7 ms·

Distrusting StartSSL

27 points by raimue 13y ago

hesselink 13y ago
They're also not about to change it: https://twitter.com/startssl/status/453631038883758080 https://twitter.com/startssl/status/453631038883758080
paulirish 13y ago
Cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:llk9t9YOBvQJ:https://raim.codingfarm.de/blog/2014/04/12/distrusting-startssl/&hl=en&gl=us&strip=1 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:llk9t9Y...
dewey 13y ago
Feels a bit silly to complain about a free certificate from the CA which probably helped a lot of people to even think about using SSL on their site and if I'm not mistaken it's just 25$ to get a new one. That's even cheaper than getting one from Comodo/etc. They always said that revoking a certificate is not free, that's what you signed up for.
- tptacek 13y ago
  It's a silly complaint. It's also the inevitable result of offering something useful at a "free" price point: it attracts pathological customers --- for instance, the ones who will attempt to organize informal boycotts against you when something about that free offering turns out not to be to their liking.
  - lisper 13y ago
    The problem with this analysis, as with most libertarian analyses, is that it ignores externalities. The security of x.509 is a cooperative endeavor. The continued existence of compromised certificates from any CA undermines the security of the entire internet because you can no longer trust the browser padlock icon. So while it is certainly arguable that Start could justifiably refuse to provide a service for customers who have never paid, it is a much harder case to make that Start is justified in undermining the security of the internet because it chose (wisely or unwisely) to provide certificates for free.
    - Joeboy 13y ago
      > The continued existence of compromised certificates from any CA undermines the security of the entire internet because you can no longer trust the browser padlock icon. True, but my guess is that StartCom doing free revocations / reissues would only make a tiny dent in that situation. http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-certificate-revocation-tsunami-yet-to-arrive.html http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
      - lisper 13y ago
        That may be, but it's beside the point. Given that we have a situation where the continued viability of the internet depends on everyone rowing in the same direction, the argument that Start has no responsibility in this case because "you get what you pay for" should not carry the day.
        tptacek 13y ago
        The viability of the Internet in no way depends on Start's actions here. Certificate revocation is not in fact a giant "everyone row the same direction" coordinated effort to save the Internet. It's closer to theater than it is to triage.
    - tptacek 13y ago
      It's not an externality of Start's business. They were up-front with their clients: revocation carries a handling fee. The externality you're referring to was caused by the users of StartSSL, who deliberately opted to pay nothing for SSL certificates that didn't have free revocation. (Certificate revocation simply doesn't work regardless, but let's stipulate here that it does).
      - lisper 13y ago
        > They were up-front with their clients That assumes that all their clients were paying attention. That is almost certainly not the case. It is arguable where the responsibility lies in a case like this, but there is a case to be made that Start carries at least some of the responsibility for having created an environment where such a critical item was so easy to miss. I am not saying that Start is in fact the villain it is being made out to be, only that the "you get what you pay for" argument should not be the last word.
- guan 13y ago
  The $24.90 fee also applies to paying Class 2 customers. Only EV certificates get free revocation from StartCom. My own personal blog (not very critical) has a Class 2 certificate, and I decided to switch to a Comodo PositiveSSL ($5/year for 5 years) and not revoke the StartSSL one.
  - pezz 13y ago
    Exactly what I did. I mean, damn people who use a free thing that then get screwed, through no fault of their own, not wanting to be charged $25 for a part of the service that they would never need to use otherwise. You're either free, or you're not -- StartSSL is a mish-mash of "free" and opportunistic costs.
    - guan 13y ago
      I think some people are exaggerating how aware Class 1 customers were of the revocation policy. It’s in the FAQ, but the site also advertises “100% Free”. I think the expectation is that free services have automated infrastructure, and that they’re a way to advertise your paid services—and I did, in fact, start out as a Class 1 and later paid for Class 2.
  - yeukhon 13y ago
    I don't see where it said $5/year. Right now it costs $50 per year. EDIT: Are resellers like them more trustworthy? I understand that big CA often sells out to smaller CA and smaller CA sell out to even smaller CA. But how trustworthy are ssls.com and namecheap? EDIT Okay. I see. namecheap has been running since 2001 which means it has been doing business pretty well :) So why are they cheaper? Because namecheap are the one managing all the accounts and Comondo is only doing validation?
    - jgillich 13y ago
      It's a lot cheaper when you buy it through resellers (like NameCheap).
      - deleted 13y ago
- Joeboy 13y ago
  The article is down for me, but: From a POV of fairness to StartCom, I agree with you, and initially saw it as a ridiculous sense of entitlement on the part of their (non-paying) customers. However as a third party user of the web I am somewhat persuaded by the simple argument that the certs should be distrusted on the basis that they are no longer trustworthy. Edit: Having thought about it for a minute, a logical consequence of my argument is that all certificates signed by CAs that charge a revocation or reissue fee should be distrusted, which probably makes it not a very reasonable argument. I guess this just leaves us at "Valid SSL certificates are not necessarily trustworthy and we just have to live with that". Edit2: http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-certificate-revocation-tsunami-yet-to-arrive.html http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
  - revelation 13y ago
    I have no problem with them asking for money to issue a new certificate, but revoking the old one when it is compromised is an obligation they took on when selling (or giving it away) in the first place. An obligation to Mozilla and others that have put them in their trust store if I may add. It is the same reason we have mandatory recycling provisions. Just because your shit is free doesn't mean we have to sit by and watch you pollute the world.
    - Joeboy 13y ago
      Hm, by that argument I guess they (and all other CAs) should just revoke all of the ones on servers that are/were vulnerable without user intervention. I can't imagine that would make them any more popular, although it probably would be the right thing to do.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
  - raimue 13y ago
    Sorry for the downtime. I did not expect this to be that popular.
- zimbatm 13y ago
  It's a marketing issue. StartSSL can make free certificates because the entire system is automated (until you require Level 2 certificates) so the cost of operation is very low. My guess is that the revocation is not entirely automated. There might also be reasons other than technical why it's not the case. In any case, if they explained the reasons it would put some perspective on their point of view and help people understand.
- drdaeman 13y ago
  > just 25$ to get a new one Due to $0 price of certificate I guess many had considered it would be a good idea to have a certificate per service, i.e. a separate one for HTTPS, email, XMPP and so on. I did. The overall thought was that if one service would be compromised, others would likely remain safe - but Heartbleed had completely changed the story. In my case if I'd revoke all the certificate it would be about $600. Call me names if you want to, but I'm not going to shell out that much. Guess, many others would think the same. I've updated OpenSSL but if any certs were compromised, they would stay so until they would naturally expire.
sexmonad 13y ago
StartSSL's default usage mode is to generate private keys on their website. Yet another horribly insecure system. I'd much rather that people used self-signed certs (and browsers had certificate pinning) by default, and could then step up to real CA certificates. Self-signed certs provide almost the same amount of trust that StartCom does.
- kmac_ 13y ago
  > StartSSL's default usage mode is to generate private keys on their website. No. AFAIR they use HTML5 <keygen> tag to generate key pair.
  - drdaeman 13y ago
    That's for personal (client) certificates. For server certificates, unless you supply the CSR by yourself by skipping a step (IIRC, you're softly encouraged to do so), they generate the key server-side and send it to you back. They even have a FAQ entries (##43,44, although their site is down ATM, so Google for a cached copy) about that.
    - kmac_ 13y ago
      You're right, I've mixed up things.
dfc 13y ago
None of this has anything to do with StartSSL's trustworthiness as a CA. It is ridiculous to see that people are whining that a company that signed their cert for $0.00 is asking for some money for additional work. The $25 rekeying is a steal for a certificate. What CA in mozilla/chromium comes closest to StartSSL's $0.00 or $25.00 certificate? That question is not rehetorical, I am genuinely curious what is the second cheapest option for a signed certificate (from a CA trusted by default in mozilla/chromium).
- yeukhon 13y ago
  https://www.gandi.net/ssl/standard#single https://www.gandi.net/ssl/standard#single $16 per year. edit Someone said reseller namecheap and ssls are way cheaper and have the same trust as any CA.
  - Spidler 13y ago
    Gandi are free if you have domain hosting with them.
    - yeukhon 13y ago
      Yes, but as a customer my SSL is only free for one year :)
- aroch 13y ago
  PossitiveSSL2 (Comodo) through a reseller (I use http://cheapsslsecurity.com/ http://cheapsslsecurity.com/ -- $5/year/5years)
  - dfc 13y ago
    I was thinking about the two Comodo RAs (or three?) that had been compromised when I said from a CA trusted by mozilla/chromium: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=470897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=470897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=526560 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=526560 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=599856 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=599856
yeukhon 13y ago
EDIT: Okay. Downvoter. Now defend your position. I think people should clam down and think thoroughly. I don't know the actual math on the cost for a CA to revoke and re-issue a new certificate. But what if someone finds another critical vulnerability? Do we go back and ask to revoke our certificate again? Free of charge? Is it necessary to call StartCom evil? Is that even fair? If you are serving real user data, please get a paid certificate yourself. Why? Because you have slightly better control of your certificate. If you are just running demo or running personal blog then get one from places like gandi.net (1 year at $16.00) edit: someone mention ssls.com and namecheap.com (resellers) offer cheap Comondo PositiveSSL at less than $10 per year. If you are running open source project, consider https://www.globalsign.com/ssl/ssl-open-source/ https://www.globalsign.com/ssl/ssl-open-source/ and http://www.godaddy.com/ssl/ssl-open-source.aspx http://www.godaddy.com/ssl/ssl-open-source.aspx. If you still can't afford one, I really don't know what to say to you at the moment.
- drdaeman 13y ago
  @EDIT: Sorry, that was me. I've misclicked the wrong button - meant to upvote, and there seems to be no way to undo. Nonetheless, I disagree. > Do we go back and ask to revoke our certificate again? Free of charge? That's right, ask to revoke. In current system, considering the position CAs' are in, trust is primarily their problem. If CA's not revoking the certificate that's compromised, it's CA who's to blame, not server administrators. Not sure about server admins who don't want to pay, but end users (those who see the false green padlock) have full moral right to call such CA "evil".
  - yeukhon 13y ago
    Thank you. I think people should try to explain their downvote whenever possible so that I can have a decent discussion as my argument isn't always "correct". Like I said I don't know the cost to revoke certificate as a CA. One possible defense for StartCom is that they are worried about facing the same bill as the next critical vulnerability emerge. Someone said in some other threads that StartCom has this fee from ancient time. If that's true, this is just another "fine print" issue. > but end users (those who see the false green padlock) have full moral right to call such CA "evil". I agree. Though the question remains: should the CA take the blame of the flaw of a library every time given CA is not a charity, but a business?
ibejoeb 13y ago
Heartbleed is a big deal, and there's not a single entity that can bear the burden alone. We've all got to do our parts to revoke the millions of bad certificates, and we've go to be pretty quick about it. I'm a StartCom customer, and I'm going to suck it up and pay to revoke all of my certificates, including several class 2s and an EV. I'm going to do it because it's better for the PKI than if I don't. Now, StartCom, It would be nice if you'd help us out, too. This is a mess. Maybe we can get a bit of a break. Maybe you can revoke all of my certs for $25. Or maybe it can be $5 or $10 a piece. We want to put you out of business, but come on, we all know signing certs is tantamount to printing money. If the trust model falls apart, you're out anyway, so how about playing an active role in sorting this out?
- tptacek 13y ago
  Very few people will actually have lost privkeys. Patching your server is a much more important countermeasure than revocation. Certificate revocation in practice works nowhere nearly as well as it does on paper; in fact, it comes dangerously close to not working at all. Read Adam Langley's (jaundiced) take on OCSP for more details. Long story short: certificate revocation is probably not a big enough deal for Start to somehow be required to rewrite the terms you agreed to when you acquired your certs from them.
  - rentzsch 13y ago
    I think this is Langley's post tptacek is referencing: https://www.imperialviolet.org/2012/02/05/crlsets.html https://www.imperialviolet.org/2012/02/05/crlsets.html
    - tptacek 13y ago
      Yup. So soft-fail revocation checks are like a seat-belt that snaps when you crash. Even though it works 99% of the time, it's worthless because it only works when you don't need it.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]

27 points by raimue 13y ago

They're also not about to change it: https://twitter.com/startssl/status/453631038883758080 https://twitter.com/startssl/status/453631038883758080

paulirish 13y ago

Cached version: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:llk9t9YOBvQJ:https://raim.codingfarm.de/blog/2014/04/12/distrusting-startssl/&hl=en&gl=us&strip=1 http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:llk9t9Y...

dewey 13y ago

Feels a bit silly to complain about a free certificate from the CA which probably helped a lot of people to even think about using SSL on their site and if I'm not mistaken it's just 25$ to get a new one. That's even cheaper than getting one from Comodo/etc. They always said that revoking a certificate is not free, that's what you signed up for.

tptacek 13y ago
It's a silly complaint. It's also the inevitable result of offering something useful at a "free" price point: it attracts pathological customers --- for instance, the ones who will attempt to organize informal boycotts against you when something about that free offering turns out not to be to their liking.
- lisper 13y ago
  The problem with this analysis, as with most libertarian analyses, is that it ignores externalities. The security of x.509 is a cooperative endeavor. The continued existence of compromised certificates from any CA undermines the security of the entire internet because you can no longer trust the browser padlock icon. So while it is certainly arguable that Start could justifiably refuse to provide a service for customers who have never paid, it is a much harder case to make that Start is justified in undermining the security of the internet because it chose (wisely or unwisely) to provide certificates for free.
  - Joeboy 13y ago
    > The continued existence of compromised certificates from any CA undermines the security of the entire internet because you can no longer trust the browser padlock icon. True, but my guess is that StartCom doing free revocations / reissues would only make a tiny dent in that situation. http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-certificate-revocation-tsunami-yet-to-arrive.html http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
    - lisper 13y ago
      That may be, but it's beside the point. Given that we have a situation where the continued viability of the internet depends on everyone rowing in the same direction, the argument that Start has no responsibility in this case because "you get what you pay for" should not carry the day.
      - tptacek 13y ago
        The viability of the Internet in no way depends on Start's actions here. Certificate revocation is not in fact a giant "everyone row the same direction" coordinated effort to save the Internet. It's closer to theater than it is to triage.
  - tptacek 13y ago
    It's not an externality of Start's business. They were up-front with their clients: revocation carries a handling fee. The externality you're referring to was caused by the users of StartSSL, who deliberately opted to pay nothing for SSL certificates that didn't have free revocation. (Certificate revocation simply doesn't work regardless, but let's stipulate here that it does).
    - lisper 13y ago
      > They were up-front with their clients That assumes that all their clients were paying attention. That is almost certainly not the case. It is arguable where the responsibility lies in a case like this, but there is a case to be made that Start carries at least some of the responsibility for having created an environment where such a critical item was so easy to miss. I am not saying that Start is in fact the villain it is being made out to be, only that the "you get what you pay for" argument should not be the last word.
guan 13y ago
The $24.90 fee also applies to paying Class 2 customers. Only EV certificates get free revocation from StartCom. My own personal blog (not very critical) has a Class 2 certificate, and I decided to switch to a Comodo PositiveSSL ($5/year for 5 years) and not revoke the StartSSL one.
- pezz 13y ago
  Exactly what I did. I mean, damn people who use a free thing that then get screwed, through no fault of their own, not wanting to be charged $25 for a part of the service that they would never need to use otherwise. You're either free, or you're not -- StartSSL is a mish-mash of "free" and opportunistic costs.
  - guan 13y ago
    I think some people are exaggerating how aware Class 1 customers were of the revocation policy. It’s in the FAQ, but the site also advertises “100% Free”. I think the expectation is that free services have automated infrastructure, and that they’re a way to advertise your paid services—and I did, in fact, start out as a Class 1 and later paid for Class 2.
- yeukhon 13y ago
  I don't see where it said $5/year. Right now it costs $50 per year. EDIT: Are resellers like them more trustworthy? I understand that big CA often sells out to smaller CA and smaller CA sell out to even smaller CA. But how trustworthy are ssls.com and namecheap? EDIT Okay. I see. namecheap has been running since 2001 which means it has been doing business pretty well :) So why are they cheaper? Because namecheap are the one managing all the accounts and Comondo is only doing validation?
  - jgillich 13y ago
    It's a lot cheaper when you buy it through resellers (like NameCheap).
    - deleted 13y ago
Joeboy 13y ago
The article is down for me, but: From a POV of fairness to StartCom, I agree with you, and initially saw it as a ridiculous sense of entitlement on the part of their (non-paying) customers. However as a third party user of the web I am somewhat persuaded by the simple argument that the certs should be distrusted on the basis that they are no longer trustworthy. Edit: Having thought about it for a minute, a logical consequence of my argument is that all certificates signed by CAs that charge a revocation or reissue fee should be distrusted, which probably makes it not a very reasonable argument. I guess this just leaves us at "Valid SSL certificates are not necessarily trustworthy and we just have to live with that". Edit2: http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-certificate-revocation-tsunami-yet-to-arrive.html http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
- revelation 13y ago
  I have no problem with them asking for money to issue a new certificate, but revoking the old one when it is compromised is an obligation they took on when selling (or giving it away) in the first place. An obligation to Mozilla and others that have put them in their trust store if I may add. It is the same reason we have mandatory recycling provisions. Just because your shit is free doesn't mean we have to sit by and watch you pollute the world.
  - Joeboy 13y ago
    Hm, by that argument I guess they (and all other CAs) should just revoke all of the ones on servers that are/were vulnerable without user intervention. I can't imagine that would make them any more popular, although it probably would be the right thing to do.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- raimue 13y ago
  Sorry for the downtime. I did not expect this to be that popular.
zimbatm 13y ago
It's a marketing issue. StartSSL can make free certificates because the entire system is automated (until you require Level 2 certificates) so the cost of operation is very low. My guess is that the revocation is not entirely automated. There might also be reasons other than technical why it's not the case. In any case, if they explained the reasons it would put some perspective on their point of view and help people understand.
drdaeman 13y ago
> just 25$ to get a new one Due to $0 price of certificate I guess many had considered it would be a good idea to have a certificate per service, i.e. a separate one for HTTPS, email, XMPP and so on. I did. The overall thought was that if one service would be compromised, others would likely remain safe - but Heartbleed had completely changed the story. In my case if I'd revoke all the certificate it would be about $600. Call me names if you want to, but I'm not going to shell out that much. Guess, many others would think the same. I've updated OpenSSL but if any certs were compromised, they would stay so until they would naturally expire.

sexmonad 13y ago

StartSSL's default usage mode is to generate private keys on their website. Yet another horribly insecure system. I'd much rather that people used self-signed certs (and browsers had certificate pinning) by default, and could then step up to real CA certificates. Self-signed certs provide almost the same amount of trust that StartCom does.

kmac_ 13y ago
> StartSSL's default usage mode is to generate private keys on their website. No. AFAIR they use HTML5 <keygen> tag to generate key pair.
- drdaeman 13y ago
  That's for personal (client) certificates. For server certificates, unless you supply the CSR by yourself by skipping a step (IIRC, you're softly encouraged to do so), they generate the key server-side and send it to you back. They even have a FAQ entries (##43,44, although their site is down ATM, so Google for a cached copy) about that.
  - kmac_ 13y ago
    You're right, I've mixed up things.

dfc 13y ago

None of this has anything to do with StartSSL's trustworthiness as a CA. It is ridiculous to see that people are whining that a company that signed their cert for $0.00 is asking for some money for additional work. The $25 rekeying is a steal for a certificate. What CA in mozilla/chromium comes closest to StartSSL's $0.00 or $25.00 certificate? That question is not rehetorical, I am genuinely curious what is the second cheapest option for a signed certificate (from a CA trusted by default in mozilla/chromium).

yeukhon 13y ago
https://www.gandi.net/ssl/standard#single https://www.gandi.net/ssl/standard#single $16 per year. edit Someone said reseller namecheap and ssls are way cheaper and have the same trust as any CA.
- Spidler 13y ago
  Gandi are free if you have domain hosting with them.
  - yeukhon 13y ago
    Yes, but as a customer my SSL is only free for one year :)
aroch 13y ago
PossitiveSSL2 (Comodo) through a reseller (I use http://cheapsslsecurity.com/ http://cheapsslsecurity.com/ -- $5/year/5years)
- dfc 13y ago
  I was thinking about the two Comodo RAs (or three?) that had been compromised when I said from a CA trusted by mozilla/chromium: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=470897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=470897 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=526560 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=526560 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=599856 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=599856

yeukhon 13y ago

EDIT: Okay. Downvoter. Now defend your position. I think people should clam down and think thoroughly. I don't know the actual math on the cost for a CA to revoke and re-issue a new certificate. But what if someone finds another critical vulnerability? Do we go back and ask to revoke our certificate again? Free of charge? Is it necessary to call StartCom evil? Is that even fair? If you are serving real user data, please get a paid certificate yourself. Why? Because you have slightly better control of your certificate. If you are just running demo or running personal blog then get one from places like gandi.net (1 year at $16.00) edit: someone mention ssls.com and namecheap.com (resellers) offer cheap Comondo PositiveSSL at less than $10 per year. If you are running open source project, consider https://www.globalsign.com/ssl/ssl-open-source/ https://www.globalsign.com/ssl/ssl-open-source/ and http://www.godaddy.com/ssl/ssl-open-source.aspx http://www.godaddy.com/ssl/ssl-open-source.aspx. If you still can't afford one, I really don't know what to say to you at the moment.

drdaeman 13y ago
@EDIT: Sorry, that was me. I've misclicked the wrong button - meant to upvote, and there seems to be no way to undo. Nonetheless, I disagree. > Do we go back and ask to revoke our certificate again? Free of charge? That's right, ask to revoke. In current system, considering the position CAs' are in, trust is primarily their problem. If CA's not revoking the certificate that's compromised, it's CA who's to blame, not server administrators. Not sure about server admins who don't want to pay, but end users (those who see the false green padlock) have full moral right to call such CA "evil".
- yeukhon 13y ago
  Thank you. I think people should try to explain their downvote whenever possible so that I can have a decent discussion as my argument isn't always "correct". Like I said I don't know the cost to revoke certificate as a CA. One possible defense for StartCom is that they are worried about facing the same bill as the next critical vulnerability emerge. Someone said in some other threads that StartCom has this fee from ancient time. If that's true, this is just another "fine print" issue. > but end users (those who see the false green padlock) have full moral right to call such CA "evil". I agree. Though the question remains: should the CA take the blame of the flaw of a library every time given CA is not a charity, but a business?

ibejoeb 13y ago

Heartbleed is a big deal, and there's not a single entity that can bear the burden alone. We've all got to do our parts to revoke the millions of bad certificates, and we've go to be pretty quick about it. I'm a StartCom customer, and I'm going to suck it up and pay to revoke all of my certificates, including several class 2s and an EV. I'm going to do it because it's better for the PKI than if I don't. Now, StartCom, It would be nice if you'd help us out, too. This is a mess. Maybe we can get a bit of a break. Maybe you can revoke all of my certs for $25. Or maybe it can be $5 or $10 a piece. We want to put you out of business, but come on, we all know signing certs is tantamount to printing money. If the trust model falls apart, you're out anyway, so how about playing an active role in sorting this out?

tptacek 13y ago
Very few people will actually have lost privkeys. Patching your server is a much more important countermeasure than revocation. Certificate revocation in practice works nowhere nearly as well as it does on paper; in fact, it comes dangerously close to not working at all. Read Adam Langley's (jaundiced) take on OCSP for more details. Long story short: certificate revocation is probably not a big enough deal for Start to somehow be required to rewrite the terms you agreed to when you acquired your certs from them.
- rentzsch 13y ago
  I think this is Langley's post tptacek is referencing: https://www.imperialviolet.org/2012/02/05/crlsets.html https://www.imperialviolet.org/2012/02/05/crlsets.html
  - tptacek 13y ago
    Yup. So soft-fail revocation checks are like a seat-belt that snaps when you crash. Even though it works 99% of the time, it's worthless because it only works when you don't need it.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]