[Cryptography] Do capabilities work? Do ACLs work?

Bill Frantz frantz at pwpconsult.com
Tue Feb 10 16:05:36 EST 2015


On 2/10/15 at 4:52 AM, iang at iang.org (ianG) wrote:

>In a more developed sense, my software has lots of caps running 
>around, but servers that serve those caps also look at who's 
>asking.  E.g., when Bob looks at Alice's photo, the server only 
>grants it if Bob is in Alice's A list.

It is probably better to look at who is asking only when 
producing the audit trail. Otherwise you won't be able to handle 
the situation I mentioned earlier in this thread:

   For an example of the flexibility we need in our policies,
   consider a real-world situation (from:
   <http://www.hpl.hp.com/techreports/2009/HPL-2009-169.pdf>):
   Alice, in a race to her next meeting, turns thunder-struck to Bob
   and says, "Bob, I just remembered I need to get my daughter
   Carol’s car to Dave’s repair shop. I’ve got to go to this
   meeting. Can you take Carol’s car over there?"

Good audit trails provide security in many non-computer 
situations. They can work with computers as well.

Cheers - Bill

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