TLS-SRP & TLS-PSK support in browsers (Re: Dutch Transport Card Broken)

[Ian G]

Frank Siebenlist wrote:

> Why do the browser companies not care?

I spent a few years trying to interest (at least) one 
browser vendor with looking at new security problems 
(phishing) and using the knowledge that we had to solve this 
(opportunistic cryptography).  No luck whatsoever.  My view 
of why it is impractical / impossible to interest the 
browser vendors in new ideas and new security might be 
summed as this:

* Browser vendors operate a closed security shop.  I think 
this is because of a combination of things.  Mostly, all 
security shops are closed, and there aren't any good 
examples of open security shops (at least that I can think 
of).  We see some outreach in the last few years (blogs or 
lists by some) but they are very ... protected, the moat is 
still there.

* Browser vendors are influenced heavily by companies, which 
have strong agendas.  Security programmers at the open 
browsers are often employed by big companies who want their 
security in.  They are not interested in user security. 
Security programmers need jobs, they don't do this stuff for 
fun.  So it is not as if you can blame them.

* Browser vendors don't employ security people as we know 
them on this mailgroup, they employ cryptoplumbers. 
Completely different layer.  These people are mostly good 
(and often very good) at fixing security bugs.  We thank 
them for that!  But they are completely at sea when it comes 
to systemic security failings or designing new systems.

* Which also means it is rather difficult to have a 
conversation with them.  For example, programmers don't know 
what governance is, so they don't know how to deal with PKI 
(which is governance with some certificate sugar), and they 
can't readily map a multi-party failure.  OTOH, they know 
what code is, so if you code it up you can have a 
conversation.  But if your conversation needs non-code 
elements ... glug glug...

* Browser vendors work to a limited subset of the old PKI 
book.  Unfortunately, the book itself isn't written, with 
consequent problems.  So certain myths (like "all CAs must 
be the same") have arisen which are out of sync with the 
original PKI thinking ... and out of sync with reality ... 
but there is no easy way to deal with this because of the 
previous points.

* Browser vendors may be on the hook for phishing.  When you 
start to talk in terms like that, legal considerations make 
people go gooey and vague.  Nobody in a browser vendor can 
have that conversation.

Which is all to say ... it's not the people!  It's the 
assumptions and history and finance and all other structural 
issues.  That won't change until they are ready to change, 
and there are only limited things that outsiders can do.

Just a personal opinion.

iang

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