An attack on paypal --> secure UI for browsers

[Adam Shostack]

On Fri, Jun 13, 2003 at 11:04:42PM +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote:
| > The problem (among others) is that this allows a virus to steal the
| > client cert.  If it is protected by a password, the malware must hang
| > around long enough for the user to unlock the cert (perhaps because the
| > malware sent a spoofed email calling for the user to visit the site,
| > even the real site!).  It can then read the user's keystrokes and acquire
| > the password.  Now it has the cert and password and can impersonate the
| > user at will.
| >
| > The solution to this is Palladium (NGSCB).
| 
| BAH! *shudders*
| 
| All we need for this is an external cryptographic token - a smartcard with
| a keypad, an USB device, a Bluetooth-enabled thingy. You plug it into the
| machine, the server you connect to sends its certificate name and
| challenge to the browser, which passes it unchanged to your token. The
...
| get as low as few dollars, can easily interface with just about any OS
| including PDAs, and doesn't require The Megacorp Whose Name Shouldn't Be
| Spoken to take over your machine.

Actually, most of the features of Nogsuccob are features that I
want, like integrity protected, authenticated boot.  The problem,
bundled with those features, is the ability of the system to attest to
its secure boot.  This can be fixed by not letting the host know if
you've exported its host key or not, which makes it possible to run a
virtualized, trusted copy in your emulation environment.

Adam

-- 
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once."
					               -Hume