NETWORK WORKING GROUP N. Williams Internet-Draft Sun Expires: December 30, 2004 July 2004 Guide to the GSS-APIv3 draft-williams-gssapi-v3-guide-to-00.txt Status of this Memo By submitting this Internet-Draft, I certify that any applicable patent or other IPR claims of which I am aware have been disclosed, and any of which I become aware will be disclosed, in accordance with RFC 3668. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/ietf/1id-abstracts.txt. The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html. This Internet-Draft will expire on December 30, 2004. Copyright Notice Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2004). All Rights Reserved. Abstract Extensions to the GSS-APIv2 are needed for a number of reasons. This documents describes the extensions being proposed, the resons, possible future directions, and portability, IANA and security considerations. This document does not define any protocol or interface and is purely informational. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 1] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 Table of Contents 1. Conventions used in this document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 2. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 3. A Pseudo-Mechanism OID for the GSS-API Itself . . . . . . . . 5 4. Mechanism Attribute Inquiry Facilities . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 5. Security Context Extensibility Extensions . . . . . . . . . . 7 6. Credential Extensibility Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8 7. Credential Export/Import . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 8. GSS_Store_cred() . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10 9. Pseudo-Mechanism Stacking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 10. Naming Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 11. Additional Name Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 12. GSS_Pseudo_random() . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 13. Channel Bindings Specifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 14. Semantic and Miscallaneous Extensions . . . . . . . . . . . . 16 15. Portability Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17 16. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 17. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 18. Normative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . 20 Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 2] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 1. Conventions used in this document The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119]. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 3] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 2. Introduction [NOTE: the references section is current fairly empty; the various KITTEN WG work items will be added to this I-D in a subsequent revision.] Since the advent of the GSS-APIv2 it has come to be used in a number of Internet (and other) protocols and a number of implementations exist. In that time implementors and protocol designers have come to understand both, the GSS-API's strengths, and its shortcommings; we believe now that a number of extensions to the GSS-API are needed. Here these proposed extensions, forming what we may call the GSS-API version 3, are described at a high-level.; Some of these extensions are intended to facilitate further extensions, so that further major revisions to the GSS-API may not be necessary. Others are intended to fill voids in the the GSS-APIv2. The extensions being proposed are: A pseudo-mechanism OID for the GSS-API itself Mechanism attribute inquiry facilities Security context extensibility extensions Credential extensibility extensions Credential export/import GSS_Store_cred(), for making delegated credentials available for acquisition Pseudo-mechanism stacking Naming extensions, to facilitate authorization by identifiers other than names Additional name types, specifically domain-based naming A pseudo-random function interface Channel bindings specifications Semantic extensions relating to thread- and/or fork-safety [Have I missed anything? I have a feeling I have. Re-keying?] ... Additionally, because we foresee future minor extensions, including, specifically, extensions which may impact the various namespaces associated with APIs (symbol names, constant values, class names, etc...) we also propose the establishment of IANA registries for these namespaces. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 4] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 3. A Pseudo-Mechanism OID for the GSS-API Itself A mechanism OID is assigned to identify and refer to the GSS-API iself. This is necessary to enable the use of extended inquiry interfaces to inquire about features of a GSS-API implementation specifically, apart from actual mechanisms. But also, this OID is needed for better error handling, so that minor status codes produced in generic contexts that lack a mechanism OID can be distinguished from minor status codes for a "default" mechanism and properly displayed. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 5] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 4. Mechanism Attribute Inquiry Facilities In the course of designing a pseudo-mechanism stacking facility, as well as while considering the impact of all of these extensions on portability, a need for interfaces through which to discover or inquire by features provided by GSS-API mechanisms was discovered. The proposed mechanism attribute inquiry interfaces consist of: GSS_Inquire_mech_attrs_for_mech() GSS_Indicate_mechs_by_mech_attrs() GSS_Display_mech_attr() These extensions facilitate portability by allowing GSS-APIv3 applications to discover the features provided by a given implementation of the GSS-API or any mechanisms. These extensions are also useful in facilitating stackable pseudo-mechanisms. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 6] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 5. Security Context Extensibility Extensions In order to facilitate future security context options we introduce a GSS_Create_sec_context() interface that creates a security context object, for use with extensions and with GSS_Init_sec_context(), GSS_Accept_sec_context(), and GSS_Inquire_sec_context(). Such security contexts are in a non-established state until they are established through the use of GSS_Init_sec_context() or GSS_Accept_sec_context(). Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 7] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 6. Credential Extensibility Extensions In order to facilitate future extensions to GSS credentials we introduce a GSS_Create_credential(), similar to GSS_Create_sec_context(), interface that creates an "empty" credential. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 8] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 7. Credential Export/Import To allow for passing of credentials between different "session contexts," between different hosts, or for storage of post-dated credentials, we introduce a credential export/import facility, much like the security context export/import facility of the GSS-APIv2. Together with credential extensibility and other extensions this facility may allow for: Credential delegation at any time Post-dated credentials, and storage of the such for subsequent use. ...? Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 9] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 8. GSS_Store_cred() This extension fills a void in the GSS-APIv2 where delegated credentials could not be used except in the context of the same process that received them. With this extension acceptor applications can now make delegated credentials available for use, with GSS_Acquire_cred() et. al., in other process contexts. [Manipulation of "credential stores" is (may be?) out of scope for this document.] Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 10] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 9. Pseudo-Mechanism Stacking A number of pseudo-mechanisms are being proposed which are designed to "stack" atop other mechanisms. The possiblities are many, including: a compression mechanism, a perfect forward security mechanism, an many others. The GSS-APIv2 only had concrete mechanisms and one pseudo-mechanism (SPNEGO) available. With this proposal the mechanism taxonomy is quite expanded: Concrete mechanisms (e.g., the Kerberos V mechanism) Composite mechanisms (a concrete mechanism composed with one or more stackable pseudo-mechanisms) Stackable pseudo-mechanisms Other pseudo-mechanisms (e.g., SPNEGO, the GSS-API itself) Although composed mechanisms may be made available for use by GSS-APIv2 applications without any further extensions, use of stackable pseudo-mechanisms can complicate mechanism negotiation; additionally, discovery of mechanisms appropriate for use in one or another context would require hard-coding information about them in GSS-APIv2 applications. Extensions to the GSS-APIv2 could facilitate use of composite. The mechanism attribute inquiry facilities, together with the forllowing additional interfaces, provide for a complete interface to mechanism composition and for managing the complexity of mechanism negotiation: GSS_Compose_oid() GSS_Decompose_oid() GSS_Release_oid() GSS_Indicate_negotiable_mechs() GSS_Negotiate_mechs() Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 11] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 10. Naming Extensions Some applications make use of exported names, as produced by GSS_Export_name(), to create/manage/evaluate access control lists; we call this name-based authorization. Exported names typically encode names that are meant for display to humans, not internal identifiers. In practice this creates a number of problems. E.g., the referential integrity of such access control lists is hard to maintain as principals are added, removed, renamed or old principal names reused. Additionally, some mechanisms may lack a notion of a "canonical" name for some or all of their principals. Such mechanisms cannot be used by applications that rely on name-based authorization. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 12] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 11. Additional Name Types Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 13] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 12. GSS_Pseudo_random() Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 14] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 13. Channel Bindings Specifications Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 15] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 14. Semantic and Miscallaneous Extensions The GSS-APIv2 specifications say nothing about the thread-safety, much less the fork-safety, of the GSS-API. Thread-safety and fork-safety are, after all, platform- and/or language-specific matters. But as support for multi-threading spreads the matter of thread-safety cannot be avoided. The matter of fork-safety is specific to platforms that provide a "fork()" function, or similar. Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 16] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 15. Portability Considerations The potential for additional generic, mechanism-specific, language binding-specific and, most importantly, semantic extensions to the GSS-APIv3 may create application portability problems. The mechanism attribute inquiry facilities of the GSS-APIv3 and the pseudo-mechanism OID for the GSS-API itself double as a run-time facility for discovery of feature availability. Run-time feature discovery facilities, in turn, can be used at application build-time as well by building small applications to display the available features. <...> Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 17] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 16. IANA Considerations Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 18] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 17. Security Considerations <...> 18 Normative [RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997. [RFC2743] Linn, J., "Generic Security Service Application Program Interface Version 2, Update 1", RFC 2743, January 2000. [RFC2744] Wray, J., "Generic Security Service API Version 2 : C-bindings", RFC 2744, January 2000. Author's Address Nicolas Williams Sun Microsystems 5300 Riata Trace Ct Austin, TX 78727 US EMail: Nicolas.Williams@sun.com Williams Expires December 30, 2004 [Page 19] Internet-Draft Guide to the GSS-APIv3 July 2004 Intellectual Property Statement The IETF takes no position regarding the validity or scope of any Intellectual Property Rights or other rights that might be claimed to pertain to the implementation or use of the technology described in this document or the extent to which any license under such rights might or might not be available; nor does it represent that it has made any independent effort to identify any such rights. Information on the procedures with respect to rights in RFC documents can be found in BCP 78 and BCP 79. 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