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strict TLS guidance wording #437

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thomas-fossati opened this issue Jul 13, 2022 · 2 comments · Fixed by #461
Closed

strict TLS guidance wording #437

thomas-fossati opened this issue Jul 13, 2022 · 2 comments · Fixed by #461
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@thomas-fossati
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** Section 3.2
  When TLS-only
  communication is available for a certain protocol, it MUST be used
  by implementations and MUST be configured by administrators.

This guidance seems a little vague but prescriptive.  Is the guidance that if
there is a TLS-version or TLS support for a given protocol, that
implementations of that protocol “MUST” support it?  My confusion is around the
wording that “it must be used by implementations.”

cc @rdanyliw

@stpeter
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stpeter commented Jul 14, 2022

Via email I replied:

The idea is that if the protocol has a way to ensure that TLS is used (e.g., port 443 in HTTP), then it is safer to use that method than to perform dynamic upgrade. This isn't about using TLS or not using TLS, but about which method is used (if a protocol supports a TLS-only mode/port and a dynamic upgrade mode/port). We thought this would have been clear from the context of the paragraph.

Perhaps this would be clearer?

OLD

  When TLS-only
  communication is available for a certain protocol, it MUST be used
  by implementations and MUST be configured by administrators.

NEW

  When a TLS-only
  communication method is available for a certain protocol, it MUST
  be used by implementations and MUST be configured by
  administrators, in preference to a dynamic upgrade method.

@stpeter
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stpeter commented Jul 18, 2022

As I suggested via email, perhaps it would be clearer to say that implementations must provide the ability for administrators to set a strict local policy. I will provide a PR.

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