IPv6 Security [Was: Re: misunderstanding scale]

Sun Mar 23 23:37:52 UTC 2014

On Mar 23, 2014 4:45 PM, "Paul Ferguson" <fergdawgster at mykolab.com> wrote:
> Also, neighbor discovery, for example, can be dangerous (admittedly,
> so can ARP spoofing in IPv4). And aside from the spoofable ability of
> ND, robust DHCPv6 is needed for enterprises for sheer operational
> continuity.

Yes. As I said, same general sorts of risks for the most part as in IPv4.
Details differ, but same general types. My point was that it's mostly FUD
to wave the flag of scary new security weaknesses with no mitigations in
IPv6. It's the same general sort of first hop and link security issues that
exist in IPv4 with similar mitigations. Not identical, but not radically
different or new either.

And yes, I can't imagine any reason a large enterprise would use SLAAC
instead of DHCPv6. We're certainly using the latter. But we have robust
DHCPv6 available, so I don't understand why you think that's a weakness.

> I haven't even mentioned spam management in v6, which will become a
> nightmare if people have been relying on IP BL's or similar.

Uh-huh. We've had our Internet mail gateways dual-stacked for a year and a
half now. There have certainly been bumps and challenges along the way. I
wouldn't want to imply it's been a cakewalk. But it hasn't been some sort
of insurmountable challenge.

And my organization is extremely security conscious and highly visible.
You'll pardon my skepticism over claims that unspecified security
weaknesses make it impossible to do what we have done and are continuing to
do.

Scott