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Let’s Encrypt Receives the Levchin Prize for Real-World Cryptography

154 points by homarp 4y ago

jonas21 4y ago
This is from a month ago. Here is a link to the previous HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31018436 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31018436
geek_at 4y ago
The post Snowden decade wouldn't have been the same without them. Cudos!
- rvnx 4y ago
  What about the theory that the NIST encryption curves may be backdoored ? If this is the case, if I would be the NSA I would strongly push for free cryptography, to make sure that only the US can decrypt the communications and have a strategic advantage.
  - duskwuff 4y ago
    Let's Encrypt is a CA. Their involvement with web cryptography begins and ends with signing certificates which are used for authentication -- they have no say over what cryptography actually gets used for a TLS connection.
    - slim 4y ago
      They are concentrating authority which is never good
      - duskwuff 4y ago
        > They are concentrating authority Honestly, not by much. There are maybe half a dozen major CAs that make up the vast majority (95%+) of certificate issuance, and that number has been shrinking as poorly run CAs have been shut down (like GeoTrust) and other CAs have gone through cycles of acquisition (like Verisign/Symantec/DigiCert). Besides, a lot of the market share which Let's Encrypt has acquired has been by expanding the market, rather than taking it from other players. Ten years ago, less than 25% of web traffic was encrypted; now, 80-90% of it is, and a lot of that growth has been through increased availability of free or low-cost certificates.
    - rvnx 4y ago
      It goes way beyond, since Let's Encrypt influence the ecosystem a lot and the standards that are used. If you use Let's Encrypt, you are likely using Certbot, which means that everybody uses a tool that a central authority strongly recommends to you. I wonder how they generate the key, for example, it may be using secp256r1: https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/5c111d0bd1206d864d7cb93754e101f6073bc669/certbot/certbot/crypto_util.py#L57 https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/5c111d0bd1206d864d7c... (this seems to be the default?) Some time ago, I remember seeing secp256r1 in some tech talks like here: https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2018/08/21/a-tale-of-two-elliptic-curves/ https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2018/08/21/a-tale-of-two-elli... "The “k” in sepc256k1 stands for Koblitz and the “r” in sepc256r1 stands for random. A Koblitz elliptic curve has some special properties that make it possible to implement the group operation more efficiently. It is believed that there is a small security trade-off, that more “randomly” selected parameters are more secure. However, some people suspect that the random coefficients may have been selected to provide a back door." If a solution is plausible, and this solution can bring dozens of billions of USD in in direct economic value or protect populations, certainly the smart people would/should think about a way to do it (and this could even be the right thing to do). I'm not saying that Let's Encrypt is backdoored; what I'm saying is that it's a juicy target and that one potential solution to this problem is to encourage decentralization.
- b65e8bee43c2ed0 4y ago
  post-Snowden approach is E2EE TLS only addresses minor threats, it doesn't help against NSA/CIA/etc and their equivalent in other jurisdictions. corporate websites will give up your plaintexts, the cloud providers will give up your private keys hosted on their servers.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago
Congratulations to Let’s Encrypt. I would also like to do a shoutout to software like Caddy Server which automatically provisions with TLS using Let’s Encrypt. Doing this removes another barrier to adoption.
- mholt 4y ago
  Thank you for the shoutout! Both projects have definitely been a community effort. There are many people and sponsors to thank. I've worked on both Let's Encrypt and Caddy. Indeed, the goal with Caddy is to set the gold standard for other software to follow. I'd say Let's Encrypt does the heavy lifting in this space, though. It's truly a remarkable team and infrastructure.
- kkielhofner 4y ago
  I’d add Traefik to that list! Maybe not quite as simple to get up and running as Caddy with LE but still pretty smooth.
nonrandomstring 4y ago
Next project: "Let's Interoperate" Total portability of data, authentication, contact lists, and full inter-working of chat and AV protocols soming soon! ? After breaking the certificate racket, let's end the tech walled-garden monopolies.
_8j50 4y ago
They have done so much in real world crypto, I feel like they should be the ones handinf out prizes and awards. The single biggest improvement in transport security since public key crypto imo.
Rafuino 4y ago
This is a very nice recognition! I realized that the registrar I have my personal site with purposefully does not support Let's Encrypt as a CA. Anyone have a registrar they'd recommend these days to transfer a domain to? FYI, the crappy registrar/host in question is namecheap.com so you can avoid them in the future.
- bombcar 4y ago
  The registrar doesn't really have much to say about which CA you use, but a hosting provider would. Given that all certs are limited to a year, we're only a few steps away from the Let's Encrypt setup being automated everywhere.
  - asimops 4y ago
    Just imagine: - Not allowed to change authoritative DNS - CAA set to everything except LE - cannot set CAA to LE Wouldn't it be nice?
    - duskwuff 4y ago
      > - Not allowed to change authoritative DNS Registrars are contractually required to allow registrants to change the nameservers associated with their domain.
      - bombcar 4y ago
        Some "free" or "low cost" "registrars" actually are hosting providers that register the domain for you, and then provide you limited access to the tools normally available.
        duskwuff 4y ago
        Do these still exist? I remember running into one of them around 2005, but I haven't heard of any since -- it's been a long time since "give away hosting and run ads against the content" was a viable business model.
deleted 4y ago
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154 points by homarp 4y ago

This is from a month ago. Here is a link to the previous HN thread: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31018436 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31018436

geek_at 4y ago

The post Snowden decade wouldn't have been the same without them. Cudos!

rvnx 4y ago
What about the theory that the NIST encryption curves may be backdoored ? If this is the case, if I would be the NSA I would strongly push for free cryptography, to make sure that only the US can decrypt the communications and have a strategic advantage.
- duskwuff 4y ago
  Let's Encrypt is a CA. Their involvement with web cryptography begins and ends with signing certificates which are used for authentication -- they have no say over what cryptography actually gets used for a TLS connection.
  - slim 4y ago
    They are concentrating authority which is never good
    - duskwuff 4y ago
      > They are concentrating authority Honestly, not by much. There are maybe half a dozen major CAs that make up the vast majority (95%+) of certificate issuance, and that number has been shrinking as poorly run CAs have been shut down (like GeoTrust) and other CAs have gone through cycles of acquisition (like Verisign/Symantec/DigiCert). Besides, a lot of the market share which Let's Encrypt has acquired has been by expanding the market, rather than taking it from other players. Ten years ago, less than 25% of web traffic was encrypted; now, 80-90% of it is, and a lot of that growth has been through increased availability of free or low-cost certificates.
  - rvnx 4y ago
    It goes way beyond, since Let's Encrypt influence the ecosystem a lot and the standards that are used. If you use Let's Encrypt, you are likely using Certbot, which means that everybody uses a tool that a central authority strongly recommends to you. I wonder how they generate the key, for example, it may be using secp256r1: https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/5c111d0bd1206d864d7cb93754e101f6073bc669/certbot/certbot/crypto_util.py#L57 https://github.com/certbot/certbot/blob/5c111d0bd1206d864d7c... (this seems to be the default?) Some time ago, I remember seeing secp256r1 in some tech talks like here: https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2018/08/21/a-tale-of-two-elliptic-curves/ https://www.johndcook.com/blog/2018/08/21/a-tale-of-two-elli... "The “k” in sepc256k1 stands for Koblitz and the “r” in sepc256r1 stands for random. A Koblitz elliptic curve has some special properties that make it possible to implement the group operation more efficiently. It is believed that there is a small security trade-off, that more “randomly” selected parameters are more secure. However, some people suspect that the random coefficients may have been selected to provide a back door." If a solution is plausible, and this solution can bring dozens of billions of USD in in direct economic value or protect populations, certainly the smart people would/should think about a way to do it (and this could even be the right thing to do). I'm not saying that Let's Encrypt is backdoored; what I'm saying is that it's a juicy target and that one potential solution to this problem is to encourage decentralization.
b65e8bee43c2ed0 4y ago
post-Snowden approach is E2EE TLS only addresses minor threats, it doesn't help against NSA/CIA/etc and their equivalent in other jurisdictions. corporate websites will give up your plaintexts, the cloud providers will give up your private keys hosted on their servers.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 4y ago

Congratulations to Let’s Encrypt. I would also like to do a shoutout to software like Caddy Server which automatically provisions with TLS using Let’s Encrypt. Doing this removes another barrier to adoption.

mholt 4y ago
Thank you for the shoutout! Both projects have definitely been a community effort. There are many people and sponsors to thank. I've worked on both Let's Encrypt and Caddy. Indeed, the goal with Caddy is to set the gold standard for other software to follow. I'd say Let's Encrypt does the heavy lifting in this space, though. It's truly a remarkable team and infrastructure.
kkielhofner 4y ago
I’d add Traefik to that list! Maybe not quite as simple to get up and running as Caddy with LE but still pretty smooth.

nonrandomstring 4y ago

Next project: "Let's Interoperate" Total portability of data, authentication, contact lists, and full inter-working of chat and AV protocols soming soon! ? After breaking the certificate racket, let's end the tech walled-garden monopolies.

_8j50 4y ago

They have done so much in real world crypto, I feel like they should be the ones handinf out prizes and awards. The single biggest improvement in transport security since public key crypto imo.

Rafuino 4y ago

This is a very nice recognition! I realized that the registrar I have my personal site with purposefully does not support Let's Encrypt as a CA. Anyone have a registrar they'd recommend these days to transfer a domain to? FYI, the crappy registrar/host in question is namecheap.com so you can avoid them in the future.

bombcar 4y ago
The registrar doesn't really have much to say about which CA you use, but a hosting provider would. Given that all certs are limited to a year, we're only a few steps away from the Let's Encrypt setup being automated everywhere.
- asimops 4y ago
  Just imagine: - Not allowed to change authoritative DNS - CAA set to everything except LE - cannot set CAA to LE Wouldn't it be nice?
  - duskwuff 4y ago
    > - Not allowed to change authoritative DNS Registrars are contractually required to allow registrants to change the nameservers associated with their domain.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      Some "free" or "low cost" "registrars" actually are hosting providers that register the domain for you, and then provide you limited access to the tools normally available.
      - duskwuff 4y ago
        Do these still exist? I remember running into one of them around 2005, but I haven't heard of any since -- it's been a long time since "give away hosting and run ads against the content" was a viable business model.

deleted 4y ago

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