Re: [RTG-DIR] [mpls] Rtgdir early review of draft-ietf-mpls-rmr-09

"Susan Hares" <shares@ndzh.com> Tue, 04 June 2019 18:28 UTC

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Subject: Re: [RTG-DIR] [mpls] Rtgdir early review of draft-ietf-mpls-rmr-09
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Draft-ietf-mpls-rmr-10.txt resolves 98% of my specific comments.  

Remaining Item: Security section
Change status: optional.  

Problem: 
The security section has been improved, but the following sentence in the
second paragraph of section 9 still could be strengthened. 
  This sentence is: 

Current: /One can also ask whether the semantic content of these extensions
can be used to compromise 
a network or initiate a denial of service attack. To do so would require
either compromising the control plane
processing these requests, or manipulating the content of the messages."
/ 

Discussion: 
The authors are precise in this sentence, the import of this sentence may be
lost
on individuals or companies deploying this technology. 

Routing control plane do get compromised.  And when they get 
compromised with a network using RMR, they may have network 
wide problems.    Therefore, the authors assume that 
when you buy RMR from a vendor make sure
it comes from with  control plane with good security. 
For example,  RMR + open linux without security - is probably a bad idea.  

This is an acceptable choice for routing  but not self-evident from the
text. 
I pose the question to the authors, do you think most people will understand
that
this is the requirement you are placing for the "outside the scope option"?

If not, will it help to provide additional text? 

Why mention it now?:  
If either the security directorate or OPS-DIR reviewer has strong routing
clue, 
the person will probably also notice the issue.  By stating it up front, I
hope to save
the security reviewers time.  


Editorial on -10.txt 

Page 3, section 1, paragraph 3, sentence 
General comment:  ", and" - does not seem to make entire sense.
Old: The intent is not to construct rings in a mess network, and use those
for protection./ 
New: The intent is not to construct rings in a mess network and use the
rings in the mess network for protection/

-----Original Message-----
From: mpls [mailto:mpls-bounces@ietf.org] On Behalf Of Susan Hares
Sent: Monday, February 11, 2019 10:01 AM
To: rtg-dir@ietf.org
Cc: draft-ietf-mpls-rmr.all@ietf.org; mpls@ietf.org; ietf@ietf.org
Subject: [mpls] Rtgdir early review of draft-ietf-mpls-rmr-09

Reviewer: Susan Hares
Review result: Not Ready

This is a routing directorate review.  As such, it should be considered the
same as other later WG LC review.

overall-comment: Well-written and an exciting new direction.  I appreciate
Kireeti and Luis work on this topic.

major concerns:
1) security (section 8),
2) long-term stability of architecture discussion,
3) FRR/Protection sections (3.6/3.7), and
4) amount of traffic that auto-discovery will place on the network.

caveat:  I have not been an WG participant for these discussions.   As such,
I
am a "fresh" pair of eyes to read the current specification.

Major concerns
=======

1) Section 8 - Security considerations.

"This section states 'It is not anticipated that either the notion of MPLS
rings or the extensions to various protocols to support them will cause
security loopholes."

This statement provides an opinion of the authors without any reasoning
behind it.  As such, it provide no utility to the reader.  Inquiring minds
would like
to know "why" the authors feel this true and on what basis.   Launching a
new
type of structure within the MPLS cloud that auto-configures it self with a
great deal of message exchange does not appear to have these qualities. 
Surely, these authors have considered or tried these issues.

2) Long-term stability of document - in the face of repeated statements of a
future version of this document.

If this is just an interim document, then why is it being standardized.  In
a specification that is going to include an RFC track, the sttaements of
scope seem inappropriate in sections 1, 3.3, 4.5,  5, 7.1, and 7.2).  This
scope should be gathered to a particular place and stated in another.

I agree with the concept of deployment and then refinement of the protocol
mechanisms.  However, this document seems to anticipate quick refinement of
the basic architeture.  If this is really true, then why is this document
going ot the IESG.  If this is not true, then the scoping in above sections
needs to be refined.

3)  Fast re-routing installation puts details (3.6) before concepts of
protection. Only after I read section 3.7, did section 3.6 start to make
sense.
  If you re-ordered the sections, perhaps you could provide additonal depth
to section 3.6.

4) paragraph 4.3, last sentence  "The nodes that set their M bit should be
extra careful in advertising their M Bit in subsequent tries".

As an engineering, I find this description to avoid many of the problems
about how long the bidding for master will take.  Is there a potential for
the bidding to repeat over and over.  If so, how does the operator detect
it.  Can something drop the nodes into membership phase or re-identification
phase
repeated?   While the ring announcement and ring identification cycle become
a
denial-of-service attack on the IGPs announcing the information?  I suspect
the authors have investigated these points, but the architeture document is
the place to indicate why the architecture prevents these problems.

As an editor, I find the anthropomorphism to be unwarranted in the text.
While it took me to flights of fantasy where the nodes became intelligent
silicon
life forms, I suspect that is not what the authors wanted.   Perhaps after
clarifying the engineering point, the authors can rewrite the sense of the
text.

brief editorial nits:

1) page 4, node index linke
/upto/ to /up to/

2) page 5 (Q_jk): - not define earlier, please define it.

3) page 5, section 3 paragraph 2, sentence file

sentence:
current: /The default is to send traffic along the shortest path./
new:  /The default policy is to send traffic along the shortest path./

4) page 6, section 3.3 sentences 2

current:/ The last attribute means/
new: /The "auto-bundled" attribute means/

While the authors first formi is current, the change makes a specification
clear.

5) page 3.5 - please spell out the first use of UHP
6) section 3.6/3.7 - could use a diagram.
7) page 11, section 4.3, paragraph 2, sentence 2 (spelling) -

old/exaclty one;/
new/exactly one/


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