Gregory Maxwell wrote:
On Fri, Jan 9, 2015 at 3:21 PM, Martin Burnicki
<[email protected]> wrote:
Systems which are simply time clients can receive the leap second warning
via the usual protocols like NTP or PTP/IEEE1588.
Indeed, they can. Even when there hasn't been a leap-second.
Practically all internet (and otherwise?) time distribution is
unauthenticated, the leap second itself is unauthenticated.
... and even the time you get via NTP or PTP is usually not
authenticated. So you can trust the time and leap second warning, or you
shouldn't trust either.
It's fragile enough that there have been accidental false leap-second events.
Yes, for example if there have been GPS receivers which decoded the UTC
parameters incorrectly, and started to announce a leap second when there
wasn't one (end of September).
That's why, for example, ntpd's leap second handling code has been
changed in v4.2.6 to accept a leap second warning only if the warning is
received from a majority of the configured servers.
If you want to be sure you can also provide ntpd with a leap second file
which is then (in current versions) considered as authentic source for
leap second information.
Martin
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