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Optimizing BFD Authentication
draft-ietf-bfd-optimizing-authentication-10

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This is an older version of an Internet-Draft whose latest revision state is "Active".
Authors Mahesh Jethanandani , Ashesh Mishra , Ankur Saxena , Manav Bhatia
Last updated 2020-07-13
Replaces draft-mahesh-bfd-authentication
RFC stream Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
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Stream WG state WG Consensus: Waiting for Write-Up
Document shepherd Reshad Rahman
Shepherd write-up Show Last changed 2020-06-14
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Send notices to Reshad Rahman <rrahman@cisco.com>
draft-ietf-bfd-optimizing-authentication-10
Network Working Group                                    M. Jethanandani
Internet-Draft                                            Kloud Services
Updates: 5880 (if approved)                                    A. Mishra
Intended status: Standards Track                            SES Networks
Expires: January 14, 2021                                      A. Saxena
                                                       Ciena Corporation
                                                               M. Bhatia
                                                                   Nokia
                                                           July 13, 2020

                     Optimizing BFD Authentication
              draft-ietf-bfd-optimizing-authentication-10

Abstract

   This document describes an optimization to BFD Authentication as
   described in Section 6.7 of BFD RFC 5880.  This document updates RFC
   5880.

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 https://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 14, 2021.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2020 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
   (https://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

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   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.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
     1.1.  Requirements Language . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     1.2.  Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   2.  Authentication Mode . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
   3.  NULL Auth Type  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   4.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   5.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   6.  References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     6.1.  Normative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
     6.2.  Informative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   Authors' Addresses  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8

1.  Introduction

   Authenticating every BFD [RFC5880] packet with a Simple Password, or
   with a MD5 Message-Digest Algorithm [RFC1321] , or Secure Hash
   Algorithm (SHA-1) algorithms is a computationally intensive process.
   This makes it difficult, if not impossible to authenticate every
   packet - particularly at faster rates.  Also, the recent escalating
   series of attacks on MD5 and SHA-1 described in Finding Collisions in
   the Full SHA-1 [SHA-1-attack1] and New Collision Search for SHA-1
   [SHA-1-attack2] raise concerns about their remaining useful lifetime
   as outlined in Updated Security Considerations for the MD5 Message-
   Digest and the HMAC-MD5 Algorithm [RFC6151] and Security
   Considerations for the SHA-0 and SHA-1 Message-Digest Algorithm
   [RFC6194].  If replaced by stronger algorithms, the computational
   overhead, will make the task of authenticating every packet even more
   difficult to achieve.

   This document proposes that only BFD packets that signal a state
   change, a demand mode change (to D bit) or a poll sequence change (P
   or F bit change) in a BFD packet be categorized as a significant
   change.  This document also proposes that all BFD control packets
   which signal a significant change MUST be authenticated if the
   session's bfd.AuthType is non-zero.  Other BFD Control packets MAY be
   transmitted and received without the A bit set.

   Most packets that are transmitted and received have no state change
   associated with them.  Limiting authentication to packets that affect
   a BFD session state allows more sessions to be supported with this
   optimized method of authentication.  Moreover, most BFD packets that

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   signal a significant change are generally transmitted at a slower
   interval of 1s, leaving enough time to compute the hash.

   To detect a Man In the Middle (MITM) attack, it is also proposed that
   a BFD control packet without a significant change be authenticated
   occasionally.  The interval of this non-state change frame can be
   configured depending on the detect multiplier and the capability of
   the system.  As an example, this could be equal to the detect
   multiplier number of packets.

   The rest of the document is structured as follows.  Section 2 talks
   about the changes to authentication mode as described in BFD
   [RFC5880].  Section 3 goes into the details of the new Authentication
   Type.

1.1.  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 BCP 14 [RFC2119]
   [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown
   here.

1.2.  Terminology

   The following terms used in this document have been defined in BFD
   [RFC5880].

   o  Detect Multiplier

   o  Detection Time

   +--------------+----------------------------------------------------+
   | Term         | Meaning                                            |
   +--------------+----------------------------------------------------+
   | significant  | State change, a demand model change (to D bit) or  |
   | change       | a poll sequence change (P or F bit).               |
   | configured   | configured authentication periodic interval        |
   | interval     |                                                    |
   +--------------+----------------------------------------------------+

2.  Authentication Mode

   The cryptographic authentication mechanisms specified in BFD
   [RFC5880] describes enabling and disabling of authentication as a one
   time operation.  As a security precaution, it mentions that
   authentication state be allowed to change at most once.  Once
   enabled, every packet must have Authentication Bit set and the

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   associated Authentication Type appended.  In addition, it states that
   an implementation SHOULD NOT allow the authentication state to be
   changed based on the receipt of a BFD Control packet.

   This document proposes that the authentication mode be modified to be
   enabled on demand.  Instead of authenticating every packet, BFD peers
   are configured for which packets need to be authenticated, and
   authenticate only those packets.  Rest of the packets can be
   transmitted and received without authentication.  For example, the
   two ends can be configured such that BFD packets that indicate a
   significant change should be authenticated and enable authentication
   on those packets only.  If the two ends have previously been
   configured as such, but at least one side decides not to authenticate
   a significant change frame, then the BFD session will fail to come
   up.

   This proposal outlines which packets need to be authenticated (carry
   the A-bit), and which packets can be transmitted or received without
   authentication enabled.  A frame that fails authentication is
   discarded, or a frame that was supposed to be authenticated, but was
   not, e.g. a significant change frame, is discarded.  However, there
   is no change to the state machine for BFD, as the decision of a
   significant change is still decided by how many valid consecutive
   packets were received, authenticated or otherwise.

   The following table summarizes when the A bit should be set.  The
   table should be read with the column indicating the BFD state the
   receiver is currently in, and the row indicating the BFD state the
   receiver might transition to based on the packet received.  The
   interesection of the two indicates whether the received packet should
   have the A bit set (Auth), no authentication is needed (NULL), most
   packets are NULL AUTH (Select) or the state transition is not
   applicable.

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          Read   : On state change from <column> to <row>
          Auth   : Authenticate frame
          NULL   : No Authentication. Use NULL AUTH Type.
          n/a    : Invalid state transition.
          Select : Most packets NULL AUTH. Selective (periodic)
                   packets authenticated.
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+
         |        | DOWN   | INIT   | UP     | ADMIN DOWN |
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+
         | DOWN   |  NULL  |  Auth  |  Auth  |    NULL    |
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+
         | INIT   |  Auth  |  NULL  |  n/a   |   n/a      |
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+
         | UP     |  Auth  |  Auth  | Select |   n/a      |
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+
         | ADMIN  |  NULL  |  Auth  | Auth   |   NULL     |
         +--------+--------+--------+--------+------------+

                       Optimized Authentication Map

   If P or F bit changes value, the packet MUST be authenticated.  If
   the D bit changes value, the packet MUST be authenticated.

   All packets already carry the sequence number.  The NULL AUTH packets
   MUST contain the Type specified in Section 3.  This enables a
   monotonically increasing sequence number to be carried in each frame,
   and prevents man-in-the-middle from capturing and replaying the same
   frame again.  Since all packets still carry a sequence number, the
   logic for sequence number maintenance remains unchanged from BFD
   [RFC5880].  If at a later time, a different scheme is adopted for
   changing sequence number, e.g.  Secure BFD Sequence Numbers
   [I-D.ietf-bfd-secure-sequence-numbers], this method can use the
   updated scheme without any impact.

   Most packets transmitted on a BFD session are BFD UP packets.
   Authenticating a small subset of these packets, for example, a detect
   multiplier number of packets per configured period, significantly
   reduces the computational demand for the system while maintaining
   security of the session across the configured authentication periods.
   A minimum of Detect Multiplier packets MUST be transmitted per
   configured periodic authentication interval.  This ensures that the
   BFD session should see at least one authenticated packet during that
   interval.

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3.  NULL Auth Type

   This section describes a new Authentication Type as:

        0                   1                   2                   3
        0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
       +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
       |   Auth Type   |   Auth Len    |  Auth Key ID  |   Reserved    |
       +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
       |                        Sequence Number                        |
       +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

                              NULL Auth Type

   where:

   Auth Type: The Authentication Type, which in this case is TBD (NULL,
   to be assigned by IANA)

   Auth Len: The length of the NULL Auth Type, in bytes i.e. 8 bytes

   Auth Key ID: The authentication key ID in use for this packet.  Must
   be set to zero.

   Reserved: This byte MUST be set to zero on transmit and ignored on
   receive.

   Sequence Number: The sequence number for this packet.  Implementation
   may use sequence numbers (bfd.XmitAuthSeq) as defined in BFD
   [RFC5880], or secure sequence numbers as defined in Secure BFD
   Sequence Numbers [I-D.ietf-bfd-secure-sequence-numbers].

   The NULL Auth Type must be used for all packets that are not
   authenticated.  This protects against replay-attacks by allowing the
   session to maintain an incrementing sequence number for all packets
   (authenticated and un-authenticated).

   In the future, if a new scheme is adopted for changing the sequence
   number, this method can adopt the new scheme without any impact.

4.  IANA Considerations

   This document requests an update to the registry titled "BFD
   Authentication Types".  IANA is requested to to assign a new BFD Auth
   Type for "NULL" (see Section 3).

   Note to RFC Editor: this section may be removed on publication as an
   RFC.

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5.  Security Considerations

   The approach described in this document enhances the ability to
   authenticate a BFD session by taking away the onerous requirement
   that every BFD control packet be authenticated.  By authenticating
   packets that affect the state of the session, the security of the BFD
   session is maintained.  In this mode, packets that are a significant
   change but are not authenticated, are dropped by the system.
   Therefore, a malicious user that tries to inject a non-authenticated
   packet, e.g. with a Down state to take a session down will fail.
   That combined with the proposal of using sequence number defined in
   Secure BFD Sequence Numbers [I-D.ietf-bfd-secure-sequence-numbers]
   further enhances the security of BFD sessions.

6.  References

6.1.  Normative References

   [I-D.ietf-bfd-secure-sequence-numbers]
              Jethanandani, M., Agarwal, S., Mishra, A., Saxena, A., and
              A. DeKok, "Secure BFD Sequence Numbers", draft-ietf-bfd-
              secure-sequence-numbers-05 (work in progress), February
              2020.

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
              Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc2119>.

   [RFC5880]  Katz, D. and D. Ward, "Bidirectional Forwarding Detection
              (BFD)", RFC 5880, DOI 10.17487/RFC5880, June 2010,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5880>.

   [RFC8174]  Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
              2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
              May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8174>.

6.2.  Informative References

   [RFC1321]  Rivest, R., "The MD5 Message-Digest Algorithm", RFC 1321,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC1321, April 1992,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc1321>.

   [RFC6151]  Turner, S. and L. Chen, "Updated Security Considerations
              for the MD5 Message-Digest and the HMAC-MD5 Algorithms",
              RFC 6151, DOI 10.17487/RFC6151, March 2011,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6151>.

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   [RFC6194]  Polk, T., Chen, L., Turner, S., and P. Hoffman, "Security
              Considerations for the SHA-0 and SHA-1 Message-Digest
              Algorithms", RFC 6194, DOI 10.17487/RFC6194, March 2011,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6194>.

   [SHA-1-attack1]
              Wang, X., Yin, Y., and H. Yu, "Finding Collisions in the
              Full SHA-1", 2005.

   [SHA-1-attack2]
              Wang, X., Yao, A., and F. Yao, "New Collision Search for
              SHA-1", 2005.

Authors' Addresses

   Mahesh Jethanandani
   Kloud Services
   USA

   Email: mjethanandani@gmail.com

   Ashesh Mishra
   SES Networks

   Email: mishra.ashesh@gmail.com

   Ankur Saxena
   Ciena Corporation
   3939 N 1st Street
   San Jose, CA  95134
   USA

   Email: ankurpsaxena@gmail.com

   Manav Bhatia
   Nokia
   Bangalore
   India

   Email: manav.bhatia@nokia.com

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