RE: iFCP: security position

["Bill Strahm" <bill@sanera.net>]

Why do you care how traffic is encrypted ???

Would you rather see Clear traffic than DES traffic ?

These are site security policies, and we as the IETF should stay out of it.
While we as a WG might raise our noses at certain algorithms, it turns out
that DES is SIGNIFICANTLY better than simple clear traffic.  Are we planning
on putting statements saying we won't accept ENIGMA, ROT-13, etc. traffic as
well ?

I am willing to live with the WG chairs prerogative to not require DES as a
MUST implement, because it is all ready a MUST implement in IPsec, therefore
there is no reason for our WG to add additional functionality to IPsec
layers.  I am not willing to give in and say that there is a requirement
that policies that drive the IPsec/IKE engines exclude DES in all cases
(even where the admin wants to allow these protocols)

Bill
-----Original Message-----
From: Franco Travostino [mailto:travos@nortelnetworks.com]
Sent: Friday, September 07, 2001 4:35 PM
To: Robert Snively; 'Bill Strahm'; ips@ece.cmu.edu
Subject: RE: iFCP: security position


At 06:57 PM 9/7/2001, Robert Snively wrote:

If I understood their summary correctly, it was a SHOULD NOT
implement DES.  That seems like an adequate warning without
creating a double bind.  What I think it means is that a DES-only
device will not be compliant.  Did I get that right?


Yes. In addition to that ... I will note that the "WG chair exercised his
prerogative to exclude DES from consideration" (from the interim meeting
security minutes posted on Aug 30). Since this makes practical good sense in
an iFCP environment as well, we will comply with whatever verbiage is
appropriate and correct wrt to IPS and IPsec WG jurisdictions. As long as we
don't see DES-encrypted storage traffic ever ...

-franco



Bob

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bill Strahm [mailto:bill@sanera.net]
> Sent: Friday, September 07, 2001 3:17 PM
> To: Franco Travostino; ips@ece.cmu.edu
> Subject: RE: iFCP: security position
>
>
> This is going to be very interseting... How do you plan on
> using standard
> IPsec clients that have DES as MUST implement when your
> application that
> sits above it has a MUST NOT implement requirement.  This
> would be like
> having a protocol that tells layer 3 that it MUST run over
> Token Ring, but
> MUST NOT run over Ethernet.
>
> These are all policy issues that can be solved by having the end users
> implement appropriate policies, not by standards organizations
>
> Bill
> Sanera Systems Inc.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-ips@ece.cmu.edu [mailto:owner-ips@ece.cmu.edu]On Behalf Of
> Franco Travostino
> Sent: Friday, September 07, 2001 1:31 PM
> To: ips@ece.cmu.edu
> Subject: iFCP: security position
>
>
>
> After the interim meeting, we restate our security coordinates in the
> following terms. Additionally, we have expanded our Irvine slides with
> rationale text and insights that we learnt at the interim
> meeting. Such
> amended slide set is available at
> ftp://standards.nortelnetworks.com/san/ifcp_security_requireme
nts-v2.pdf
Comments most welcome.

Keying: IKE
Pre-shared keys: MUST implement
Signature key authentication: MAY implement
Phase-1/Main Mode: MUST implement
Phase-1/Aggressive Mode: MAY implement
Phase-2/Quick Mode: MUST implement
Phase-2/Quick Mode + KE payload: MUST implement
Identities are IP addresses in all Phase-1/Phase-2 Modes


Integrity MAC:
HMAC-SHA1: MUST implement
AES (X)CBC MAC: SHOULD implement*


Encryption:
3DES CBC: MUST implement
AES CTR: SHOULD implement*
DES: SHOULD NOT implement
NULL: MUST implement


Encapsulation Style:
Tunnel Mode.


(*) IFF there is a Proposed Standard RFC that we can cite by the time we hit
Last Call. HMAC-SHA1 and 3DES CBC suit us fine otherwise (as justified in
the slides).

-franco
iFCP Technical Coordinator



Franco Travostino, Director Content Internetworking Lab
Advanced Technology Investments
Nortel Networks, Inc.
600 Technology Park
Billerica, MA 01821 USA
Tel: 978 288 7708 Fax: 978 288 4690
email: travos@nortelnetworks.com