[Cryptography] FREAK attack

[Phillip Hallam-Baker]

On Wed, Mar 4, 2015 at 12:18 PM, Jerry Leichter <leichter at lrw.com> wrote:

> Latest attack on SSL, affecting some huge percentage of both servers and
> clients:  https://freakattack.com/
>
> Remember all those export modes for SSL that we had to live with two
> decades ago?  Well, it turns out they are still present in at least two
> code bases (OpenSSL and Apple's SSL implementation), though they aren't
> offered to the peer.  However, if you MITM the connection and simply tell
> both ends to use export RSA (512 bit=) - due to bad checking, they will.
>
> Lessons to learn:
>
> 1.  Modes and choices are bad in crypto protocols.
> 2.  Leaving holes to let "good governments" in will inevitably leave holes
> for others as well.
> 3.  In code, assume nothing ever really goes away.
>

0. You don't get more security by adding stronger ciphers to a system. You
get more security by stopping use of the weaker ones.

Also, I note that we get one of these events about once a month while CA
issues occur at a much lower rate. Every time there is a CA event there are
people proposing to do away with CAs. But nobody ever seems to come to the
same conclusion about browsers...
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