Re: [TLS] Document Action: 'TLS Elliptic Curve Cipher Suites with SHA-256/384 and AES Galois Counter Mode' to Informational RFC

Yoav Nir <ynir@checkpoint.com> Wed, 25 June 2008 19:20 UTC

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From: Yoav Nir <ynir@checkpoint.com>
To: Dean Anderson <dean@av8.com>
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Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2008 22:20:11 +0300
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Subject: Re: [TLS] Document Action: 'TLS Elliptic Curve Cipher Suites with SHA-256/384 and AES Galois Counter Mode' to Informational RFC
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Hi Dean.

It's debatable whether or not ECC is really heavily patented,  
considering that the original articles are from the early 80s. AFAIK  
all the IPR claims that may matter are from Certicom. You may have  
found this statement in your search: https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/750/

In that disclosure, Certicom grants a license to use their IPR for ECC  
in all IKE, IKEv2 and TLS protocols. This may be the reason why there  
are no disclosure specific to this draft.

Yoav

On Jun 25, 2008, at 9:53 PM, Dean Anderson wrote:

> Gentle people,
>
> I can find no patent disclosures on this document listed on the IETF  
> IPR
> search page at https://datatracker.ietf.org/ipr/search/ using
> draft-ietf-tls-ecc-new-mac as the I-D Filename.
>
> Elliptic curve cryptography is a heavilly patented area, and it seems
> impossible that this draft does not involve an existing patent.
>
> I also seemed to have missed the discussion of non-patented
> alternatives, as required by RFC3979.
>
> Surely the IESG would not approve a document AGAIN that did not  
> disclose
> its patent status in violation of RFC3979 et al!?!
>
> I have to object to the approval of this draft on those grounds.  I am
> very concerned that the IESG would not be more circumspect and careful
> in light of the previous TLS-Authz scandal. See
> http://www.av8.net/IETF-watch/People/Housley/index.html
> http://www.av8.net/IETF-watch/People/TimPolk/index.html
> for more information about TLS-Authz.
>
> 		--Dean
>
>
> On Mon, 23 Jun 2008, The IESG wrote:
>
>> The IESG has approved the following document:
>>
>> - 'TLS Elliptic Curve Cipher Suites with SHA-256/384 and AES Galois
>>   Counter Mode '
>>   <draft-ietf-tls-ecc-new-mac-07.txt> as an Informational RFC
>>
>> This document is the product of the Transport Layer Security Working
>> Group.
>>
>> The IESG contact persons are Pasi Eronen and Tim Polk.
>>
>> A URL of this Internet-Draft is:
>> http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-tls-ecc-new-mac-07.txt
>>
>> Technical Summary
>>
>>   This document describes new ECC cipher suites for TLS which
>>   specify stronger MAC algorithms. Eight use HMAC with SHA-256 or
>>   SHA-384 and eight use AES in Galois Counter Mode (GCM).
>>
>> Working Group Summary
>>
>>   This document is a product of the Transport Layer Security (TLS)
>>   Working Group. The document represents the consensus of the TLS
>>   working group.
>>
>> Document Quality
>>
>>   There has been significant review of the document by members of
>>   the TLS working group on the document and changes were made to
>>   improve the document based on these reviews.
>>
>> Personnel
>>
>>   The Document Shepherd for this document is Joseph Salowey, and the
>>   responsible Area Director is Pasi Eronen.
>>
>> RFC Editor Note
>>
>>   In document title, expand "GCM" to "Galois Counter Mode (GCM)"
>>
>>   Abstract:
>>   OLD:
>>      However, all those cipher suites use SHA-1 as their MAC
>>      algorithm.  This document describes sixteen new cipher suites
>>      for TLS which specify stronger digest algorithms.
>>   NEW:
>>      However, all those cipher suites use HMAC-SHA1 as their MAC
>>      algorithm.  This document describes sixteen new cipher suites
>>      for TLS which specify stronger MAC algorithms.
>>
>>   Section 3.1
>>   OLD:
>>      These eight cipher suites are the same as the corresponding
>>      cipher suites in RFC 4492 (with names ending in "_SHA" in place
>>      of "_SHA256" or "_SHA384"), except for the hash and PRF
>>      algorithms.
>>   NEW:
>>      These eight cipher suites are the same as the corresponding
>>      cipher suites in RFC 4492 (with names ending in "_SHA" in place
>>      of "_SHA256" or "_SHA384"), except for the MAC and PRF
>>      algorithms.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> TLS mailing list
>> TLS@ietf.org
>> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/tls
>>
>>
>
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