[Web-bot-auth] Re: What does draft-meunier-webbotauth-httpsig-protocol do?

[Martin Thomson <[e-mail]>]

I'm not sure that "why not both" is the answer here.  Can we make a decision?

As noted, the purpose of binding to a real-world identity is to either enable a higher-layer continuity (for key rotation) or to bless a key pair with some existing reputation.  It would be really good if we could work out what the principles are behind that decision can be articulated?

--

I see something interesting in your text:

> The binding is not exclusive: several domains may publish the same key.

Your "I am Spartacus"[1] defenses in the directory draft seem a bit unwieldy.  Are they really necessary?

[1] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-am-spartacus

On Fri, Jul 17, 2026, at 09:14, Thibault Meunier wrote:
> Following this thread, I started laying out a "trust model" section in 
> the protocol draft, prompted by Martin's original email. This thread 
> has helped a lot to sharpen it, and i've reused some of the modelling 
> and wording that came from this discussion (opaque 
> value/external-binding from ekr, key on a domain being distinct from 
> endorsement from Dick).
>
> You can see the new section in a rendered protocol draft [1] at the 
> below URL (given the submission window has passed)
> https://thibmeu.github.io/http-message-signatures-directory/protocol-trust-model/draft-meunier-webbotauth-httpsig-protocol.html#name-identifiers-and-trust-model
>
> Beyond the new section, the PR also tightens the directory draft [2] by 
> removing parts which have not seen adoption in deployments such as the 
> delegation examples, and add a MUST for verifiers that rely on domain 
> binding.
>
> This proposal does not settle if the current draft makes the right 
> split with two modes. The goal is for it to help better inform the 
> discussion in Vienna.
>
> While there is a PR open [104], I believe that it's best to keep 
> comments on the list.
>
> [1] 
> https://thibmeu.github.io/http-message-signatures-directory/protocol-trust-model/draft-meunier-webbotauth-httpsig-protocol.html
> [2] 
> https://thibmeu.github.io/http-message-signatures-directory/protocol-trust-model/draft-meunier-webbotauth-httpsig-directory.html
> [104] 
> https://github.com/thibmeu/http-message-signatures-directory/pull/104
>
> Thanks,
> Thibault
>
>
>
> On Thursday, July 16th, 2026 at 18:44, Thibault Meunier 
> <ot-ietf=[e-mail]> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Thursday, July 16th, 2026 at 14:38, Eric Rescorla <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >
>> > Well, we're not drafting a document right now, but rather trying to map out
>> > the space. For that I find it most useful to try to separate questions into
>> > objectives (what the mechanism tries to accomplish) and constraints
>> > on that mechanism. You've listed one here, but it should also be efficient,
>> > secure, etc. Those constraints are going to be crosscutting for all the
>> > objectives and so I don't think it's helpful to list them as if they were
>> > parallel; they are not alternatives.
>>
>> Fair. That's a good split. "no pre-established relationship", similar to security, efficiency, and others, is a constraint, crosscutting both of the objectives
>>
>> > I don't really think it's that helpful to think of these both as *names* in
>> > a practical sense. Going back to my initial taxonomy, there are two things
>> > we can do here, stated slightly differently.
>> >
>> > - Bind authentication to some opaque value which is not mapped
>> > to any other external identity.
>> > - Bind authentication to an identifier which is bound to some external
>> > identity.
>>
>> I really like the term "opaque value". That's better than "key-alone" to qualify the model.
>>
>> >
>> > Non-rotatable keys, keys signed by some root key, rotatable keys with
>> > rotation stored in the ledger, keys stored in opaque URLs that aren't
>> > attributable to the domain name (e.g., google drive) are all variants of
>> > this same basic idea. You know someone is talking to you but you don't
>> > know their identity.
>> >
>> > By contrast, proposals where the key is stored in DNS or in /.well-known
>> > bind authentication to the domain name, which, by convention, is
>> > a real-world identity [0]. I recognize that this *looks* similar to an
>> > arbitary URL that stores the keys, but it's actually semantically quite
>> > different.
>>
>> Agree. The URL shape is not what differentiate the opaque and the domain-bound model.
>>
>> >
>> > -Ekr
>> >
>> > [0] What I mean here is we have a whole infrastructure buiilt up to
>> > let you discover the mapping between domain names and real
>> > world identities; for instance, you can search for "ExampleCo"
>> > and see what result you get.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
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