIs to give casual users more information
about what it going on and to enable them to take intelligent
action on decisions that should be under their control.  There
are good reasons why the IETF has generally stayed out of the UI
area but, for the security and privacy areas discussed in this
thread, there may be no practical way to design protocols that
solve real problems without starting from what information a UI
needs to inform the user and what actions the user should be
able to take and then working backwards.  As I think you know,
one of my personal peeves is the range of unsatisfactory
conditions --from an older version of certificate format or
minor error to a verified revoked certificate -- that can
produce a message that essentially says "continuing may cause
unspeakable evil to happen to you" with an "ok" button (and only
an "ok" button).  

Similarly, even if users can figure out which CAs to trust and
which ones not (another issue and one where protocol work to
standardize distribution of CA reputation information might be
appropriate) editing CA lists whose main admission qualification
today seems to be cosy relationships with vendors (and maybe the
US Govt) to remove untrusted ones and add trusted ones requires
rocket scientist-level skills.  If we were serous, it wouldn't
be that way.  

And the fact that those are 75% of more UI issues is probably no
longer an excuse.

    john