[IP] Warning: Microsoft/Verisign scam on the horizon
Begin forwarded message:
From: Cliff Bamford <bamford@xxxxxx>
Date: October 26, 2006 10:45:34 AM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Warning: Microsoft/Verisign scam on the horizon
Dave: for IP if you wish...
Microsoft doesn't like the fact that Firefox is chipping away at its
Internet Explorer monopoly. It has teamed up with another outfit
with equally uncertain corporate morals: Verisign. Together, they
are going to implement a masterpiece of marketing hype called
"extended validation certificates (EVCs)” I’ll explain what those are
below, but first here are my predictions about the effects EVCs will
have on our online lives:
Extended validation certificates will:
1. Further screw up the already dismal security of the Internet
2. Confuse and mislead nearly everybody
3. Help Microsoft scare people back to Internet Explorer
4. Allow Verisign to charge premium prices for a bunch of almost
meaningless "upgrades"
The way this will work is: when you visit a site that has purchased
an EVC from Verisign, if you are using a recent version of Internet
Explorer, the address bar at the top of your browser window will turn
green --- supposedly indicating that you are connected to a "super
secure" site. This is brilliant marketing, but technically, it is
99% baloney.
Digital certificates are electronic credentials that your browser
uses to insure that you are actually communicating with the website
you think you're communicating with. They don't work very well, in
part because this is a very difficult problem involving elusive
concepts like "the true identity of an organization, as reflected in
the equipment it attaches to the Internet" --- or worse, "the
website you think you're communicating with". The problem was slowly
being solved, but neither Microsoft nor Verisign (nor, to be fair,
anybody else) was willing to wait for a solution. So the current
version of digital certificates was implemented, in a manner that
left serious holes in the security fence that certificates were
supposed to provide.
Most of the holes have been patched, but the original, fundamental
issues of identity and authentication are still unsolved. Until a
good solution to those abstract problems is found and widely
implemented (that’s at least 5 to 10 years away), the term “fully
validated digital certificate” is an oxymoron.
But peopled want assurance that they are safe while surfing the wild
and dangerous Internet --- and they don’t want to waste much time
understanding the details. Which is why a green bar is a brilliant
marketing idea --- even if it actually means next to nothing.
Microsoft is a masterful marketing company, but it doesn’t do
security very well. Remember January 2004, when Bill Gates promised
us that spam would be ended by 2006? The reason that Bill couldn’t
keep his promise was ultimately due to the same kinds of problems
with identity and authentication that apply to digital certificates
-- "extensively validated" or otherwise.
Bill’s promise about spam was empty. The green bar in Internet
Explorer will be almost equally empty. Unfortunately, many people
will probably fall for the razzle-dazzle.
Cliff Bamford
Here’ some background information:
Original URL: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/25/
verisign_extended_validation/
Verisign backs Vista security green streak
By Chris Williams (chris.williams@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Published Wednesday 25th October 2006 12:04 GMT
The Mozilla Foundation risks losing the browser battle if it fails to
keep up with Microsoft by incorporating new security technology into
Firefox, a Verisign exec has claimed.
According to Verisign product marketing director Tim Callan, the
"loose collection of technoanarchists" which make up the open source
development community has frustrated efforts to build new security
features into its new browser.
Verisign is at the RSA Europe Conference in Nice talking up a new
breed of online security certificate. The padlock encryption symbol
used by browsers has been effectively meaningless for some time, and
consumer paranoia surrounding fraud remains a barrier to using online
commerce for many.
In response, the verification industry in the form of the CA browser
forum has come up with extended validation SSL, where the certificate
really is a guarantee of kosher status. Honest.
Murphy's law says extended validation will be broken by the bad guys
sooner or later. Callan said the industry had learned from the
fossilised nature of SSL, and the new standard will be continually
updated to keep pace with organised crime. "That's how it goes...I'm
not going to lie and say we can beat them with a static defence," he
said.
The system is implemented in IE7 by turning the address green for
sites holding a extended validation certificate. Redmond is keeping
the feature under wraps until the release of Vista in January, when
the first wave of extended validation certificates will be issued to
the likes of PayPal and Amazon. Along with many others, Verisign are
working towards a January 24 release date which was briefly bean-
spilled by Amazon on Vista pre-orders.
Callan puts Mozilla's apparent heel-dragging on the new security
technology down to the character of its development community.
Several community members have been involved in the development
process however and are "acutely aware of the most minor details" of
the project.
One snarl-up for Mozilla may have been working out an alternative to
the rest of Microsoft's site-rating system. As well as getting
dishing out green address bars, servers at Redmond will blacklist
dodgy and suspect sites, which can look forward to red and amber
flashing up.
A Firefox implementation of extended validation can only be a matter
of time, since the Mozilla Foundation knows in order to compete it
cannot afford for its browser to be just as good as IE7; it has to be
better.
Verisign say 99 per cent of sites will be get the "ok" and the
address bar left white. Only outfits which fork out for an extended
validation SSL will get the psychological filip of "green for go".
Firms will have to stump up about 150 per cent of what they currently
do for an SSL certificate.
Microsoft-beating security meant the first Firefox browser found its
way onto millions of desktops. When Vista finally ships, a big
Microsoft public awareness campaign will be aimed at making extended
validation a de facto standard, which will pile pressure on Mozilla
to update Firefox sharpish. ®
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