Re: [liberationtech] W3C WebCrypto Last Call for Comments *today*

On Mon, May 26, 2014 at 04:54:59PM +0200, Anders Rundgren wrote:
> I guess the problem is that writing secure applications remain difficult.

Unless you acknowledge the problem as such and design a new stack
from scratch. Look at EthOS, GNUnet, Briar for inspiration.
They place security at the routing layer thus avoiding entire
classes of typical mistakes by design. WebCrypto is a perpetuation
of the broken old design.

> The (in)famous "heartblead" bug is is a recent example of that.
> Promising secure applications by using secure algorithms would be wrong
> because that is only a part of the problem.

Heartbleed is a bad example since it is not about security design
but about the safety or corruptibility of the open source software
maintenance culture. Apples and oranges so to speak.

> Packaged solutions may provide solutions for people with limited
> knowledge of secure applications.  Such packages can be written on
> top of APIs such as WebCrypto.

No, because the security design failures are below WebCrypto, thus
nothing on top of it can be safe by design - it can only happen to
work by accident or authority permission. If you want something you
may possibly be enabled to build safe things upon, look at the three
things I mentioned above.

> We must not forget that the banks haven't managed creating secure
> credit-card payments on the web although they have had 20
> years to think about it :-)

That's because they would have to replace the web. They could
do safe credit-card payments over GNUnet within months from now.

> Due to the latter no even the "secure" EMV-cards are more secure
> than the non-secure dittos when used on the Internet.
> 
> WebCrypto will hopefully spur further innovation in this field!

No, because the foundations are corrupt. It is distracting people
from the actual problems by creating false hopes.

I am the person who in 1997 warned the HTTP-WG that "E-Tag" was
going to be a threat to privacy. I've seen enough cows fly to
not fall for any nice positivist blue-eyed thinking coming my way.

I know I will be ignored, but I also know that you will have to
think about what you did the rest of your life.

I mean the entire group.

You are contributing to the deus ex machina.

Received on Monday, 26 May 2014 15:15:47 UTC