4 ms·

> SSL can easily be MITMed if you control the host How is it MITM if you control the host? If you don't trust the host then you are hosed, period- there is no

> SSL can easily be MITMed if you control the host How is it MITM if you control the host? If you don't trust the host then you are hosed, period- there is no protocol that will save you.

rictic 12y ago
You and the parent are not in disagreement. The point was merely that individuals who are subordinate (children, employees) can be monitored with or without TLS, and the original article's objection was irrelevant (and to my eyes, very strange).
- phkamp 12y ago
  No, this is actually a very important point for me. If HTTP/2.0 had done this right, there wouldn't be a need for your employer to trojan your CA list so they can check for "inappropriate content" going either way through their firewall. (Under various laws they may be legally mandated to do so, flight controllers, financial traders etc.) But because HTTP/2.0 was more about $BIGSITEs unfettered access to their users, no mechanism was provided for such legally mandated M-I-T-M, and therefore the CA-system will be trojaned by even more people, resulting in even less security for these users. Likewise, pushing a lot of traffic which doesn't really need it onto SSL/TLS will only force NSA and others to trojan the CA-system even harder, otherwise they cannot do the job the law says they should do. As I've said earlier: Just mindlessly slapping encryption on traffic will not solve political problems but is likely to make them much worse. See for instance various "Law Enforcement" types calling for laws to ban encryption or Englands existing law that basically allow them to jail you until you decrypt whatever they want you to decrypt (never mind if you actually can or not...) Edit to add: The point about $BIGSITE is that everybody hates it when Hotels, ISPs and Phone companies modifies the content to insert adds etc. Rightfully so. Any proxy which does not faithfully pass content should be forced to need the clients accept for its actions. But since such proxies are legal and in some cases legally mandated some places (smut filters in libraries & schools, filters in jails. Parental controls at home, "compliance gateways" at companies) trying to make them impossible with the protocol just means that the protocol will be broken.
  - magicalist 12y ago
    > But because HTTP/2.0 was more about $BIGSITEs unfettered access to their users Can you explain the link from required SSL to this point? I'm not seeing it...don't they already have unfettered access?
  - yellowapple 12y ago
    I think the big point that a lot of people are raising, however, is that a "proxy which does not faithfully pass content" shouldn't be legal in the first place. Users don't want network operators to be snooping on them if they can avoid it. The fact that such behaviors are formally legal now does not mean that we (i.e. internet users as a whole) should just lay on our backs and let $BIGSITE have its way with us. In fact, the uses of proxies that you seem to be pointing out as examples of why ubiquitous encryption is a "bad thing" - such as those in schools, homes, workplaces, etc. to block "objectionable content" - would probably be better handled by blocking IP addresses or domain names, rather than trying to break into encrypted HTTP sessions, would it not? Last I checked, TLS does not prevent the ability to detect when a user agent attempts to access a particular host (whether by IP address or domain name), thus allowing $BIGSITE to close off access to blacklisted or non-whitelisted hosts without needing to know the exact data being exchanged. Honestly, and with all due respect, the idea that ubiquitous use of TLS would in any way, shape, or form stifle $BIGSITE's ability to monitor and block attempts to access "objectionable" sites seems absurd when there are plenty of more effective ways to do such things that don't involve a total compromise of privacy or secrecy.
    - phkamp 12y ago
      You are welcome to that opinion, take it up with your lawmakers, vote based on it, or run for office yourself to make it reality. Just don't think you will make such proxies disappear with technical means -- in particular not where they are mandated by law. I fully agree with you when we're talking about people trying to make money by modifying 3rd party traffic. But I leave it to the relevant legislatures (and their electorates!) to decide with respect to libraries, schools, prisons, financial traders, spies, police offices and so on. With respect to HTTP/2 there were two choices: 1) Try to use the protocol to force a particular political agenda through. 2) Make the protocol such that people behind manipulating proxies have notice that this is so, and leave the question of which proxies whould be there to the political systems. Implementing policy with protocols or standardisation has never worked and it won't work this time either. At the end of the day: IETF has no army, NSA is part of one.

> SSL can easily be MITMed if you control the host How is it MITM if you control the host? If you don't trust the host then you are hosed, period- there is no protocol that will save you.

rictic 12y ago

You and the parent are not in disagreement. The point was merely that individuals who are subordinate (children, employees) can be monitored with or without TLS, and the original article's objection was irrelevant (and to my eyes, very strange).

phkamp 12y ago
No, this is actually a very important point for me. If HTTP/2.0 had done this right, there wouldn't be a need for your employer to trojan your CA list so they can check for "inappropriate content" going either way through their firewall. (Under various laws they may be legally mandated to do so, flight controllers, financial traders etc.) But because HTTP/2.0 was more about $BIGSITEs unfettered access to their users, no mechanism was provided for such legally mandated M-I-T-M, and therefore the CA-system will be trojaned by even more people, resulting in even less security for these users. Likewise, pushing a lot of traffic which doesn't really need it onto SSL/TLS will only force NSA and others to trojan the CA-system even harder, otherwise they cannot do the job the law says they should do. As I've said earlier: Just mindlessly slapping encryption on traffic will not solve political problems but is likely to make them much worse. See for instance various "Law Enforcement" types calling for laws to ban encryption or Englands existing law that basically allow them to jail you until you decrypt whatever they want you to decrypt (never mind if you actually can or not...) Edit to add: The point about $BIGSITE is that everybody hates it when Hotels, ISPs and Phone companies modifies the content to insert adds etc. Rightfully so. Any proxy which does not faithfully pass content should be forced to need the clients accept for its actions. But since such proxies are legal and in some cases legally mandated some places (smut filters in libraries & schools, filters in jails. Parental controls at home, "compliance gateways" at companies) trying to make them impossible with the protocol just means that the protocol will be broken.
- magicalist 12y ago
  > But because HTTP/2.0 was more about $BIGSITEs unfettered access to their users Can you explain the link from required SSL to this point? I'm not seeing it...don't they already have unfettered access?
- yellowapple 12y ago
  I think the big point that a lot of people are raising, however, is that a "proxy which does not faithfully pass content" shouldn't be legal in the first place. Users don't want network operators to be snooping on them if they can avoid it. The fact that such behaviors are formally legal now does not mean that we (i.e. internet users as a whole) should just lay on our backs and let $BIGSITE have its way with us. In fact, the uses of proxies that you seem to be pointing out as examples of why ubiquitous encryption is a "bad thing" - such as those in schools, homes, workplaces, etc. to block "objectionable content" - would probably be better handled by blocking IP addresses or domain names, rather than trying to break into encrypted HTTP sessions, would it not? Last I checked, TLS does not prevent the ability to detect when a user agent attempts to access a particular host (whether by IP address or domain name), thus allowing $BIGSITE to close off access to blacklisted or non-whitelisted hosts without needing to know the exact data being exchanged. Honestly, and with all due respect, the idea that ubiquitous use of TLS would in any way, shape, or form stifle $BIGSITE's ability to monitor and block attempts to access "objectionable" sites seems absurd when there are plenty of more effective ways to do such things that don't involve a total compromise of privacy or secrecy.
  - phkamp 12y ago
    You are welcome to that opinion, take it up with your lawmakers, vote based on it, or run for office yourself to make it reality. Just don't think you will make such proxies disappear with technical means -- in particular not where they are mandated by law. I fully agree with you when we're talking about people trying to make money by modifying 3rd party traffic. But I leave it to the relevant legislatures (and their electorates!) to decide with respect to libraries, schools, prisons, financial traders, spies, police offices and so on. With respect to HTTP/2 there were two choices: 1) Try to use the protocol to force a particular political agenda through. 2) Make the protocol such that people behind manipulating proxies have notice that this is so, and leave the question of which proxies whould be there to the political systems. Implementing policy with protocols or standardisation has never worked and it won't work this time either. At the end of the day: IETF has no army, NSA is part of one.