If you really want to have a header, you could also have the unsigned JWT
have 2 components (1 dot).  That way, you would demux
unsigned/signed/encrypted based on number of dots, not "alg".

--Richard


On Thu, Aug 1, 2013 at 1:51 PM, Matt Miller (mamille2)
<[email protected]>wrote:

> If something doesn't have a signature (or MAC, yeah yeah yeah), then I
> have a really hard time calling it a JWS (JSON Web Signature), and there
> fore have a really hard time seeing "alg":"none" as useful.
>
> Assuming this is using compact serialization: Why not just send in the
> base64url(payload)?  Then you can tell if you have an actually signed JWT
> (3 dots) versus an unsigned JWT (0 dots).
>
>
> - m&m
>
> Matt Miller < [email protected] >
> Cisco Systems, Inc.
>
> On Aug 1, 2013, at 1:23 PM, jose issue tracker <
> [email protected]> wrote:
>
> > #36: Algorithm "none" should be removed
> >
> >
> > Comment (by [email protected]):
> >
> > And sure enough, working groups across the IETF are having to explicitly
> > forbid the use of null ciphersuites.  They provide empirical evidence
> that
> > this design pattern is a bad idea.
> >
> > As I've pointed out before, you can add that verification algorithm, but
> > you will not have a good time writing security considerations around it.
> > Checking that you support "none" is not enough -- you have to check that
> > *nothing* *else* in the header could possibly indicate that a different
> > signature algorithm should be used.
> >
> > So we have something that (1) causes a lot of spec work, (2) causes
> > security vulnerabilities under likely implementaiton designs, and (3) has
> > no use case, and (4) will haunt us for years to come (how many times do
> > you want to write 'MUST NOT use "alg":"none"'?).  Sounds like a recipe
> for
> > success!
> >
> > --
> >
> -------------------------+-------------------------------------------------
> > Reporter:               |       Owner:  draft-ietf-jose-json-web-
> >  [email protected] |  [email protected]
> >     Type:  defect       |      Status:  new
> > Priority:  major        |   Milestone:
> > Component:  json-web-    |     Version:
> >  signature              |  Resolution:
> > Severity:  -            |
> > Keywords:               |
> >
> -------------------------+-------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Ticket URL: <http://trac.tools.ietf.org/wg/jose/trac/ticket/36#comment:4
> >
> > jose <http://tools.ietf.org/jose/>
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > jose mailing list
> > [email protected]
> > https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/jose
>
>
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