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Re: [saag] Channel binding is great but not a silver bullet

Nicolas Williams <Nicolas.Williams@sun.com> Thu, 26 February 2009 20:45 UTC

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Date: Thu, 26 Feb 2009 14:36:33 -0600
From: Nicolas Williams <Nicolas.Williams@sun.com>
To: Sam Hartman <hartmans-ietf@mit.edu>
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Cc: der Mouse <mouse@Rodents-Montreal.ORG>, saag@ietf.org
Subject: Re: [saag] Channel binding is great but not a silver bullet
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On Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 03:20:06PM -0500, Sam Hartman wrote:
> Nico, while I'm in favor of channel binding and believe your approach
> has a lot of value, please be careful to apply it only where applicable.
> 
> Phil is talking about the web browser PKI.  Channel binding to
> existing authentication solves some problems in that space, but
> definitely not all.  For example it is not useful for securing
> enrollment or certain classes of URI-only handoff.
> 
> So, I think the web will continue to need a PKI.:-)

A PKI that does not exist.  Channel binding is not a silver bullet, and
in this case one could argue it ought not have a place.  But given what
we have to work with it seems like it can actually help.

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