Randomness Improvements for Security Protocols

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Publisher: IETF
Doc Type: Informational
Pages: 9
Abstract: Randomness is a crucial ingredient for Transport Layer Security (TLS) and related security protocols. Weak or predictable "cryptographically secure" pseudorandom number generators (CSPRNGs) can be abused or exploited for malicious purposes. An initial entropy source that seeds a CSPRNG might be weak or broken as well, which can also lead to critical and systemic security problems. This document describes a way for security protocol implementations to augment their CSPRNGs using long-term private keys. This improves randomness from broken or otherwise subverted CSPRNGs. This document is a product of the Crypto Forum Research Group (CFRG) in the IRTF.
Publication Date: 2020-10-01
Status Note: Informational
DOI: 10.17487/RFC8937
Link: https://doi.org/10.17487/RFC8937
Author(s): Cas Cremers
Luke Garratt
Stanislav V. Smyshlyaev
Nick Sullivan
Christopher A. Wood
Keyword(s): Security, Cryptography, TLS

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Document Versions — IETF RFC 8937

▶ IETF RFC 8937 (2020-10-01)

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Normative Reference(s)

IETF RFC 2119 [Active*]
IETF RFC 5869 [Active*]
IETF RFC 6979 [Active*]
IETF RFC 8174 [Active*]

Bibliographic Reference(s)

10.1007-978-3-540-75670-5_1 — NAXOS EXTERNAL
10.1007-978-3-662-49301-4_17 — DualEC EXTERNAL
10.1109-CSF49147.2020.00027 — SecAnalysis EXTERNAL
10.1145-1644893.1644896 — DebianBug EXTERNAL
ANSI.X9.62.2005 — X9.62-2005 EXTERNAL
NIST.SP.800-90Ar1 — SP80090A EXTERNAL
Ristenpart, T. and S. Yilek, "When Good Randomness Goes Bad: Virtual Machine Reset Vulnerabilities and Hedging Deployed Cryptography", January 2010, <https://rist.tech.cornell.edu/papers/sslhedge.pdf>. EXTERNAL
McGrew, D., Anderson, B., Fluhrer, S., and C. Schenefiel, "PRNG Failures and TLS Vulnerabilities in the Wild", January 2017, <https://rwc.iacr.org/2017/Slides/david.mcgrew.pptx>. EXTERNAL

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Referenced By

IETF RFC 9415 [Active*]
IETF RFC 9562 [Active*]
IETF RFC 9846 [Active*]