Re: [TLS] Rethink TLS 1.3

[Jeffrey Walton <[e-mail]>]

On Sun, Nov 23, 2014 at 8:27 AM, Ralph Holz <[e-mail]> wrote:
> I'd disagree with the notion of "it is clear what TLS supports" - there is
> no threat model describing the strength of an attacker (and there never has
> been). It's not even clear what TLS means by "authentication".
+1.

The charter could be a bit more clear about the security goals and
objectives. The current charter is more like a TODO or task list. The
task list is good, but the overall goals and objectives would be even
better.

Watson's statement about "interception free connection (sic)" caught
my eye. That's never been a goal (cf.,
http://datatracker.ietf.org/wg/tls/history/).

In fact, the IETF seem to accommodate interception in its standards,
which makes me wonder if its an unwritten agenda. For example, Public
Key Pinning opaquely accommodates interception by allowing attackers
to break pinsets (cf. Section 2.7 of
https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-websec-key-pinning-21). And the
ability to surreptitiously break a pinset is not listed in security
considerations.

Interception support is so pervasive at times I'm wondering when the
PKIX WG is going to allocate INTERCEPTION as a certificate Key Usage.