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ALTO Server Discovery
draft-ietf-alto-server-discovery-04

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This is an older version of an Internet-Draft that was ultimately published as RFC 7286.
Authors Sebastian Kiesel , Martin Stiemerling , Nico Schwan , Michael Scharf , Song Yongchao
Last updated 2012-07-16
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draft-ietf-alto-server-discovery-04
ALTO                                                           S. Kiesel
Internet-Draft                                   University of Stuttgart
Intended status: Standards Track                          M. Stiemerling
Expires: January 17, 2013                                NEC Europe Ltd.
                                                               N. Schwan
                                                               M. Scharf
                                                Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs
                                                                 H. Song
                                                                  Huawei
                                                           July 16, 2012

                         ALTO Server Discovery
                  draft-ietf-alto-server-discovery-04

Abstract

   The goal of Application-Layer Traffic Optimization (ALTO) is to
   provide guidance to applications, which have to select one or several
   hosts from a set of candidates that are able to provide a desired
   resource.

   Entities seeking guidance need to discover and possibly select an
   ALTO server to ask.  This is called ALTO server discovery.  This memo
   describes an ALTO server discovery mechanism based on several
   alternative mechanisms that are applicable when the resource consumer
   is co-located with the ALTO client.

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Requirements Language

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119].

Status of this Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF).  Note that other groups may also distribute
   working documents as Internet-Drafts.  The list of current Internet-
   Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
   and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
   time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   This Internet-Draft will expire on January 17, 2013.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2012 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
   (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
   publication of this document.  Please review these documents
   carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
   to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
   include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.

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Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
     1.1.  Discovery Scenarios  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  5
       1.1.1.  ALTO Server Discovery by Resource Consumers  . . . . .  6
       1.1.2.  ALTO Server Discovery by a Third Party . . . . . . . .  7
     1.2.  Pre-Conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
   2.  Protocol Overview  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
   3.  Retrieving the URI by U-NAPTR  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.1.  Retrieving the Domain Name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
       3.1.1.  Option 1: User input . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
       3.1.2.  Option 2: DHCP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
       3.1.3.  Option 3: PPP  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
     3.2.  U-NAPTR Resolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
   4.  Applicability  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
     4.1.  Applicability for Resource Consumer Server Discovery . . . 16
     4.2.  Applicability for Third Party Server Discovery . . . . . . 16
   5.  Deployment Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     5.1.  DHCP option for DNS Suffix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     5.2.  PPP option for DNS Suffix  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
   6.  IANA Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.1.  Registration of PPP IPCP Configuration Option Type . . . . 19
     6.2.  Registration of U-NAPTR application service tag  . . . . . 19
   7.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
     7.1.  General  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
     7.2.  For U-NAPTR  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
   8.  Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
   9.  References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
     9.1.  Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
     9.2.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
   Appendix A.  Contributors List and Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . 25
   Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

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1.  Introduction

   The goal of Application-Layer Traffic Optimization (ALTO) is to
   provide guidance to applications, which have to select one or several
   hosts from a set of candidates, that are able to provide a desired
   resource [RFC5693].  The requirements for ALTO are itemized in
   [I-D.ietf-alto-reqs].

   ALTO is realized by a client-server protocol.  ALTO clients send
   queries to ALTO servers, in order to solicit guidance.  Hence, ALTO
   clients need to know the contact information of ALTO servers, which
   can provide appropriate guidance for a given resource consumer.
   Typically the closer an ALTO server is to a resource consumer the
   more accurate guidance it can provide.  Thus a design objective is to
   automatically discover an ALTO server topologically close to the
   network attachment point of the resource consumer, if available.  The
   contact information of the ALTO server is retrieved by invoking the
   ALTO discovery procedure defined in this document.

   The ALTO protocol specification [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol] is based on
   HTTP.  Therefore, it expects that the ALTO discovery procedure yields
   the HTTP(S) URI of the ALTO server's Information Resource Directory,
   which gives further information about the capabilities and services
   provided by that ALTO server.  Further (DNS) lookups may be necessary
   in order to find out the ALTO server's IP address.

   The goal of this memo is to propose a discovery mechanism for ALTO
   client deployments in uncontrolled environments that is implementable
   and deployable at a fast pace, i.e., without creating other
   deployment dependencies for ALTO.  We propose a schema which employs
   the U-NAPTR mechanism [RFC4848] to determine the URI of the ALTO
   server and where mutliple input methods to the U-NAPTR process can be
   used.  U-NAPTR is used because the discovery mechanism must return an
   URI, and thus other discovery mechanisms are not applicable (e. g.,
   DNS SRV records).

   There are various architectural options where to place the ALTO
   client and the ALTO server discovery procedure:

   o  One option is that the ALTO client and the ALTO server discovery
      procedure are embedded directly in the resource consumer, i.e.,
      the application protocol entity that will eventually initiate data
      transmission to/from the selected resource provider(s).  In this
      case, the ALTO server discovery procedure might be able to
      interact with the user (i.e., prompt for a host name).
      Furthermore, it may use services such as DHCP, which are only
      available within the access network to which the resource consumer
      is connected.  This option is described in this memo.

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   o  A similar architectural setup exists in controlled environments,
      e.g. a CDN that uses ALTO as information base for request
      redirection.  However in such a controlled environment it is
      unlikely that a dynamic server discovery is necessary.  Instead it
      is expected that the CDN administrator will manually configure the
      contact information of the ALTO server.  Thus this draft is
      focused on allowing dynamic discovery in uncontrolled environments
      where provisioning contact information is impossible or
      undesireable.

   o  Another option is to integrate the ALTO client and the ALTO server
      discovery procedure into a third party such as a resource
      directory ("peer-to-peer tracker"), which issues ALTO queries on
      behalf of various resource consumers.  This third party may reside
      in a different part of the network (administrative domain) than
      the resource consumer.  It may occur that said third party whishes
      to issue ALTO queries on behalf of a resouce consumer, but all it
      knows about the resource consumer is the source IP address of
      messages originating from it (i.e., the resource consumer's IP
      address or the "public" IP address of the outermost NAT in front
      of the resource consumer).  A general server discovery procedure
      based solely on this IP address raises several issues, and are out
      of scope of this document.  This option is further discussed in
      [I-D.kist-alto-3pdisc].

   A more detailed discussion of various options where to place the
   funcional entities comprising the overall ALTO architecture can be
   found in [I-D.ietf-alto-deployments].

   A general mechanism that redirects ALTO clients from one ALTO server
   to another, potentially closer, ALTO server raises several issues.
   First ALTO servers by definition provide Network Maps for the whole
   IP address space and thus can provide each client with a potentially
   useful answer.  Second ALTO servers might be deployed independently
   by seperate administrative entities and are thus not necessarily
   aware of each other.  The use of a redirection mechanism thus depends
   on the deployment scenario and is for this reason out of the scope of
   this document.

   Comments and discussions about this memo should be directed to the
   ALTO working group: alto@ietf.org.

1.1.  Discovery Scenarios

   Figure 1 below shows an overview on the different entities of a
   generic ALTO framework.  The ALTO Server discovery mechanism is used
   by the peer-to-peer (P2P) application in order retrieve the point of
   contact of the ALTO Service.

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                                                   +------+
                                                 +-----+  |  Peers
                  +-----+      +------+    +=====|     |--+-oo
                  |     |......|      |====+   oo+--*--+     o
                  +-----+      +------+    |   o    *  ooooooo
                Source of       ALTO       |   o    *
                Topological     Service    |   o +--*--+
                information                +===o=|     | Tracker
                                               o +-----+ /Super-peer
                                ALTO Discovery o    o
                                    Service    o    o
                                   +------+    o    o
                                   |      |oooooooooo
                                   +------+

                 Legend:

                 ===   ALTO query protocol
                 ooo   ALTO service discovery protocol
                 ***   Application protocol (out of scope)
                 ...   Provisioning or initialization (out of scope)

                     Figure 1: ALTO Discovery Overview

   Hereby the ALTO service discovery scenarios are classified into two
   types: one is the ALTO server discovery by the resource consumer, and
   the other is the ALTO server discovery by a third party, such as
   application trackers.  Before the specification of the discovery
   mechanism the following section illustrates and discusses both
   scenarios.

1.1.1.  ALTO Server Discovery by Resource Consumers

   The ALTO service discovery in some scenarios needs to be performed by
   the resource consumer itself.  In particular in P2P applications
   without a tracker like DHTs and other conventional client/server
   applications.  Also P2P application which are tracker based may embed
   the ALTO client into the resource consumer to allow peers a selection
   of peers after retrieving the peer list from the application tracker.

   The following figure illustrates this scenario, showing the
   relationship between the different entities as discussed before.

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                 +---------------+
                 |  ALTO Server  |
                 +---------------+
                      ^        ^         +-----------+
                      |        |         | ALTO      |
                      |    +---+---+     | Service   |
                      |    |tracker|     | Discovery |
                      |    +-------+     +---------+-+
                      |        |           o       o
         +------------+--+     |           o       o
         |P2P Application|ooooo|oooooooooooo       o
         |   Client A    |     |                   o
         +---------------+     |                   o
                               |                   o
                            +--+-------------+     o
                            | P2P Application|oooooo
                            |   Client B     |
                            +----------------+

        Figure 2: Resource Consumer ALTO Server Discovery (Example)

1.1.2.  ALTO Server Discovery by a Third Party

   Some P2P applications have trackers, and these applications might not
   need to have their clients looking for the ALTO server guidance.  In
   these scenarios trackers query the ALTO servers for guidance
   themselves, and then return the final ranked result to the
   application clients.  However, application clients are distributed
   among different network operators and autonomous systems.  Trackers
   thus need to find different ALTO servers for the clients located in
   different operator networks or autonomous systems.  In such scenarios
   the discovery is thus not performed by the resource consumer, but a
   third party entity on behalf of the resource consumer.

   This third party ALTO server discovery raises several issues.
   Typically only the IP address of the ALTO client is known that needs
   to suffice for finding the corresponding ALTO server.  This requires
   detemining a FQDN as input for the U-NAPTR process.  One option to do
   this is to use a reverse DNS lookup.  However, reverse DNS has
   several limitations:

   First, there is no established unique way of maintaining the DNS
   tree, and there are different practices in different networks.
   Furthermore, it is possible that a lookup fails or that the returned
   value is not valid.  For instance, it can point to a different
   domain.  As a result, any potential use of reverse DNS lookup for
   service discovery must be able to deal with failures of lookup and
   react accordingly.

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   Second, determining a domain name from IP addresses by tree climbing
   is problematic, in particular for IPv6.  [RFC4472] discusses the
   issues for IPv6.

   Third, populating a DNS name space what looks like a reverse tree is
   a significant administrative DNS overhead.

   Finally it must be emphasized that any tree walking procedure raises
   several issues.  There is no single best way tree, and heuristics are
   needed.

   Given these problems, this memo does not specify a reverve DNS
   mechanism to determine a FQDN.

   Thus, this draft is limited to scenarios where the discovery
   procedure is done by the resource consumer.  In case a third party
   needs to know the contact information of the ALTO server it is
   RECOMMENDED that the resource consumer discovers the ALTO server and
   then sends the contact information directly to the third party.
   However, this requires a modification of the protocol used between
   the resource consumer and the third party, e.g., the tracker protocol
   in the peer-to-peer case.  As a potential alternative, the client
   could provide a valid FQDN, so that the third party can use this as
   input for the U-NAPTR process, but this variant has no significant
   advantages.  The options on how to transmit the contact information
   from the resource consumer to the third party are out of scope of
   this document.

1.2.  Pre-Conditions

   In general, the ALTO server discovery SHOULD be based on the IP
   address that is used to communicate with other peers, i. e., it
   should return a server that can provide guidance for that address.

   In order to achieve this, the whole document assumes certain pre-
   conditions, in particular:

   o  The ALTO server discovery procedure is executed on a per IP family
      base, i.e., seperate for IPv4 and IPv6.  It is up to the ALTO
      client to decide which of the possible multiple results of
      different IP address families to use.  The choice of whether to
      use IPv4 or IPv6 is out of scope of this document.

   o  A change of the IP address at an interface invalidates the result
      of the ALTO server discovery procedure.  For instance, if the IP
      address assigned to a mobile host changes due to host mobility, it
      is required to run the ALTO server discovery procedure for the new
      IP address without relying on earlier gained information.

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   o  The ALTO server discovery procedure is executed on a per IP
      address base.  Multiple IP addresses per interface or multiple IP
      addresses assigned to different IP interfaces require to repeat
      the procedure for every IP address.  It may be fine to group IP
      addresses according their domain suffixes and to perfom the
      procedure for such a group.  However, this is out of scope of this
      document.

   o  There are several challenges with DNS on hosts with multiple
      interfaces [RFC6418], which can affect the ALTO server discovery.
      If the DNS resolution is performed on the wrong interface, it can
      return an ALTO server that could provide sub-optimal or wrong
      guidance.  Finding the best ALTO server for multi-interfaced hosts
      is outside the scope of this document.

   o  The discovery procedure may need information about the public IP
      address and thus have to discover NATs.  Details of NAT discovery
      are not discussed in this memo.

   o  Similarly the discovery procedure may need information about the
      IP address of a proxy or agent if this address is used for
      communication.  Examples include Virtual Private Network (VPN) or
      mobile IP triangular routing.  Details on how to obtain the IP
      address that is used for communication in such setups are not
      discussed in this memo, since they can be specific to the network
      in use.

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2.  Protocol Overview

   We define multiple alternatives to discover the IP address of the
   ALTO server, as there are a number of ways possible how such
   information can be provided to the ALTO client.  The choice of method
   is up to the local network deployment.  For instance, there can be
   deployments where the ALTO server in charge for ALTO client is
   provisioned by the network operator and communicated to the ALTO
   client's host via a DHCP option, while in other deployments no such
   means may exist.

   It should be noted that there is no silver bullet solution to the
   ALTO server discovery, as there too many deployment scenarios in the
   server discovery space.

   The following figure illustrates the different protocols that SHOULD
   be used to find the URI of a suitable ALTO server.

                    Descending Order of Preference
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~>

    --------------   --------------    --------------
    | User Input |   | DHCP query |    | PPP query  |
    | in res.c.  |   | by res.c.  |    | by res.c.  |
    --------------   --------------    --------------
                |          |            |
                 \         |           /
                  \--------+----------/
                           |
                           V
                       DNS suffix
                           |
                           V
                   ------------------
                   | U-NAPTR lookup |
                   ------------------
                           |
                           V
        ALTO Server's Information Resource Directory URI

     Legend:
           res.c. : resource consumer

                        Figure 3: Protocol Overview

   Figure 3 illustrates the U-NAPTR based resolution process to retrieve
   the ALTO Server URI As a precondition for resolution the U-NAPTR

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   process needs the right DNS suffix as input.  This domain name is
   typically the domain name of the client's IP address.  In order to
   retrieve the DNS suffix we specify three options, which are listed in
   descending order of preference.  A client SHOULD use the first method
   that determines a DNS suffix.  It MAY try the other methods in case
   the U-NAPTR lookup failed.

   User input:  A user MAY manually specify the DNS suffix on its own,
      either to access a 3rd party ALTO service provider or as it does
      know such information.  This input MAY also origin from a web page
      where the user downloads the configuration, which is loaded as
      user input, or obtained by other discovery methods.

   DHCP:  A network provider MAY provide the DNS suffix through a DHCP
      option.

   PPP:  A network provider MAY provide the DNS suffix through a Point-
      to-Point (PPP) Internet Protocol Control Protocol (IPCP)
      extension.

   This discovery method SHOULD be repeated if the resource consumer
   moves, i. e., if its IP address changes.

   Given that DHCP and PPP are widely used for IP address configuration,
   this discovery method is applicable to many networks.  The mechanism
   described in this document can also be applied to further networks if
   they provide an equivalent mechanism to retrieve the DNS suffix.
   Such straightforward extensions to other technologies are not
   specified in this memo.

   Instead of using the standard ALTO server discovery method,
   applications MAY also use own methods to discover an ALTO server.
   This variant is outside the scope of this document.

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3.  Retrieving the URI by U-NAPTR

   This section specifies the U-NAPTR based resolution process.  To
   start the U-NAPTR resolution process a domain name is required as
   input.  Thus the section is devided into two parts: Section 3.2
   describes the U-NAPTR resolution process itself.  How the client
   identifies this DNS suffix of the access network where the resource
   consumer is registered in is described in Section 3.1.

3.1.  Retrieving the Domain Name

   The U-NAPTR resolution process requires a domain name as input.  The
   algorithm that SHOULD be applied to determine this domain name is
   described in this section.  We specify three different options.  In
   option 1 the user manually configures a specific ALTO service
   instance that he wants to use.  Option 2 defines a DHCP and option 3
   defines a PPP IPCP option to allow the network service provider a
   remote configuration of the client.

   In general, the ALTO server discovery SHOULD be based on the IP
   address that is used to communicate with other peers.  The resource
   consumer may have private IP addresses and public IP addresses and
   depending on the deployment it might be necessary to determine for
   all IP addresses the ALTO server in charge of.  To determine its
   public IP address the resource consumer may need to use STUN[RFC5389]
   or BEP24[bep24].  Determining the correct IP address out of multiple
   options strongly depends on the deployment scenario but is out of
   scope for this document, although we discuss it to some extend in
   Section 4.  For the following examples we assume that the IP address
   of the resource consumer is a.b.c.d.

3.1.1.  Option 1: User input

   A user may want to use a third party ALTO service instance.
   Therefore we allow the user to specify a DNS suffix on its own, for
   example in a config file option.  The DNS suffix given by the user is
   combined with the IP address of the resource consumer to allow the
   third party ALTO service to direct the client to a suitable ALTO
   server based on the location of the client.  A possible DNS suffix
   entered by the user may be:

      myaltoprovider.org

   In case not ALTO NAPTR records are found, we consider the discovery
   process based on user input as failed.  A client MAY try one of the
   other options.

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3.1.2.  Option 2: DHCP

   As a second option network operators MAY configure the domain name to
   be used for service discovery within an access network using DHCP.
   RFC 5986[RFC5986] defines DHCP IPv4 and IPv6 access network domain
   name options that identify a domain name that is suitable for service
   discovery within the access network.  The ALTO server discovery
   procedure uses these DHCP options to retrieve the domain name as an
   input for the U-NAPTR resolution.  One example could be:

      example.com

3.1.3.  Option 3: PPP

   In some network deployments the PPP [RFC1661] IPCP [RFC1332] is used
   to do network configuration of residential user equipment, such as
   assigning an IP address or the name of a DNS server[RFC1877].  Thus
   as a third option a network operator MAY configure the domain name to
   be used for the server discovery using a PPP IPCP extension.  The
   next section specifies the extension for configuration of the access
   network domain name, which can be used as input for the U-NAPTR
   process.  One possible example yielded by this extension could be:

      example.com

3.1.3.1.  Access Network Name Encoding

   This section describes the encoding of the domain name used in PPP
   IPCP extension Section 3.1.3.2.

   The domain name is encoded according to Section 3.1 of [RFC1035]
   whereby each label is represented as a one-octet length field
   followed by that number of octets.  This is the same encoding as in
   DHCP according to RFC 5986[RFC5986].  Since every domain name ends
   with the null label of the root, a domain name is terminated by a
   length byte of zero.  The high-order two bits of every length octet
   MUST be zero, and the remaining six bits of the length field limit
   the label to 63 octets or less.  To simplify implementations, the
   total length of a domain name (i.e., label octets and label length
   octets) is restricted to 255 octets or less.

   For example, the domain "example.com." is encoded in 13 octets as:

         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+
         | 7 | e | x | a | m | p | l | e | 3 | c | o | m | 0 |
         +---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+---+

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3.1.3.2.  Access Network Domain Name IPCP Configuration Option

   This Configuration Option defines a method for negotiating with the
   remote peer the name of the Access Network Domain Name to be used on
   the local end of the link.

   A summary of the Access Network Domain Name Configuration Option
   format is shown below.  The fields are transmitted from left to
   right.

            Type    Len   Access Network Domain Name
            +-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+----
            | TBD |  n  |  s1 |  s2 |  s3 |  s4 | s5  |  ...
            +-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+-----+----

   The values s1, s2, s3, etc. represent the domain name labels in the
   domain name encoding.  Note that the length field in the IPCP option
   represents the length of the entire domain name encoding, whereas the
   length fields in the domain name encoding (see Section 3.1.3.1) is
   the length of a single domain name label.

   Type:  to be assigned by IANA

   Len:  Length of the 'Access Network Domain Name' field in octets.

   Access Network Domain Name:  The domain name of the Access Network
      for the client to use.

3.2.  U-NAPTR Resolution

   The ALTO protocol specification [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol] expects that
   the ALTO discovery procedure yields the HTTP(S) URI of the ALTO
   server's Information Resource Directory, which gives further
   information about the capabilities and services provided by that ALTO
   server.  The first step of the ALTO server discovery procedure (see
   Section 3.1) yielded an U-NAPTR/DDDS (URI-Enabled NAPTR/Dynamic
   Delegation Discovery Service) [RFC4848] application unique strings,
   in the form of a DNS name.  An example is "example.com".

   In the second step, the ALTO Server discovery procedure needs to use
   the U-NAPTR [RFC4848] specification described below to obtain a URI
   (indicating host and protocol) for the ALTO server's Information
   Resource Directory.  In this document, only the HTTP and HTTPS URL
   schemes are defined, as the ALTO protocol specification defines the
   access over both protocols, but no other [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol].
   Note that the HTTP URL can be any valid HTTP(s) URL, including those

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   containing path elements.

   The following two DNS entries show the U-NAPTR resolution for
   "example.com" to the HTTPS URL
   https://altoserver.example.com/secure/directory or the HTTP URL
   http://altoserver.example.com/directory, with the former being
   preferred.

       example.com.

       IN NAPTR 100  10   "u"    "ALTO:https"
            "!.*!https://altoserver.example.com/secure/directory!"  ""

       IN NAPTR 200  10   "u"    "ALTO:http"
            "!.*!http://altoserver.example.com/directory!"  ""

   There is a potential that retrieveing the domain name or the U-NAPTR
   lookup itself does not yield to a result, i.e. no ALTO NAPTR record
   is found.  In this case the discovery procedure failed for this IP
   address.  It is RECOMMENDED that clients give up the discovery
   process and wait a period of time before repeating the procedure.
   Clients MAY repeat the discovery procedure for a different IP address
   instantaneously.

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4.  Applicability

   This section discusses the applicability of the proposed solution
   with respect to the resource consumer server discovery and the third
   party deployment scenarios.  Each section discusses the proposed
   steps that are needed to determine the ALTO Server URI.

4.1.  Applicability for Resource Consumer Server Discovery

   In this scenario the ALTO server discovery procedure is performed by
   the resource consumer, for example a peer in a P2P system.  After the
   discovery the peer does the ALTO query on its own, or it might share
   the ALTO server contact information with a third party, for example a
   tracker, which then executes the ALTO query on behalf of the peer.

   To complete the ALTO server discovery process the resource consumer
   first SHOULD check whether the user has provider the domain name
   through manual configuration.  If this is not the case the next step
   SHOULD be to check for the access network domain name DHCP option
   (Section 3.1.2).  Finally the client SHOULD try to retrieve the
   domain name by the PPP option Section 3.1.3.

   A client can have several candidate IP addresses that it may use for
   the discovery process.  For example if it is located behind a NAT, a
   private and a public IP address may be used for the discovery
   process.  It depends on the deployment scenario which of the IP
   addresses is the correct one.  Thus it is out-of-scope of this
   document to specify how exactly the client finds the right IP
   address.  However in the following we list methods that may be used
   in order to determine these candidate IP addresses.  Generally in P2P
   environments peers already have implemented mechanisms for NAT-
   traversal.  This includes proprietary solutions to determine a peer's
   public IP address, for example by asking a neighbour peer about its
   record of the own IP address.  Non-proprietary solutions that are
   favorable include the Session Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN)
   [RFC5986] protocol to determine the public address.  If the client is
   behind a residential gateway another option may be to use Universal
   Plug and Play (UPnP) [UPnP-IGD-WANIPConnection1] or the NAT Port
   Mapping Protocol (NAT-PMP) [I-D.cheshire-nat-pmp].

   In case the ALTO discovery client has determined the domain name
   through one of the described options it proceedes with the U-NAPTR
   lookup as described in Section 3.2.

4.2.  Applicability for Third Party Server Discovery

   In case of the third party server discovery deployment scenario the
   entity performing the ALTO server discovery process is different from

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   the resource consumer.  Typically the resource consumer is a peer
   whereas the ALTO client is a resource directory which seeks for ALTO
   guidance on behalf of the peer.  Another use case for the third party
   discovery is an application that looks for ALTO guidance
   transparently for the resource consumer, for example a CDN.

   Here the ALTO server discovery process can also retrieve guidance
   through the PPP/DHCP options or manual user configuration, but only
   if the provided discovery information is forwarded by the resource
   consumer to the third party entity.  In this case, additional
   mechanisms for the forwarding of this discovery information need to
   be specified.  However these mechanisms are out of scope of this
   doument.

   In case the resource consumer needs guidance for a different IP
   address, for example one from a private network, we recommend that
   the resource consumer discovers the server itself and forwards the
   ALTO server contact information directly to the third party entity,
   which in turn can then do the third party ALTO query.  Again,
   forwarding the contact information from the resource consumer to the
   third party entity is out of scope of this document.

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5.  Deployment Considerations

   The mechanism specified in this document needs some configuration
   effort in order to work properly.

5.1.  DHCP option for DNS Suffix

   Section 3.1.2 describes the usage of a DHCP option.  It enables the
   network operator of the network, in which the ALTO client is located,
   to provide a DNS suffix.  However, this assumes that this particular
   DHCP option is correctly passed from the DHCP server to the actual
   host with the ALTO client, and that the particular host understands
   this DHCP option.  This memo assumes the client to be able to
   understand the proposed DHCP option, otherwise there is no further
   use of the DHCP option, but the client has to use the other proposed
   mechanisms.

   There are well-known issues with the handling of DHCP options in home
   gateways.  One issue is that unkown DHCP options are not passed
   through some home gateways, effectively eliminating the DHCP option.

   Another well-known issues is the usage of home gateway specific DNS
   suffixes which "override" the DNS suffix provided by the network
   operator.  For instance, a host behind a home gateway may receive a
   DNS suffix ".local" instead of "example.com".  This suffix is not
   usuable for the server discovery procedure.

5.2.  PPP option for DNS Suffix

   Section 3.1.3 describes the usage of a PPP option.  It enables the
   network operator of the network, in which the ALTO client is located,
   to provide a DNS suffix.  In residental networks, PPP is often
   terminated in the residential gateway.  The ALTO client may run on
   hosts behind that gateway.  As a result, the information may have to
   be passed to the client.  The residential gateway could for instance
   use the DHCP option for that.

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6.  IANA Considerations

6.1.  Registration of PPP IPCP Configuration Option Type

   The IANA is requested to assign an Type code for the PPP IPCP
   Configuration Option Types for an Access Network Domain Name, as
   described in Section 3.1.3.2 of this document.

   [TO BE REMOVED: This registration should take place at the following
   location: http://www.iana.org/assignments/ppp-numbers]

6.2.  Registration of U-NAPTR application service tag

   The IANA is requested to register the following U-NAPTR application
   service tag:

      Application Service Tag:  ALTO

      Intended usage:  Identifies a service that provides a Device with
         its location information.

      Defining Publication:  The specification contained within this
         document.

      Contact information:  The authors of this document

      Author/Change controller:  The IESG

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7.  Security Considerations

7.1.  General

   There are two different failures for the ALTO server discovery, which
   can both be caused by malicious attacks or by configuration problems,
   e. g., in case of DNS configuration errors or multi-homed hosts.

   First, the discovery might not be able to discover an ALTO server,
   even if a suitable ALTO server exists.  In that case, ALTO guidance
   will not be used.  The resulting application performance and traffic
   distribution will correspond to a deployment scenario without ALTO
   guidance.  But given that users cannot rely on the availability of an
   ALTO server, this results in no significant additional security risk.

   Second, the discovery procedure may discover a sub-optimal or wrong
   ALTO server.  Such an ALTO server may either not be able to provide
   information for a given resource consumer (e. g., behind a NAT), thus
   rendering the ALTO service useless.  Alternatively, it may provide
   sub-optimal or forged information.  In the latter case, attackers
   could try to use ALTO to affect the traffic distribution or the
   performance of applications.  Users may then observe performance
   problems, and network operators could detect traffic anormalities.  A
   potential counter-measure is to disable the use of the ALTO service.

   Security issues of ALTO in general and potential solutions are also
   discussed in [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol].

7.2.  For U-NAPTR

   The address of an ALTO server is usually well-known within an access
   network; therefore, interception of messages does not introduce any
   specific concerns.

   The primary attack against the methods described in this document is
   one that would lead to impersonation of an ALTO server since a device
   does not necessarily have a prior relationship with an ALTO server.

   An attacker could attempt to compromise ALTO discovery at any of
   three stages:

   1.  providing a falsified domain name to be used as input to U-NAPTR

   2.  altering the DNS records used in U-NAPTR resolution

   3.  impersonation of the ALTO server

   This document focuses on the U-NAPTR resolution process and hence

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   this section discusses the security considerations related to the DNS
   handling.  The security aspects of obtaining the domain name that is
   used for input to the U-NAPTR process is described in respective
   documents, such as [RFC5986].

   The domain name that is used to authenticated the ALTO server is the
   domain name in the URI that is the result of the U-NAPTR resolution.
   Therefore, if an attacker was able to modify or spoof any of the DNS
   records used in the DDDS resolution, this URI could be replaced by an
   invalid URI.  The application of DNS security (DNSSEC) [RFC4033]
   provides a means to limit attacks that rely on modification of the
   DNS records used in U-NAPTR resolution.  Security considerations
   specific to U-NAPTR are described in more detail in [RFC4848].

   An "https:" URI is authenticated using the method described in
   Section 3.1 of [RFC2818].  The domain name used for this
   authentication is the domain name in the URI resulting from U-NAPTR
   resolution, not the input domain name as in [RFC3958].  Using the
   domain name in the URI is more compatible with existing HTTP client
   software, which authenticate servers based on the domain name in the
   URI.

   An ALTO server that is identified by an "http:" URI cannot be
   authenticated.  If an "http:" URI is the product of the ALTO
   discovery, this leaves devices vulnerable to several attacks.  Lower
   layer protections, such as layer 2 traffic separation might be used
   to provide some guarantees.

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8.  Conclusion

   This document describes a general ALTO server discovery process and
   discusses how the process can be applied in different deployment
   scenarios.  The discovery process uses U-NAPTR resolution based on
   input information obtained either manually, by DHCP, or by PPP.

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9.  References

9.1.  Normative References

   [RFC1035]  Mockapetris, P., "Domain names - implementation and
              specification", STD 13, RFC 1035, November 1987.

   [RFC1332]  McGregor, G., "The PPP Internet Protocol Control Protocol
              (IPCP)", RFC 1332, May 1992.

   [RFC1661]  Simpson, W., "The Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP)", STD 51,
              RFC 1661, July 1994.

   [RFC1877]  Cobb, S. and F. Baker, "PPP Internet Protocol Control
              Protocol Extensions for Name Server Addresses", RFC 1877,
              December 1995.

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
              Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.

   [RFC2818]  Rescorla, E., "HTTP Over TLS", RFC 2818, May 2000.

   [RFC3958]  Daigle, L. and A. Newton, "Domain-Based Application
              Service Location Using SRV RRs and the Dynamic Delegation
              Discovery Service (DDDS)", RFC 3958, January 2005.

   [RFC4033]  Arends, R., Austein, R., Larson, M., Massey, D., and S.
              Rose, "DNS Security Introduction and Requirements",
              RFC 4033, March 2005.

   [RFC5389]  Rosenberg, J., Mahy, R., Matthews, P., and D. Wing,
              "Session Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN)", RFC 5389,
              October 2008.

   [RFC6418]  Blanchet, M. and P. Seite, "Multiple Interfaces and
              Provisioning Domains Problem Statement", RFC 6418,
              November 2011.

9.2.  Informative References

   [I-D.cheshire-nat-pmp]
              Cheshire, S., "NAT Port Mapping Protocol (NAT-PMP)",
              draft-cheshire-nat-pmp-03 (work in progress), April 2008.

   [I-D.ietf-alto-deployments]
              Stiemerling, M. and S. Kiesel, "ALTO Deployment
              Considerations", draft-ietf-alto-deployments-03 (work in
              progress), November 2011.

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   [I-D.ietf-alto-protocol]
              Penno, R., Alimi, R., and Y. Yang, "ALTO Protocol",
              draft-ietf-alto-protocol-10 (work in progress),
              October 2011.

   [I-D.ietf-alto-reqs]
              Kiesel, S., Previdi, S., Stiemerling, M., Woundy, R., and
              Y. Yang, "Application-Layer Traffic Optimization (ALTO)
              Requirements", draft-ietf-alto-reqs-11 (work in progress),
              July 2011.

   [I-D.kist-alto-3pdisc]
              Kiesel, S. and M. Stiemerling, "3rd Party ALTO Server
              Discovery (3pdisc)", draft-kist-alto-3pdisc-00 (work in
              progress), July 2012.

   [RFC4472]  Durand, A., Ihren, J., and P. Savola, "Operational
              Considerations and Issues with IPv6 DNS", RFC 4472,
              April 2006.

   [RFC4848]  Daigle, L., "Domain-Based Application Service Location
              Using URIs and the Dynamic Delegation Discovery Service
              (DDDS)", RFC 4848, April 2007.

   [RFC5693]  Seedorf, J. and E. Burger, "Application-Layer Traffic
              Optimization (ALTO) Problem Statement", RFC 5693,
              October 2009.

   [RFC5986]  Thomson, M. and J. Winterbottom, "Discovering the Local
              Location Information Server (LIS)", RFC 5986,
              September 2010.

   [UPnP-IGD-WANIPConnection1]
              UPnP Forum, "Internet Gateway Device (IGD) Standardized
              Device Control Protocol V 1.0: WANIPConnection:1 Service
              Template Version 1.01 For UPnP Version 1.0", DCP 05-001,
              November 2001.

   [bep24]    Harrison, D., "Tracker Returns External IP",
              BEP http://bittorrent.org/beps/bep_0024.html.

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Appendix A.  Contributors List and Acknowledgments

   The initial version of this document was co-authored by Marco Tomsu
   <marco.tomsu@alcatel-lucent.com>.

   Hannes Tschofenig provided the initial input to the U-NAPTR solution
   part.  Hannes and Martin Thomson provided excellent feedback and
   input to the server discovery.

   Olafur Gudmundsson provided an excellent DNS expert review on an
   earlier version of this document.

   The authors would also like to thank the following persons for their
   contribution to this document or its predecessors: Richard Alimi,
   David Bryan, Roni Even, Gustavo Garcia, Jay Gu, Xingfeng Jiang,
   Enrico Marocco, Victor Pascual, Y. Richard Yang, Yu-Shun Wang, Yunfei
   Zhang, Ning Zong.

   Nico Schwan is partially supported by the ENVISION project
   (http://www.envision-project.org), a research project supported by
   the European Commission under its 7th Framework Program (contract no.
   248565).  The views and conclusions contained herein are those of the
   authors and should not be interpreted as necessarily representing the
   official policies or endorsements, either expressed or implied, of
   the ENVISION project or the European Commission.

   Michael Scharf is supported by the German-Lab project
   (http://www.german-lab.de) funded by the German Federal Ministry of
   Education and Research (BMBF).

   Martin Stiemerling is partially supported by the COAST project
   (COntent Aware Searching, retrieval and sTreaming,
   http://www.coast-fp7.eu), a research project supported by the
   European Commission under its 7th Framework Program (contract no.
   248036).  The views and conclusions contained herein are those of the
   authors and should not be interpreted as necessarily representing the
   official policies or endorsements, either expressed or implied, of
   the COAST project or the European Commission.

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Authors' Addresses

   Sebastian Kiesel
   University of Stuttgart Computing Center
   Allmandring 30
   Stuttgart  70550
   Germany

   Email: ietf-alto@skiesel.de
   URI:   http://www.rus.uni-stuttgart.de/nks/

   Martin Stiemerling
   NEC Laboratories Europe
   Kurfuerstenanlage 36
   Heidelberg  69115
   Germany

   Phone: +49 6221 4342 113
   Email: martin.stiemerling@neclab.eu
   URI:   http://ietf.stiemerling.org

   Nico Schwan
   Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs
   Lorenzstrasse 10
   Stuttgart  70435
   Germany

   Email: nico.schwan@alcatel-lucent.com
   URI:   www.alcatel-lucent.com/bell-labs

   Michael Scharf
   Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs
   Lorenzstrasse 10
   Stuttgart  70435
   Germany

   Email: michael.scharf@alcatel-lucent.com
   URI:   www.alcatel-lucent.com/bell-labs

   Haibin Song
   Huawei

   Email: melodysong@huawei.com

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