Transcript Who’s watching your network The IETF standards process and OpenPGP Jon Callas 8 October 1998

Who’s watching your network
The IETF standards process and
OpenPGP
Jon Callas
8 October 1998
Who’s watching your network
The IETF
Internet Engineering Task Force
An International community of people concerned
with the evolution of Internet Standards
 Made of Working Groups
– Each WG has a chartered scope
– Official work done on mailing lists
– Three meetings per year
Who’s watching your network
The IETF
Working groups in Areas
– General, Internet, Applications, Operations and
Management, Security, Routing, Transport, User
Services
Each Area has an Area Director
ADs form the Internet Engineering Steering Group
(IESG)
Who’s watching your network
The IETF
Areas are overseen by the Internet Architecture
Board (IAB)
IAB and IESG are chartered by The Internet Society
(ISOC)
ISOC is a non-profit professional society
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) assigns
constants, parameters, etc.
Internet Research Task Force (IRTF)
Who’s watching your network
The Tao of the IETF
The IETF is a controlled anarchy
There is no membership
– If you are on a WG mailing list, or attend a
meeting, or contribute in any way, you’re as close
to a member as there is.
– IETF contributions come from people, not
corporations
Who’s watching your network
BOFs
Birds of a Feather Sessions
– Essentially proto-working groups
– Can meet only twice, and then never again
– Closely related concept -- The Bar BOF
Who’s watching your network
RFC
Request For Comments
– Essentially IETF standards
Many are pseudo-standards
Pseudo-standards are nonetheless important
– Drafts of RFCs are called Internet Drafts
Have a life of 6 months
– RFC 2223, Instructions to Authors, tells how to
write an RFC
Who’s watching your network
RFC
Informational
– Anyone can create one, no review required
– IETF pseudo-standards
– Many are reprints of other documents
– Tradition of April Fools RFCs
Many of these are only half jokes
Who’s watching your network
RFC
Standards Track
– Created by Working Groups
– Detailed Process for Approval
Proposed Standard, Draft Standard, Standard
– Standards get an STD number, which is a handle
Who’s watching your network
RFC
FYI
– Have their own FYI numbers, like STDs
Best Practices
Experimental
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Other considerations
Intellectual Property Considerations
– Patented technologies are forbidden from being
MUSTs unless there is an alternative
– Munich doctrine as applied to crypto
– Patents have caused much havoc in the Security
area
Who’s watching your network
Writing an RFC
Read RFC2223, 2119, STD1
Arcane format
– I use Tim Dierk’s Perl program to format
Find a working group to support you, or go
informational
Or start your own WG
Who’s watching your network
OpenPGP
Standards Track Working Group
Has two main goals
– OpenPGP formats -- PGP message and certificate
formats
– OpenPGP/MIME -- MIME security encoding of
multipart messages
Who’s watching your network
OpenPGP
OpenPGP formats
– Replaces informational RFC1991
– In IETF last call for Proposed Standard
OpenPGP/MIME
– Finishing up replacement for RFC2015
Who’s watching your network
Who’s watching your network
Who’s watching your network