Subject: [secdir] SecDir review of draft-ietf-sidr-repos-struct-08

From: Yaron Sheffer <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 03 Jul 2011 22:14:14 +0300

I have reviewed this document as part of the security directorate's 
ongoing effort to review all IETF documents being processed by the IESG. 
These comments were written primarily for the benefit of the security 
area directors. Document editors and WG chairs should treat these 
comments just like any other last call comments

This draft describes the structure of the RPKI repositories. This is a 
dedicated, even more complex than usual PKI deployment.

The security considerations are short, considering that the entire 
document is about the security underpinnings of a critical 
infrastructure. However they do make sense to me. I do have two comments:

• The mandatory use or Rsync (vs. e.g. simple HTTP) in a one-way content 
retrieval context seems like a questionable security vs. operational 
cost trade-off. Rsync is complex and has seen various security 
vulnerabilities over the years: 
http://secunia.com/advisories/search/?search=rsync. BTW, the reference 
"to rsync" only defines the URI format. As to a formal specification of 
the protocol, guess what? 
http://lists.samba.org/archive/rsync/2008-October/021927.html.
• The following sentence seems to require clarification, and hints at 
possible risks/mitigations: "However, even the use of manifests and CRLs 
will not allow a relying party to detect all forms of substitution 
attacks based on older (but not expired) valid objects."

Thanks,
Yaron