Re: [TLS] Update spec to match current practices for certificate chain order

[Peter Gutmann <[e-mail]>]

Martin Rex <[e-mail]> writes:

>As previously mentioned, all TLS specifications up to and including TLSv1.2
>have been extremely clear that the name contained in the certifcates is a
>matter of the protocols & software layers on top of TLS, and none of TLS
>business:
>
>https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5246#page-5
>
>                                  the decisions on how to initiate TLS
>   handshaking and how to interpret the authentication certificates
>   exchanged are left to the judgment of the designers and implementors
>   of protocols that run on top of TLS.

Oh, I thought that was just marketing fluff rather than a hard-and-fast
requirement.  If it is a set requirement for the protocol though then it shows
a major disconnect between the protocol designers and its users, you've got a
protocol that promises to do cryptographic authentication of the server so
that developers of apps running on top of it don't have to deal with this, and
yet in that one sentence it quietly makes it Someone Else's Problem.  So the
developers of the thousands of vulnerable apps will be assuming that the TLS
layer [0] will do the checking for them, while the TLS layer can conveniently
say "well, it's not my problem, and I've got the weasel-words to prove it".

Peter.

[0] There's probably a better term to use here than Transport Layer Security
    layer.