Re: working on re-authentication

Hi Alistair 

for convenience here is the latest wording in editors draft

Essential steps of an authentication process which rely upon recalling or transcribing information have one of the following:

alternative essential steps, which do not rely upon recalling or transcribing information
an authentication-credentials reset process, which does not rely upon recalling or transcribing information
Except for when any of the following are true:

Authentication process involves basic personal identification information to which the user has easy access, such as name, address, email address, and identification or social security number.
This is not achievable due to legal requirements.
the only way to meet the SC is with biometrics  (unless copy paste is not transcription - in which case transcription becomes meaningless because you can copy-paste) 

so the exceptions become the only way to meet this

exception 1 is completely undefined.   Easy access is not testable.  and unless the examples are the ONLY acceptable examples — the examples do not allow it to be tested since you don’t know what else would conform

ALSO   you can’t, or shouldn’t, ever authenticate with publicly available information like a person’s name or address or email address.
 And users should never under any circumstances be turning in their national identity code to every website that has a sign in.
 So the first exception is not testable and therefore not useful. In addition it violates privacy and any reasonable authentication standard.

 So it looks like the only way  an author could possibly meet this standard would be if there was some legal requirement.    


 also I’m not sure what the purpose of an SC  is that there is no way to satisfy it. You can only hope that you can qualify for the exception.


 Can you tell me what the sufficient techniques are for this SC?

 is the exception limited to only those items listed under the first bullet? If not as either a web author or as a tester how would I determine what other things do and do not qualify in a way that I know all other testers would agree?

thanks 


Gregg

 


> On Dec 20, 2017, at 12:32 PM, Alastair Campbell <acampbell@nomensa.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi Greg,
> 
> You are reading into it a restriction that isn't there, the SC restricts relying on memorization / transcription, but with the exceptions  there are several options to achieve this. Please review the thread, I can't type it out again from my phone.
> 
> Alastair 
> 
> 
> Sent from my phone, apologies for typos.
> _____________________________
> From: Gregg Vanderheiden 
> 
> 
> I still don’t see how you can require an AUTHOR to provide an authentication method ( or re-authentication — which is authentication) without requiring any information beyond  publicly available information ( not good for authenticating)  or their country ID  (which I would NOT want to give to any and all websites that have sign in.
> 
> As such this SC is not implementable by authors since the only solution to it is biometrics - which a page author cannot do. 
> 
> Am I missing something?
> 
> G
> 
> 
>> On Dec 20, 2017, at 11:30 AM, lisa.seeman <lisa.seeman@zoho.com <mailto:lisa.seeman@zoho.com>> wrote:
>> 
>> Hi Alastair
>> 
>> The reason it might be ok to allow transcribing etc at sign up, is that it might be reasonable for someone to get help the first time they use the site, but completely unreasonable to expect the user to have help each time they sign in. It is a compromise if people felt that we have to allow people to copy in a code first time. (Which is why i thought you had tried to limit the scope to re-authentication. )
>> 
>> If we can live without the exception that is better.
>> 
>> All the best
>> 
>> Lisa Seeman
>> 
>> LinkedIn <http://il.linkedin.com/in/lisaseeman/>,Twitter <https://twitter.com/SeemanLisa>
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ---- On Wed, 20 Dec 2017 18:08:08 +0200 Alastair Campbell<acampbell@nomensa.com <mailto:acampbell@nomensa.com>> wrote ----
>> Hi Andrew,
>> 
>> I agree we should be able to answer those, I just updated the wiki page and I think this version helps:
>> ————-
>> Re-authentication processes do not rely upon the user to do any of the following:
>> 
>> - memorize information;
>> - perform calculations;
>> - reliably produce gestures;
>> - transcribe information.
>> 
>> Exceptions: 
>> 
>> - Re-authentication process can rely on the user or user-agent entering personal identification information such as name, username, address, email address or national identification number if the web content does not block automatic entry.
>> 
>> - There are governing statutory requirements that require the use of memorisation, calculations, gestures or transcription in re-authentication processes.
>> —————
>> 
>> On your questions:
>> > 1. Regarding user’s abilities to memorize information, don’t browser/OS capabilities or separate tools (e.g. splash ID, LastPass, etc)
>> 
>> I think the first exception covers that now, and yes, I think we need to except that is a user-agent & education issue rather than content, so long as content doesn’t prevent their use (which is also accepted security best practice, despite certain banks thinking otherwise).
>> 
>> > Regarding the ability to transcribe information, this includes:
>> 
>> Anything where you see/hear characters and have to type them in somewhere.
>> 
>> > Regarding the ability to transcribe information, what kind of barrier does this create for users – is it a complete barrier or something less? In one of the current options it seems that transcribing a one-time code is ok for the first time – why is it not a barrier the first time but is a barrier after that?
>> 
>> In usability testing, which wasn’t exactly on this, but close as we gave people made-up information to type in as part of usability testing, it can take 5-10 seconds per character, if they are patient and motivated. The typical time-based-one time code is 6 characters to type in within 30 seconds.
>> 
>> We can discuss degree, but personally I’ve seen enough to know it is a real issue and any transcription will prevent some people from completing that task.
>> 
>> I don’t think we were saying some transcription is ok the 1st time, but that you could set/reset your password? Not sure where that came from. In the above SC text you can:
>> - rely on a password manager so long as you don’t block it.
>> - use a magic-link or email loop password reset.
>> - use webauth for 2nd factor.
>> 
>> > It seems that there is a possible conflict with 1.1.1. In that SC there is language about using CAPTCHA, which is sometimes used as part of an authentication process. 
>> 
>> *Generally* I’ve seen it used in account creation rather than authentication, but I guess that can happen.
>> 
>> > It seems that providing a multi-modal approach which uses but doesn’t rely exclusively on visual CAPTCHA is ok under 1.1.1 but may be forbidden in this SC? 
>> 
>> Yes, as that involves transcription (which can be either visual or auditory, I don’t think we can discriminate here ;-)
>> 
>> So I think it prevents CAPTCHA for being used for re-authentication, but not account creation or authenticating the 1st time in a browser. I think there is good argument for that, as CAPTCHA should not be used if you have already proven you’re not a robot.
>> 
>> The current 2.0 SC is still useful for the multi-model aspect.
>> 
>> > Are there examples of sites that currently pass the proposed SC language without relying on the exceptions?
>> 
>> Yes, in the above form just having a username/password is fine. If you block pasting then you’d need to provide an email alternative.
>> With second factor it gets more difficult, as you need to off-load the 2nd factor onto an OS/hardware device, which Chrome supports now, and others support soon. As Chrome supports webauth now I assume there are some google sites which support it, and as it can be used as an alternative method (e.g. time-based code OR webauth), I’m sure we can find some.
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> 
>> -Alastair
>> 
>> PS. The 10 years of listening to security podcasts are finally coming in useful!
>> 
>> 
>> 
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