[TLS] Re: Adoption call for TLS 1.2 Update for Long-term Support

[Eric Rescorla <[e-mail]>]

I am against adoption.

As Nick and Watson note, this is not just a profile of TLS 1.2 but is
rather a set of negotiated with a new extension code point, i.e., it's
effectively a new version of TLS with as yet only lightly analyzed security
properties. We already have a new version of TLS which has been heavily
analyzed and widely deployed, namely TLS 1.3.

There's nothing stopping people deploying this if they want to and in fact
there is already a code point assigned. However, the TLS WG should not take
up this work.

-Ekr

On Tue, Nov 5, 2024 at 1:21 PM Arnaud Taddei <arnaud.taddei=
[e-mail]> wrote:

> I do support the adoption of this draft.
>
> This draft is a very good product and the details and care that this draft
> exhibits is in itself a testimony of someone who has a real production
> experience, is realistic and pragmatic.
>
> There is a big difference between
> patching an endpoint to a variation of TLS1.2 which is meant to work in a
> ’TLS1.2 designed environment”
> Vs
> patching an endpoint to TLS1.3 in an environment that was ’TLS1.2 designed
> environment’
>
> If the organisation that needs to manage a security risk is given a choice
> of
> 1) Patch to TLS-LTS
> 2) Patch to TLS1.3
>
> Any risk manager is going to ask the qualification of the implications on
> both and the result will be that 1) will be far less intrusive and risky
> than 2)
>
> Moreover the bench-test platform that the solution needs to go through to
> prove its production readiness may not be able to support TLS1.3 at all.
>
> Not adopting this draft leaves only one choice to any customer with no
> guarantees that the patching to TLS1.3 will work in its TLS1.2 designed
> end-to-end environment at a manageable time, cost and ‘go to production’ or
> ‘go to market’ time, and risk.
>
> Worse, it could have unanticipated consequences like breaking compliancy
> to regulations, to safety and I can just imagine how it could move the
> risks from bits and bytes to blood and flesh.
>
> My 0.02 Swiss francs
>
> *Arnaud Taddei*
> Global Security Strategist | Enterprise Security Group
>
> *mobile:* [phone]
> Geneva, Switzerland
> [e-mail] | broadcom.com
>
> On 5 Nov 2024, at 19:48, Nick Harper <[e-mail]> wrote:
>
> I understand the stated goal of this draft to be to provide a way for
> hard-to-update endpoints to keep using TLS 1.2 in a secure way. The idea of
> a document that describes how to safely deploy TLS 1.2 sounds like a good
> idea, e.g. "use only these cipher suites, require EMS and RI, etc". This
> draft is not that.
>
> This draft makes changes to the TLS handshake protocol, which undermines
> the goal of supporting hard-to-update endpoints. The two changes made to
> the protocol are also addressed by RFC 8446. If endpoints need to be
> updated to support TLS-LTS, it would make more sense to update them to
> support TLS 1.3 than TLS-LTS.
>
> The rationale section (3.7) of the draft presents two reasons for using
> TLS-LTS over TLS 1.3. The first is the slow deployment cadence of a new
> protocol. LTS requires a change to the protocol and deployment of that new
> change, no different from 1.3. The second reason is fear of the unknown in
> 1.3: "TLS 1.3 is an almost entirely new protocol. As such, it rolls back
> the 20 years of experience that we have with all the things that can go
> wrong in TLS". The 20 years of all the things that can go wrong in TLS were
> due to unsound cryptographic decisions. The research and analysis that
> found those 20 years of issues was applied to the design of 1.3 to avoid
> making the same mistakes. 1.3 doesn't roll back that experience, and we now
> have over 8 years of experience with 1.3.
>
> I do not support adoption of the draft in this format. If the draft made
> no changes to the TLS 1.2 protocol and were deployable only through
> configuration changes (e.g. a fixed list of cipher suites and extensions),
> I would probably support it.
>
> On Tue, Nov 5, 2024 at 11:02 AM Salz, Rich <rsalz=
> [e-mail]> wrote:
>
>> I strongly support adoption.
>>
>> I do not understand why anyone would be opposed to the IETF making
>> deployment recommendations. I can understand why someone might be bothered
>> by the impliciation that *THIS ONE WAY* is the only way to get long-term
>> support, especially if it's seen to contradict our encouragement of TLS
>> 1.3. But that is an editorial issue that can be easily fixed.
>>
>> I would like to see this adopted, a short change cycle, and then advanced
>> in the same cluster with our TLS 1.2 is frozen document.
>>
>>
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