Re: [jose] Platform Support for JWA Crypto Algorithms

[Mike Jones <[e-mail]>]

No, Concat often isn't natively supported, but it's very easy to implement given implementations of SHA-256 and SHA-512, as shown in http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-jose-json-web-encryption-06#appendix-A.4 and http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-jose-json-web-encryption-06#appendix-A.5.

When the table was discussed at the WebCrypto F2F, it was pointed out that a shortcoming of the current table is that it doesn't indicate which of the "NO" values are effectively show-stoppers and which are easy to build implementations of, and so not a problem in practice.  As shown in the appendices, I believe that Concat is in the latter category.  Given the ease of implementation, it's certainly not worth adding space to the JWEs to work around.

                                                            -- Mike

From: [e-mail] [mailto:[e-mail]]
Sent: Monday, October 29, 2012 6:03 AM
To: Mike Jones; [e-mail]
Cc: [e-mail]
Subject: RE: Platform Support for JWA Crypto Algorithms

As one can see from this table the KDF is unsupported on all platforms (except one).
http://self-issued.info/presentations/Platform_Support_for_JWA-04_Crypto_Algorithms.xlsx

JWE

kdf

CS256

Concat Key Derivation Function (KDF)

NO

Win7





NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO



NO

NO

NO

JWE

kdf

CS384

Concat Key Derivation Function (KDF)

NO

Win7





NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO



NO

NO

NO

JWE

kdf

CS512

Concat Key Derivation Function (KDF)

NO

Win7





NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO

NO



NO

NO

NO


Isn't this an indication that we should look at alternatives?

e.g.: we could generate the integrity protection key randomly instead of deriving it from the content encryption key.
This would add some more bytes (e.g. about 32) to the jwt but is very easy to implement on all platforms.


One way to do it would be to generate enough bytes "Bytes" in "JWE Encrypted Key" for encryption and integrity.
The CEK is then "Bytes[0 .. cekLength-1]" and the CIK "Bytes[cekLength .. cekLength+cikLength-1]"


Axel

[On some platforms (Firefox/NSS) it might even be nearly impossible to implement (without extending the platform's functions) because the build-in digest function is always reset when finalize (doFinal) is called. The spec of the Concat-KDF says that bytes are generated in a loop but the digest is NOT reset in the loop.]


From: [e-mail]<mailto:[e-mail]> [mailto:[e-mail]] On Behalf Of Mike Jones
Sent: Monday, October 29, 2012 7:28 AM
To: [e-mail]<mailto:[e-mail]>
Subject: [jose] Platform Support for JWA Crypto Algorithms

FYI, I posted the table describing support for the JWA algorithms in common Web development platforms that we discussed at IETF 84.  See http://self-issued.info/?p=884.

                                                            -- Mike