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Maybe I dont understand PGP and this is a stupid question, but if the site is compromised, would it not be possible for them to just put a different key up? One
by willyt 14y ago
Maybe I dont understand PGP and this is a stupid question, but if the site is compromised, would it not be possible for them to just put a different key up? One which they knew the private key for? How would you know the public key on the compromised site has not been changed unless you could compare it to the PGP key from before the site was compromised?
- JoachimSchipper 14y agoYou can't, but having a security.html page gives attackers the possibility to contact you privately and securely; this reduces the chance that they'll decide to "contact" you by completely pwning your public site.
- tptacek 14y agoPublishing the key is what allows you to detect malicious changes to the key.
- jaytaylor 14y ago@JoachimSchipper do sec people inherently know to try hitting /security.html by convention, or should there be links to it from the main site?
- tptacek 14y agoThey know to look for a link to the security page. Github's is in their site footer. 37signals' is in their site footer. Twitter's is linked off the sidebar in their "About" page. Google's and Facebook's are the top search result for their site and "vulnerability" "security". These are all fine options.
- jaytaylor 14y agoThank you!
- arjie 14y agoWhat if the key is endorsed by the individual people on the team? Their personal keys, which they keep, must sign the security team key. A replacement cannot have this endorsement.
- rmoriz 14y agoYou can publish the key on keyservers and get some trust on it. e.g http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?search=37signals&op=index http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?search=37signals&op=... http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?search=heroku http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?search=heroku