[145883] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
Re: A mighty fortress is our PKI, Part III
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Andy Steingruebl)
Wed Sep 15 18:19:11 2010
In-Reply-To: <E1Ovu5L-0005Ly-4M@wintermute02.cs.auckland.ac.nz>
Date: Wed, 15 Sep 2010 13:12:27 -0700
From: Andy Steingruebl <steingra@gmail.com>
To: Peter Gutmann <pgut001@cs.auckland.ac.nz>
Cc: cryptography@metzdowd.com
On Wed, Sep 15, 2010 at 8:39 AM, Peter Gutmann
<pgut001@cs.auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
> Some more amusing anecdotes from the world of PKI:
Peter,
Not to be too contrary (though at least a little) - not all of these
are really PKI failures are they?
> - There's malware out there that pokes fake Verisign certificates into th=
e
> =A0Windows trusted cert store, allowing the malware authors to be their o=
wn
> =A0Verisign.
The malware could just as easily fake the whole UI. Is it really
PKI's fault that it doesn't defend against malware? Did even the
grandest supporters ever claim it could/did?
> - CAs have issued certs to cybercrime web sites like
> =A0https://www.pay-per-install.com (an affiliate program for malware
> =A0installers), because hey, the Russian mafia's money is as good as anyo=
ne
> =A0else's.
Similarly here - non-EV CAs bind DNS names to a field in a
certificate. No more. They don't vouch for the business being run,
and in any case any such "audit" would be point in time anyway. I
suppose way back when people "promised" that certs would do this, but
does anyone believe that anymore and have it as an expectation?
Perhaps you're setting the bar a bit high?
BTW - do you have pointers to most of the things you've reported? I'd
love to get the full sordid details :)
- Andy
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