"Is BGP safe yet?" test

Tue Apr 21 11:42:22 UTC 2020

>> essentially agree.  my pedantic quibble is that i would like to
>> differentiate between the RPKI, which is a database, and ROV, which
>> uses it.
> 
> And I think that is a very important distinction to be clear about.
> Right now, it's not completely arrest-worthy to use RPKI and ROV
> interchangeably, but I think considering that other use-cases might
> come from the database itself in the future, being explicit about it
> and how it can be used is appropriate pedantry.

i have been pushing this rock uphill for over a decade.  to expand, a
bit of text from long ago, so hence a bit out of date, but still clear

    RPKI

    The RPKI is an X.509 based hierarchy [RFC 6481] which is congruent
    with the internet IP address allocation administration, the IANA,
    RIRs, ISPs, ...  It is just a database, but is the substrate on
    which the next two mechanisms are based.  It is currently deployed
    in all five administrative regions.

    RPKI-based Origin Validation (ROV)

    RPKI-based Origin Validation [RFC 6811] uses some of the RPKI data
    to allow a router to verify that the autonomous system originating
    an IP address prefix is in fact authorized to do so.  This is not
    crypto checked so can be violated.  But it should prevent the vast
    majority of accidental 'hijackings' on the internet today, e.g. the
    famous Pakistani accidental announcement of YouTube's address space.
    RPKI-based origin validation is in shipping code from AlcaLu, Cisco,
    Juniper, and possibly others.

    BGPsec

    RPKI-based Path Validation, AKA BGPsec, a future technology still
    being designed [draft-ietf-sidr-bgpsec-overview], uses the full
    crypto information of the RPKI to make up for the embarrassing
    mistake that, like much of the internet BGP was designed with no
    thought to securing the BGP protocol itself from being
    gamed/violated.  It allows a receiver of a BGP announcement to
    cryptographically validate that the autonomous systems through which
    the announcement passed were indeed those which the sender/forwarder
    at each hop intended.

currently, bgosec still has no traction.  there are other proposals in
the space, e.g. ASPA.  but the point is that they USE the rpki, they are
not the rpki.

randy