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Thawte Protects The World From Crypto
nutsaq writes: "Thawte.com, a South African Certificate Authority, in a move of astonishing wrong-headedness, has inexplicably changed it's developer certificate policy. To quote from the site: 'Due to current world circumstances developer certificates can no longer be issued to individuals.'Sucks to be working with crypto these days. Apparently I'll get no help from Thawte to encrypt stuff, oh wait, I didn't need it, the browsers did."
This is about signing certificates, nothing with "oops, my browser encrypted" bla. This is a very interesting move, that I cannot quite follow. Why in the world would you only limit signing certificates and blame it on the "world". Excuse me? I mean if it was about global server IDs, strong encrpytion, etc. I might find some reasons in current events to limit the distribution. But code signing certs? Quote from the Site: "Your customers can be confident that a Thawte Developer Certificate will guarantee that your code remains tamper proof, and that the content originated from the source on the certificate. Important Notice:
Due to current world circumstances developer certificates can no longer be issued to individuals." Or am I totally missing the point here (probably too late here on Pacific Time)
Before we claim another atrocity forced upon the "little guy" let's take a look at the situation. Thawte is not the only provider of certificates out there. There are others and if individuals demand the ability to work with crypto (as they will) someone will provide the service.
Thawte is not Microsoft. They cannot strongarm other businesses, let alone individuals, into working just how they see fit. There's no chance for Thawte to rule the world.
So before everyone gets all up in arms realize that all you have to do to correct the situation is not use Thawte for anything until they reverse their stance or simply use another certificate provider. Write a nice email and let them know why you don't agree with them and move on. This isn't a crisis...
Of course we torture people, we need the information --Gen. Pinochet
I think this is a real shame, and is probably originated by some badly informed member of Thawte-management.
How do they plan on catering for the self-employed? What about small companies where the corporate and technical contacts are the same person? Why should an individual have any less right to certifying their code than a corporate?
Of course it is up to Thawte who they sell their product to, but given the mind-set of people they are selling to (technical staff), this is not going to do them any favours.
Generally Thawte are very forward thinking... Their "Web of Trust" model brings free X.509 email certificates to the masses by using a PGP-like trust model (extended through face-to-face authentication) on top of the CA signing model.
Enjoy Y2K? Roll-on Year 2037!
I my opinion, the concept of code signing is flawed. The user is tempted to think "this piece of code just loaded by my web browser is signed, so I can trust it."
In fact, the signature only proves that the code really comes from a specific developer and has not been tampered with during transmission. It says absolutely nothing about the trustworthiness of the developer. So, as long as I don't know if I can trust the developer, the signature doesn't help.
Here are some first thoughts, if you end up talking to the media:
- The strongest form of cryptography was invented in the 19th century and does not require a computer (XOR against one-time-pad), though computers certainly make it faster.
- Cryptography technology that is available for free to the general public is very sophisticated. Weakening the cryptography available to shoppers on the Internet will not prevent the best and strongest software being used by "bad guys".
- Stunting the public's ability to encrypt will hurt everyone from dissedents in oppressive countries to Internet retail companies to international corporations.
It's time to fight back in the war of words. Make this "Internet shopper" vs. "public ignorance". Make it "my credit card for sale". Public opinion is carried on sound bites, so let's get some!Actually, I know that it was, because I wrote it for the Wipout competition, which is spookily enough another /. story of the day.
I wrote this story in early September, pre-11th. It postulates a society where knowledge of crypto is so strongly controlled that... well, read the story.
At the time that I wrote it, it was science fiction. It now looks like I was way too conservative, and events are already on the way towards overtaking my predictions. Hey ho.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Now only real companies, like the MANY that bin Laden's network runs, can get encryption tools.
The line must be drawn here. This far. No further.
Oh but you CAN experiment with the technology. See, all they are is a certificate authority. OpenSSL, for example, has a fairly robust (but not recomended for mass comercial use) facillity for doing the same exact thing they do. Check the OpenSSL documentation for the 'ca' subset of commands. Sure, you'll have to install your own root cert to test it out, but at least that won't stop you from doing the testing itself.
I really doubt that much signed code is distributed with authority from certificates issued to individuals. Chill out. They will lose some money, and I'm sure Thawte doesn't like that, but crypto is not going away.
If you use GnuPG (GPG) - you can create your own circle of trust.
You sign your own certificates (verifying them over the phone or through some other means) and then you in turn publish your keys to open key servers around the world.
The more places your identity exists the harder it is for someone to steal it - that is why Slashdot allows you to put your public key into your account (you can see the box for it just below the signature box)
The key servers are run mostly by institutions around the world (I think Stanford is a main hub here in the US) - they basically hold a bunch of public keys that have been signed.
So this story isn't a big deal for jo shmoe because if you need to securely transfer something from yourself to someone else you can do that for free using GPG.
So let the companies have their closed ring of trust and you can create your own.
Derek
This is no longer the case. Microsoft has changed their policy on this for the time being. CAs pay nothing...
On the other hand, CAs must pass a WebTrust CA audit in order to get on the list. WebTrust audits are extremely expensive. Of course, they serve a useful purpose. They serve to give the end user some sense of confidence that the CA does due dilligence in determining that "you are who you say you are" before issuing a certificate. There is a very small group of companies that have passed WebTrust Audits... (according to WebTrust press releases, Verisign, Entrust, Digital Signature Trust).
Setting up a non-profit to issue certs sounds like a nice idea, but isn't a realistic option when one must spend lots of money to audit ones practices to assure the public. The commercial CAs are even having troubles making money...
Determining that "I am who I claim to be" really is a difficult task.
I e-mailed them and got this response from Jeanne Fourie:
Dear Marius
Thank you for emailing me with regard to your concern. Due to the current
international threat of terrorism we have been advised by
our parent company VeriSign to refrain from issuing developer certs to
individuals, for the mean while.
As you will be aware, there is a need right now for companies like ourselves to be
extremely cautious in all aspects that concern
security and encryption.
Developer certs are issued to individuals based on verification of passports and
drivers licenses. These documents are however easily
forged and we have therefore had to take the executive decision of not issuing
certs where the verification process may be
questionable.
We are positive that we will be able to resume this service in the near future. I
do apologize for any inconvenience that this may have
caused you.
Regards
Jeanne
As can be seen it seems to be Verisign who requested this....
Hmm...
1. letters to newspapers. this can be the first, lowest-effort thing to do. the net is full of good examples of how crypto is good, first of all the writings of Phil Zimmermann, that could be at least inspiring. here's the link and a quote:
"You don't have to distrust the government to want to use cryptography. Your business can be wiretapped by business rivals, organized crime, or foreign governments. Several foreign governments, for example, admit to using their signals intelligence against companies from other countries to give their own corporations a competitive edge. Ironically, the United States government's restrictions on cryptography in the 1990's have weakened U.S. corporate defenses against foreign intelligence and organized crime."
.2Euros :)
2. for those of you who have good capabilities/reputation, start spreading the word. Not only among your friends (no matter how commputer-illiterate they are, public opinion is independent from tech skills, unfortunately), but also at work.
3. the main goal is to make the idea of 'banning crypto can make more damage to your business than give benefits to the country' reach the higher levels. letters to newspapers will perhaps lighten a few minds, but enlighten a CEO of a multinational or a big company will help things better. It may seem unreal, but if you think that anyone in the world is just seven hops away, why don't try it? Never underestimate the power of coffee-break gossiping.
4. all the 'geeks' and technician all over the world have a great power over "regular user". When a techie or a sysadmin talks, everybody is listening. Make good use of it. Be responsible, and be clear. Make people think. 5. talk to newspaper writers, friends working for the media, whoever you think can spread the world.
6. wait
7. repeat
8. listen to other ideas and possibly invite your "opponent" to post it somewhere, to publish it, basically don't treat who does not agree with you as a stupid.
that's what I'm doing with my friends, parents, et cetera. I'm posting opinions on public forums in newspapers, and although I cannot see an immediate feedback, I'm positive about it.
Just my
-- There are two kind of sysadmins: Paranoids and Losers. (adapted from D. Bach)
Thanks for opening up your skull and letting us peek at the cavern inside. I normally wouldn't reply to flamebait such as yours, but I'll make an exception in this case to try to stem the flow of ignorance that pours from your keyboard.
1)
Script kiddies do not break ciphers. They do not find exploits. They do not reverse engineer systems. If they could do any of these things, they would not fall under the derogatory category, "script kiddie".
2)
Pick any of the following algorithms and break it: IDEA, 3DES, RSA, DH. I guarantee you will be famous, at least within security/cryptography circles. These are algorithms that have been scrutinized for decades by professors and professionals. I don't think a 12 year old could break these, except in a movie.
3)
SDMI (I assume this is what you mean by SDMA), was a copyright protection system not an encryption system. Anyone who believes they can create a secure, stand-alone, software copyright protection scheme is either ignorant or a genius. Given the ratio of ignorance to genius in the world, I know how I'll bet.
4)
The reason so many crypto systems are broken usually falls into one of two categories
a) The developers think they can design a system just as strong as the professionals who have devoted their lives to making and breaking ciphers.
b) The designers were forced to use limited strength crippto due to stupid crypto laws.
Incidentally, the DVD CSS system was broken by the combination of government-mandated 40 bit key length, and a home-made algorithm that reduced the effective keylength to around 30 bits. This makes it possible for an attack to be completed in seconds. FWIW, a 40 bit key search takes 1024 times longer than a 30 bit key search.
You can never equivocate too much.
Make your homebrew CA private key:
openssl genrsa -des3 -out ca.key 1024
Create your CA self-signed public key:
openssl req -new -x509 -days 365 -key ca.key -out ca.crt
OK, you're set up as a homebrew Certificate Authority (CA) and ready to start signing your own home-brew certs:
First, create a homebrew private key:
openssl genrsa -des3 -out server.key 1024
Create the unsigned public key (AKA certificate signing request) At one point in the process, it asks for "Your Name" - if this is for personal identification, then put in your name. However, if this is for a development web server, then put in the web site address "dev.www.wherever.com" when it asks for "Your Name"
openssl req -new -key server.key -out server.csr
Get the sign.sh script from the Apache mod_ssl distribution, use this to sign the certificate:
There you go, you now have the private (server.key) and public (server.crt) keys. Install them on your webserver.
They will work, but your browser will whine about them being signed by an untrusted source. No problem there, give a copy of CA.crt (NOT CA.key!!) to any developers using your web server and have them install it on their machine, from then on, their browser will consider any certs signed by your homebrew CA key to be valid. To install the cert on IE browsers, a hint: you do not use your browser to do it, even though there is an "Install Cert" button on the window that pops up to let you know that the cert is signed by an unknown CA. Instead, you give them CA.crt, have them save it to their hard drive, then open up Windows Explorer, right click on CA.crt, and pick Install Cert from the menu, a Certificate Wizard will pop up, go with the defaults, then your machine will trust the homebrew certs.
The root certificate game has always been just a money scam, especially for dev certs.
Why not just have a non-profit organization that issues certificates to anyone that wants one for a nominal fee?
Well, you can generate your own certificate, it's straightforward enough. The issue is trust. When you (a shopper, say) go to a site secured by Verisign, you are in effect saying that you trust Verisign not to issue a certificate to anyone who isn't trustworthy. Of course, for most people, it's "I trust Netscape/Microsoft/Whoever, who trust Verisign, who trust this merchant". If you generate your own certificate, there is no "trusted third party" to confirm you are who you say you are. The reason certificates cost money is because for a certificate to be trustworthy, the issuer has to perform due-diligence checks (for example, company registration documents) to ensure that they are granting it to a legitimate organization.
Logically, this could and perhaps should, be a function of Companies House (or the US equivalent), the body responsible for keeping track of company registrations, filing accounts and so forth. But any company with a strong enough brand (a hardware vendor, a major bank or law firm, a telco) could act as a trusted third party, so long as that TTP is itself trusted by the public. The only problem there is, how to get the browser vendors to distribute their certificates along with the browser.
What developer certs let you down is put ActiveX controls on your web pages that the user can download without going through a scary dialog saying "the browser can't tell who created this file". You do get a dialog saying "This file was created by so-and-so, click 'yes' if you trust them" but that dialog is designed to not be scary, and encourage the user to download whatever crap is about to take over his computer.
There are also developer certs for signed objects in Netscape browsers, but not too many people care about those any more. :(