Multisig (was: OpenPGP Minutes / Quick Summary)

[Werner Koch <[e-mail]>]

On Mon, 21 Aug 2006 19:42, Thomas Roessler said:

   Users should be aware of the fact that each individual signature can
   be broken out and used to create a valid "multipart/signed" body
   according to the underlying protocol and RFC 1847.

Assuming that parallel signatures are used to give extra security in
case one of the protocols or algorithms has been broken, this indeed a
problem.  

A solution is easy: The protocols and algorithms used to make up the
signatures need to be hashed with the content.  For example by an
extra header line in the first part.  When verifying the signatures an
application can easily detect whether a signature has been removed and
present an appropriate warning (also considering the algorithms deemed
to be broken at the time of verification).

Obviously this requires that either all signatures are created at the
same time or forehand knowledge of the signatures to be added later is
required.


Shalom-Salam,

   Werner