>From the IETF mailing list - further fallout from Edward Snowden's revelations. I have provided an acronym decoder at the end.
- Robin W3C/IAB workshop on Strengthening the Internet Against Pervasive Monitoring (STRINT) ====================================== http://www.w3.org/2014/strint/ The Vancouver IETF plenary concluded that pervasive monitoring represents an attack on the Internet, and the IETF has begun to carry out various of the more obvious actions [1] required to try to handle this attack. However, there are additional much more complex questions arising that need further consideration before any additional concrete plans can be made. The W3C and IAB will therefore host a one-day workshop on the topic of "Strengthening the Internet Against Pervasive Monitoring" before IETF-89 in London in March 2014, with support from the EU FP7 STREWS [2] project. Pervasive monitoring targets protocol data that we also need for network manageability and security. This data is captured and correlated with other data. There is an open problem as to how to enhance protocols so as to maintain network manageability and security but still limit data capture and correlation. The overall goal of the workshop is to steer IETF and W3C work so as to be able to improve or "strengthen" the Internet in the face of pervasive monitoring. A workshop report in the form of an IAB RFC will be produced after the event. Technical questions for the workshop include: - What are the pervasive monitoring threat models, and what is their effect on web and Internet protocol security and privacy? - What is needed so that web developers can better consider the pervasive monitoring context? - How are WebRTC and IoT impacted, and how can they be better protected? Are other key Internet and web technologies potentially impacted? - What gaps exist in current tool sets and operational best practices that could address some of these potential impacts? - What trade-offs exist between strengthening measures, (e.g. more encryption) and performance, operational or network management issues? - How do we guard against pervasive monitoring while maintaining network manageability? - Can lower layer changes (e.g., to IPv6, LISP, MPLS) or additions to overlay networks help? - How realistic is it to not be fingerprintable on the web and Internet? - How can W3C, the IETF and the IRTF better deal with new cryptographic algorithm proposals in future? - What are the practical benefits and limits of "opportunistic encryption"? - Can we deploy end-to-end crypto for email, SIP, the web, all TCP applications or other applications so that we mitigate pervasive monitoring usefully? - How might pervasive monitoring take form or be addressed in embedded systems or different industrial verticals? - How do we reconcile caching, proxies and other intermediaries with end-to-end encryption? - Can we obfuscate metadata with less overhead than TOR? - Considering meta-data: are there relevant differences between protocol artefacts, message sizes and patterns and payloads? Position papers (maximum of 5 pages using 10pt font or any length Internet-Drafts) from academia, industry and others that focus on the broader picture and that warrant the kind of extended discussion that a full day workshop offers are the most welcome. Papers that reflect experience based on running code and deployed services are also very welcome. Papers that are proposals for point-solutions are less useful in this context, and can simply be submitted as Internet-Drafts and discussed on relevant IETF or W3C lists, e.g. the IETF perpass list. [3] The workshop will be by invitation only. Those wishing to attend should submit a position paper or Internet-Draft. All inputs submitted and considered relevant will be published on the workshop web page. The organisers (STREWS project participants, IAB and W3C staff) will decide whom to invite based on the submissions received. Sessions will be organized according to content, and not every accepted submission or invited attendee will have an opportunity to present as the intent is to foster discussion and not simply to have a sequence of presentations. [1] http://down.dsg.cs.tcd.ie/misc/perpass.txt [2] http://www.strews.eu/ [3] https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/perpass ============================ IETF = Internet Engineering Task Force http://www.ietf.org IRTF = Internet Research Task Force http://www.irtf.org IAB = Internet Architecture Board http://www.iab.org W3C = World Wide Web Consortium http://www.w3.org/ WebRTC = Web Real-Time Communications - an Application Programming Interface for "browser-to-browser applications for voice-calling, video-chat and peer-to-peer (P2P) file sharing without plugins." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebRTC IoT = Internet of Things - devices connecting to other devices with little or now human involvement. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_of_Things LISP = An attempt to achieve scalable routing - large numbers of networks with their own IP addresses without causing the problem, which this would cause at present, of overburdening the control plane of the interdomain routing system. Also, achieving mobility of devices which retain their IP address as they change their physical connections. Not in use except for experiments. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locator/Identifier_Separation_Protocol Critique and alternative: http://www.firstpr.com.au/ip/ivip/ MPLS = Multiprotocol Label Switching - enables streams of data in various other protocols to be encapsulated and sent along pre-defined paths through MPLS routers based on a short label at the start of each packet. Used by telco/ISP networks, not by end-users. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPLS IPv6 = A separate, mid-to-late 1990s little-used 128 bit addressing Internet from the main IPv4 32 bit Internet. A few protocols such as SMTP (email) interwork, but otherwise computers with addresses on only one cannot communicate with computers with addresses on only the other. SIP = For setting up Voice over Internet Protocol calls. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Session_Initiation_Protocol TCP = Transmission Control Protocol. In this context, means the basic protocols for all Internet (IPv4 and IPv6) communications. Embedded systems = devices with a computer built in, but where the functionality is pretty much predetermined - that is it is not a general purpose system with the ability to load application programs or have the user manage the device. For example GPS systems, washing machine control microcontrollers, probably chips in credit cards, automotive control systems, digital cameras etc. etc. Industrial verticals. They seem to have made this one up. Metadata = various "data about data" meanings. TOR = The Onion Router. Global network to support anonymised communications. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tor_%28anonymity_network%29 Running code = Computer software (AKA code) which actually works. _______________________________________________ Link mailing list [email protected] http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/link
