4 ms·

I think the lack of standardization for a general purpose PKI is the biggest barrier, and the reason why Joe Schmo has no idea what a key pair is.

tptacek 7y ago
You're not really answering my question. Assume the standardization falls into place, and it's all JSON instead of X.509 so that Javascript developers will actually use it. What gets better? What thing out there was just begging to be encrypted by a giant tree shared by the whole Internet?
- pvg 7y ago
  What gets better? What thing out there was just begging to be encrypted by a giant tree shared by the whole Internet? The Nine Planes of the Internet would be connected. Níðhöggr, Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr and Duraþrór would be in their ordained places, no longer roaming lost in endless Violation of the Layers.
  - strbean 7y ago
    It would also be much easier to transfer your data to Fólkvangr / Valhöll after you die a hero's death on the battlefield.
- strbean 7y ago
  First thing that comes to mind is official emails from organizations to individuals. Wouldn't such a system basically squash most fishing?
  - toast0 7y ago
    Please walk us through how a PKI would help against phishing emails?
    - strbean 7y ago
      Companies sign official correspondence, and email clients give blaring sirens/red flags for unsigned correspondence (or send it straight to the spam folder) similar to how browsers now handle http vs. https traffic? It would also be very easy to detect any misrepresentation. Email contains a link to a domain that isn't on your cert? Alarms / no clickable links / etc.
      - toast0 7y ago
        Scammers are capable of setting up signing and getting certificates for their domains. It's an extra hurdle, but, like setting up https, it's not a big hurdle. No cross domain links would disrupt a lot of current emails, but most senders would likely setup in-domain redirectors to carry on their current mailing patterns. Unfortunately, some of those would probably be open redirectors (because it's easy to make an open redirector and it "solves" the immediate problem), leading to some amount of security issues.

tptacek 7y ago

You're not really answering my question. Assume the standardization falls into place, and it's all JSON instead of X.509 so that Javascript developers will actually use it. What gets better? What thing out there was just begging to be encrypted by a giant tree shared by the whole Internet?

pvg 7y ago
What gets better? What thing out there was just begging to be encrypted by a giant tree shared by the whole Internet? The Nine Planes of the Internet would be connected. Níðhöggr, Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr and Duraþrór would be in their ordained places, no longer roaming lost in endless Violation of the Layers.
- strbean 7y ago
  It would also be much easier to transfer your data to Fólkvangr / Valhöll after you die a hero's death on the battlefield.
strbean 7y ago
First thing that comes to mind is official emails from organizations to individuals. Wouldn't such a system basically squash most fishing?
- toast0 7y ago
  Please walk us through how a PKI would help against phishing emails?
  - strbean 7y ago
    Companies sign official correspondence, and email clients give blaring sirens/red flags for unsigned correspondence (or send it straight to the spam folder) similar to how browsers now handle http vs. https traffic? It would also be very easy to detect any misrepresentation. Email contains a link to a domain that isn't on your cert? Alarms / no clickable links / etc.
    - toast0 7y ago
      Scammers are capable of setting up signing and getting certificates for their domains. It's an extra hurdle, but, like setting up https, it's not a big hurdle. No cross domain links would disrupt a lot of current emails, but most senders would likely setup in-domain redirectors to carry on their current mailing patterns. Unfortunately, some of those would probably be open redirectors (because it's easy to make an open redirector and it "solves" the immediate problem), leading to some amount of security issues.