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Comment by danyork | Hacker News Reader

tptacek:

> I don't understand the point you're trying to make.

I am trying to understand how the attack you say is possible truly is possible.

> In this case, you're talking about a zone (COM) the USG explicitly controls. They don't need to spoof the delegation from the root to COM, or the anchor key for the root itself.

Verisign operates the .COM TLD registry and has documented in excruciating detail how they handle the security of DNSSEC key material: https://www.verisigninc.com/assets/tld-gtld-zone-v1.2.pdf

Is your assertion that the NSA would order Verisign to bypass those controls and make a change to a DS record (and associated NS records) to redirect people to another site?

If so, how would they do that for just me? It would have to be a much larger redirection of people.

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First, Verisign operates the .COM TLD at the pleasure of the US government.

Second, if "just trust Verisign" is enough, we're done: just have the browsers only allow Verisign as the TLS CA for .COM names.

to tptacek's point - an attacker doesn't need to change the root zone. All they need is the root key. (This argument could be equally made of the CA system.)

Then they can sign anything they like, anytime they like, and only for some small targeted set of the population - and for DNSSEC, that's ONLY if you're checking it anyway. (and if you don't control your recursive resolver or patch your browser, tough cookies). @danyork your edge checking is great.. so I presume you never bring your laptop to a coffee shop. ;)

Let's not be naive.. as far as root keys go, Verisign is a big company and will promptly hand over any and all keys upon receipt of an NSL or court order and probably just an administrative subpoena. That's how you win and keep massive, government-mandated monopolies to run the world.

(To be fair, it's not Verisign's fault that the entire CA system is broken. Oh, wait, actually.. it's exactly Verisign's fault. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verisign#History )

Let's be clear, though, the root of DNSSEC is NOT handled like the root of any CA system. The process of obtaining the root private key is not something where you just break into some system and grab a file somewhere.

The root zone's private key is actually distribute across a set of smart cards possessed by Trusted Community Representatives (TCRs - people like you and me within the Internet technical community) - some number of whom get together periodically in "key ceremonies" to perform actions that require the root KSK, such as the generation of new Zone Signing Keys (ZSKs) every 3 months in what are called "key ceremonies" - https://www.iana.org/dnssec/ceremonies

The entire process of protecting the root zone's key material are documented at length in what is called a DNSSEC Practice Statement: https://www.iana.org/dnssec/icann-dps.txt

Again, the DNSSEC root zone management is EXTREMELY different from that of the CA system. It was designed to be much more secure and to not allow the kind of penetration we're seeing with the CA system.

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