key change for TCP-MD5

Mon Jun 19 13:40:50 UTC 2006

On 19-jun-2006, at 14:32, Steven M. Bellovin wrote:

> I just submitted an I-D on TCP-MD5 key change.  Until it shows up  
> in the
> official repository, see
> http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb/papers/draft-bellovin- 
> keyroll2385-00.txt
> Here's the abstract:

>                 The TCP-MD5 option is most commonly used to secure
>                 BGP sessions between routers.  However, changing
>                 the long-term key is difficult, since the change
>                 needs to be synchronized between different
>                 organizations.
>                 We describe single-ended strategies that will permit
>                 (mostly) unsynchronized key changes.

> Comments welcome.

I wonder how long that policy will hold.  (-:

Ok:

First of all, I applaud this effort.

There doesn't really seem to be a way to introduce a new key other  
than to just to agree on a time. I'm not sure this is good enough.

Wouldn't it be better to exchange some kind of "time to change keys"  
message? This could simply be a new type of BGP message that hold a  
key ID. Obviously the capability to send and receive these messages  
must be negotiated when the session is created, but still, I think  
the extra complexity is worth it because it allows for much more  
robust operation.

And is NANOG now officially an IETF working group...?

Iljitsch