Subject: RE: [Asrg] Its all over for Challenge Response

From: "Hallam-Baker, Phillip" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 3 Mar 2004 15:10:21 -0800

>   SSH exists and has been widely deployed for years.  SMTP exists and
> has been widely deployed for years.  There is no need for additional
> standards work.  There is only a need for MUA authors to implement and
> deploy existing protocols.

STARTLS exists, is an approved standard and has been implemented in
Microsoft exchange along with pretty much every other mail server for 
years.

Incidentally STARTTLS is the most commonly used email encryption scheme
in use today. It is vastly more successful than PGP or S/MIME combined.

>   Nothing in that process requires input from the IETF or any other
> standards body.

Using SSH would require input. You have to know the other endpoint
supports SSH.

Digital certificates provide the accreditation component that is the
principle value in the only two cryptography schemes that have been
an unqualified success - SSL driven e-commerce and the authenticode scheme.

Sure there are people who claim there is no value from certificates 
that cannot be provided through a web of trust. The real issue is 
accountability. I designed my procedures so that each employee in the 
CA center is accountable for their actions, as a company we agree to
be held accountable within the bounds of predefined limits to the
parties relying on our certificates.

Sure you can build peer-to-peer type networks. But peer-to-peer trust
networks are complex and unweildy. That is why pretty much every 
B2B scheme that starts as bilateral relationships quickly moves
to a Value Added Network model, you authenticate to the hub and
then you can talk to anyone.

The Web has peer to peer aspects, eliminating the central hub was 
what made the network hypertext model work. But look at Google and
you will see that the search model is not peer to peer. 

		Phill

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From: Mark Baugher <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2004 15:24:17 -0800

Phillip,

>in use today. It is vastly more successful than PGP or S/MIME combined.

How could that be since STARTLS is hop-by-hop and not end-to-end?  This is 
comparing apples and oranges, isn't it?

Mark

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From: Yakov Shafranovich <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 03 Mar 2004 18:52:57 -0500

> you will see that the search model is not peer to peer. 

If so, what kind of trust systems would work in email?

Yakov

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From: "Alan DeKok" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 04 Mar 2004 11:41:17 -0500

> Microsoft exchange along with pretty much every other mail server for 

  Sure.  But how many MUAs implement SUBMIT?

> Using SSH would require input. You have to know the other endpoint

  If you're roaming, you can potentially use SSH (or SUBMIT +
STARTTLS) to submit messages to the MTA for your domain.
Functionally, they're the same thing.

  Where SSH got it right, and SUBMIT got it wrong, was that with SSH,
you just do port forwarding, and authentication is seperate from
SMTP.  So you don't need to change your SMTP clients to effectively
use a "SUBMIT + STARTTLS" work-alike.

> you will see that the search model is not peer to peer. 

  Communication is peer to peer, discovery is not.  Most protocols
work this way.  Discovery through DNS, peer to peer via SMTP.

  Creating a trust system using that model should be relatively easy.

  Alan DeKok.