On 6 March 2015 at 16:12, Stephen Kent <[email protected]> wrote:

>  Ben,
>
> Happy to oblige.  The revised text is attached.
>

Thanks.


>
> As for your comments:
>
> I still don't really understand this point: the log has no power to check
> syntax that is not also available to a client,
>
>  In principle that's true, but in practice we have seen many instances
> where client software
> fails to perform checks established by standards. Thus logs represent an
> opportunity to
> do a better job (since they are new code) and perhaps help save clients
> from bad code.
>
> so I don't see how the log checking/not checking syntax is interesting - a
> malicious CA presumably cannot know what all clients will do? Because of
> this, I also still do not see the real value of logs checking syntax - I am
> not fundamentally against it, but it doesn't seem to me to add much.
>
>  A malicious CA can determine (via testing) which clients, by browser type
> and version,
> fail to perform certain syntactic checks. If the CA is creating a bogus
> cert with a
> particular set of clients in mind, this may suffice.
>
> It is not clear to me that gossip has to be mandatory. So long as some
> fraction of participants gossip, then clients are protected from
> non-targeted attacks. Obviously this does not remove the need to specify
> gossip, which is clearly required for CT to fully realise its potential.
>
>
Perhaps we need a mechanism analagous to TLS extensions that allow CT logs
to extend their validation and advertise that fact?


>
> Remember that IETF standards almost always specify mandatory to implement
> (MTI) features, not
> mandatory to use (MTU) features. I believe your comment above supports my
> argument that gossip needs
> to be MTI, but not MTU.
>

I am not so sure, but in any case, this is a debate for the gossip RFC.


>
> Steve
>
>
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