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OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

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Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#11

Post by some_furry »

tptacek wrote: post #5
Rafuino wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is taking 2 years to address a vulnerability normal?

Maybe in this case! You can look at P1v15 RSA and assume that there might be some kind of behavior oracle, which is definitely not the same thing as demonstrating that there is a viable oracle. A problem with P1v15 in general is that you have to mitigate these kinds of covert channels directly. But I assume the comment above was suggesting there was something more interesting than the magnitude of the lag.

> But I assume the comment above was suggesting there was something more interesting than the magnitude of the lag.

Nothing insidious, just thought maybe it could have been a typo. But if not, then it's just an amusing coincidence.

Taking 2 years to demonstrate the impact of a difficult or strange cryptographic bug isn't really that interesting in and of itself.

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#13

Post by tptacek »

some_furry wrote: post #11
tptacek wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe in this case! You can look at P1v15 RSA and assume that there might be some kind of behavior oracle, which is definitely not the same thing as demonstrating that there is a viable oracle. A problem with P1v15 in general is that you have to mitigate these kinds of covert channels directly. But I assume the comment above was suggesting there was something more interesting than the magnitude of the lag.

> But I assume the comment above was suggesting there was something more interesting than the magnitude of the lag. Nothing insidious, just thought maybe it could have been a typo. But if not, then it's just an amusing coincidence. Taking 2 years to demonstrate the impact of a difficult or strange cryptographic bug isn't really that interesting in and of itself.

Right, especially in this case where you can almost just go from TLS library to TLS library saying "hm, this implements P1v15, probably has a timing channel" to get credit for the eventual finding. :)

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#14

Post by some_furry »

tptacek wrote: post #13
some_furry wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But I assume the comment above was suggesting there was something more interesting than the magnitude of the lag. Nothing insidious, just thought maybe it could have been a typo. But if not, then it's just an amusing coincidence. Taking 2 years to demonstrate the impact of a difficult or strange cryptographic bug isn't really that interesting in and of itself.

Right, especially in this case where you can almost just go from TLS library to TLS library saying "hm, this implements P1v15, probably has a timing channel" to get credit for the eventual finding. :)

Right. In a lot of cases "this implements RSA" and "this wasn't written by Thomas Pornin" is enough to suspect a timing channel. Writing a proof of concept for one is at least an order of magnitude more challenging; at least in my experience. (I am way better at mitigation than exploit development.)

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#15

Post by Flocular »

stabbles wrote: post #9

A few more CVEs and we're at OpenSSL 1.1.1z, followed by v1.1.1.za, and it is going to break some package manager that in a certain locale orders versions as 1.1.1.za > 1.1.1z, and its users will be stuck on a vulnerable version.

openSSL 1.1.1 is EOL 2023-09-11 which is likely to be the bigger problem for random-distro-XYZ

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#16

Post by tptacek »

some_furry wrote: post #14
tptacek wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, especially in this case where you can almost just go from TLS library to TLS library saying "hm, this implements P1v15, probably has a timing channel" to get credit for the eventual finding. :)

Right. In a lot of cases "this implements RSA" and "this wasn't written by Thomas Pornin" is enough to suspect a timing channel. Writing a proof of concept for one is at least an order of magnitude more challenging; at least in my experience. (I am way better at mitigation than exploit development.)

Everybody is!

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#17

Post by some_furry »

tptacek wrote: post #16
some_furry wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. In a lot of cases "this implements RSA" and "this wasn't written by Thomas Pornin" is enough to suspect a timing channel. Writing a proof of concept for one is at least an order of magnitude more challenging; at least in my experience. (I am way better at mitigation than exploit development.)

Everybody is!

Good to know! (I thought maybe this was just my own biases or weaknesses showing. I've been trying to work on it this year when I have time.)

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#18

Post by mg_at_fork-pl »

midasuni wrote: post #7
tptacek wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is that interesting?

2 year was frequently the length of ssl certificates (they’ve since dropped to 1 year) Or maybe it’s a coincidence.

It was never 2 years as it's not 1 year now. It's specified in days (397 currently, 825 and 1185 days before).

Re: OpenSSL Security Advisory [7th February 2023]

#20

Post by kroeckx »

some_furry wrote: post #2

Are these dates correct? An initial report of a possible timing side channel was made on 14th July 2020 by Hubert Kario (Red Hat). A refined report identifying a specific timing side channel was made on 15th July 2022 by Hubert Kario. The fix was developed by Dmitry Belyavsky (Red Hat) and Hubert Kario. If so, it's interesting that it took exactly 2 years and 1 day for the refined report. EDIT: By interesting I just…

Yes, the dates are correct.
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