4 ms·

I think the traditional concepts of CAs has showed again and again that it does not work. Yet cryptography is worthless if you can't validate who you are talkin

by _ME_ 7y ago

I think the traditional concepts of CAs has showed again and again that it does not work. Yet cryptography is worthless if you can't validate who you are talking with. I would propose a system where multiple parties could sign the SSL-certificate and these would be shown as badges in the browser. The more badges the more trustworthy. Say for example that you have an online store. Then the local tax-office could sign your certificate if you are a registered company in that country. If you have a contract with VISA, they could sign your certificate. The authority for your top-domain could also sign the certificate to prove you own the domain and so on. And for a customer buying from this store, seeing these badges in the browser would let them decide how trustworthy the website is. I actually think with this solution getting the users to understand would be the least problem. The big problem would be to get developers to authenticate the certificates while doing back-end calls. I mean how many developers even does this today?

ben_w 7y ago
Number of badges is not going to help if you can’t trust any given badge — no matter what the details are, given how automated attacks are, it is reasonable to presume that as soon as you’ve worked out how to circumvent one, you’ve probably figured out how to circumvent more of them than will fit in a browser bar at once.
als0 7y ago
> And for a customer buying from this store, seeing these badges in the browser would let them decide how trustworthy the website is. I actually think with this solution getting the users to understand would be the least problem. Given that a non-technical user can't tell the difference between an EV cert and a regular CV, I can't understand why they would care about the actual number of badges. Sliding scales just don't work, they just care about whether it's safe to use a website or not. The browser vendors _could_ establish a baseline for the number of badges that would make a site acceptable. But the economics would have to match real world incentives (e.g. small and large businesses), and protect against problems like sybil attacks...but then we're back to the heart of the problem.
rocqua 7y ago
I like the idea of multiple signatures, but mostly so it is much easier to drop trust in a CA.
dboreham 7y ago
You invented Web of Trust.

by _ME_ 7y ago

ben_w 7y ago

Number of badges is not going to help if you can’t trust any given badge — no matter what the details are, given how automated attacks are, it is reasonable to presume that as soon as you’ve worked out how to circumvent one, you’ve probably figured out how to circumvent more of them than will fit in a browser bar at once.

als0 7y ago

> And for a customer buying from this store, seeing these badges in the browser would let them decide how trustworthy the website is. I actually think with this solution getting the users to understand would be the least problem. Given that a non-technical user can't tell the difference between an EV cert and a regular CV, I can't understand why they would care about the actual number of badges. Sliding scales just don't work, they just care about whether it's safe to use a website or not. The browser vendors _could_ establish a baseline for the number of badges that would make a site acceptable. But the economics would have to match real world incentives (e.g. small and large businesses), and protect against problems like sybil attacks...but then we're back to the heart of the problem.

rocqua 7y ago

I like the idea of multiple signatures, but mostly so it is much easier to drop trust in a CA.

dboreham 7y ago

You invented Web of Trust.