Subject: Request for a code point assignment for ED25519 - draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 08 Apr 2014 18:01:17 -0700

Hello,

The Ed25519 signature algorithm has been implemented in OpenSSH.  RFC 
4255 defines a DNS resource record, "SSHFP", which can be used to 
publish a fingerprint of the SSH server publickey in the 
DNS.  draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519 
(http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01 ) is a 
request for a code point assignment for ED25519 in the SSHFP RR Types 
for public key algorithms registry.  The draft has received comments 
in SAAG and (IRTF) CFRG:

http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/saag/current/msg04584.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/saag/current/msg04588.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/saag/current/msg04827.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/saag/current/msg04828.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/saag/current/msg04829.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/cfrg/current/msg04411.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/cfrg/current/msg04412.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/cfrg/current/msg04414.html
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/cfrg/current/msg04422.html

I responded to the comments.  There hasn't been any objections.  It 
seems to me that the Security Area Director is a bit slow in 
processing this request for a code point assignment.  I would 
appreciate if some information could be provided to explain the delay.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

---

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 01:54:16 -0700

Hi Jari,

I sent a message to the IESG yesterday (see 
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg87189.html 
).  As the wasn't any response from the IESG there might be a 
perception that the IESG isn't responsive to concerns when the matter 
affects OpenSSH code.  For what it is worth OpenSSH is widely 
deployed.  It is easy to assess whether what I wrote is true by 
looking at a few open source operating systems.

It has been stated that:

   'To break the deadlock, document authors often choose some "seemingly
    unused" code points, often by selecting the next available value from
    the registry; this is problematic because these may turn out to be
    different from those later assigned by IANA.  To make this problem
    worse, "pre-RFC" implementations are often developed and deployed
    based on these code point selections.'

I did not choose a "seemingly unused" code point (see 
draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01).  I followed what the IETF 
documentation says and the advice I have been given.  I requested 
feedback from CFRG even though it is not an IETF Working Group.  I 
could have objected to that given what has been said in the news.

According to RFC 2026:

   "If an individual should disagree with an action taken by the IESG in
    this process, that person should first discuss the issue with the
    ISEG Chair."

The problem is that the IESG has not taken any action.  In my opinion 
it is constructive to be open to discussion.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 10:10:18 +0100

Hi SM,

On 04/10/2014 09:54 AM, S Moonesamy wrote:
> http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/ietf/current/msg87189.html ).  

You ask in that message "why the delay?"

As I told you off list before you posted that, we are hoping that
CFRG will organise a virtual interim meeting for which the main
topic of discussion will be whether CFRG's advise the IETF that
some set of new curves (including that required by your draft)
are good enough for use in IETF standards. That question was
raised at the CFRG session in London but there were not enough
people in the room who felt they knew enough about the topic to
be sure. Aside from you the TLS wg are also waiting on that
answer. I hope the CFRG virtual interim will happen in the next
few weeks. That is the reason for delay.

If that CFRG meeting doesn't happen soon, (but I expect it
will) then I will organise some other way to get an answer on
this topic, but better if we can get folks who do crypto for
a living to give us an answer if we can.

Regards,
Stephen.

PS: I don't really know what the rest of you mail relates to
but feel free to explain off list if it needs a response.

> As
> the wasn't any response from the IESG there might be a perception that
> the IESG isn't responsive to concerns when the matter affects OpenSSH
> code.  For what it is worth OpenSSH is widely deployed.  It is easy to
> assess whether what I wrote is true by looking at a few open source
> operating systems.
> 
> It has been stated that:
> 
> feedback from CFRG even though it is not an IETF Working Group.  I could
> have objected to that given what has been said in the news.
> 
> According to RFC 2026:
> 
> The problem is that the IESG has not taken any action.  In my opinion it
> is constructive to be open to discussion.
> 
> Regards,
> S. Moonesamy
> 
> 
>

---

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 02:30:37 -0700

Hi Stephen,
>a living to give us an answer if we can.

Thanks for explaining the delay.  I am okay with waiting a few weeks.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 13:12:01 +0300

SM,

SSH is obviously important and I am a long-term OpenSSH user myself :-) And I also happen to believe in timely registration of values in registries, particularly when there is running code.

Anyway, I cannot speak for the IESG yet in this case but please do not take lack of a response to a message sent yesterday as a sign that we do not care :-)

I looked at the draft and it seems fine, ready to move forward. I do not personally have any knowledge about ED25519 and I cannot say whether it is something that we should be using in IETF standards. Stephen seems to think that waiting a bit to get an opinion from the crypto experts would be useful. What is your opinion on that, SM? What about others, do you have an opinion? And SM, do you have an idea how soon we need an answer for the implementations to usefully employ the allocated number?

Jari

---

From: Randy Bush <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 19:33:04 +0900

perhaps one day is a bit impatient

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 11:35:59 +0100

> perhaps one day is a bit impatient

To be fair, SM has been asking me about this for a while,
and there has been delay while we're trying to get the
crypto ducks in a crypto row. (...cue jokes about randmoness:-)

S.

---

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 05:12:46 -0700

Hi Jari,
At 03:12 10-04-2014, Jari Arkko wrote:
>SSH is obviously important and I am a long-term OpenSSH user myself 
>:-) And I also happen to believe in timely registration of values in 
>registries, particularly when there is running code.

I am also an OpenSSH user. :-)  I wrote the draft because of the code.

>I looked at the draft and it seems fine, ready to move forward. I do 
>not personally have any knowledge about ED25519 and I cannot say 
>whether it is something that we should be using in IETF standards. 
>Stephen seems to think that waiting a bit to get an opinion from the 
>crypto experts would be useful. What is your opinion on that, SM? 
>What about others, do you have an opinion? And SM, do you have an 
>idea how soon we need an answer for the implementations to usefully 
>employ the allocated number?

The draft is intended as Informational.  I would not argue that what 
is in the draft is an IETF standard.  I suggested to Stephen to start 
the Last Call as it would take a month.  That does not prevent the 
gathering of input from folks who do crypto.

It is usually good to get more opinions from crypto experts.  I did 
some research before writing the draft to determine whether there 
were any concerns.  I did not find anything noteworthy.

 From a code point request perspective a possible outcome would be to 
deny the request.  It is a problem when a registry does not reflect 
what is used in the wild.  I am okay with having disclaimer text in 
the draft (I'll defer to Stephen).  The code was not included in the 
last release (March).  Note that I am not one of the person who gets 
to decide about code release.  I could provide feedback saying, for 
example, that there will be a (IETF) decision about the code point 
request by end of May.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 21:08:30 +0300

> I suggested to Stephen to start the Last Call as it would take a month.  That does not prevent the gathering of input from folks who do crypto.

FWIW, I would be fine with this.

Jari

---

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2014 01:32:50 -0700

Hi Jari, Stephen,
At 11:08 10-04-2014, Jari Arkko wrote:
> > I suggested to Stephen to start the Last Call as it would take a 
> month.  That does not prevent the gathering of input from folks who do crypto.
>

I am following up on this as the CFRG meeting has held 
yesterday.  There was a message (msg-id: 
[email-masked]) to the ietf-ssh mailing list about 
getting an early assignment for using ED25519 in SSHFP.

Would it be possible to start the Last Call for 
draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01 [1]?

I'll disclose that I made this request as there is already code in an 
open source software (OpenSSH).  I have not derived any financial 
benefit in doing this work.

Thanks,
S. Moonesamy

1. http://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01

---

From: Stephen Farrell <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2014 09:54:07 +0100

Hiya,

On 30/04/14 09:32, S Moonesamy wrote:
> Hi Jari, Stephen, At 11:08 10-04-2014, Jari Arkko wrote:
> I am following up on this as the CFRG meeting has held yesterday.
> There was a message (msg-id: [email-masked]) to
> the ietf-ssh mailing list about getting an early assignment for
> using ED25519 in SSHFP.
> 

Yes. The CFRG meeting didn't raise any objection to this,
so I'll move it along now. (Well, tomorrow.)

Cheers,
S.

> 
> I'll disclose that I made this request as there is already code in
> an open source software (OpenSSH).  I have not derived any financial 
> Thanks, S. Moonesamy

---

From: S Moonesamy <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2014 02:22:38 -0700

Hi Stephen,
>so I'll move it along now. (Well, tomorrow.)

Thanks for the quick reply.

For the record, I am not aware of any IPR related to 
draft-moonesamy-sshfp-ed25519-01.

Regards,
S. Moonesamy