The chair speaks....
In the new security aware internet community, it is likely the IESG,
or IAB will accept for standardization a RFC with known security
limitations, without explicitly pointing them out, rating the degree
of danger, and proposing work-arounds where necessary.
I assume you meant "unlikely", not "likely".
While this discussion is currently focused on particular content types, I
would like to observe that this is not necessary. In general, no electronic
mail message should be believed without some form of authorization,
irrespective of the content type.
I assert that a trojan horse could be inserted in almost any content-type,
and the act of "viewing" that content-type should be considered threatening.
This is the statement, with an appropriate extended discussion, that would
be a *welcome* addition to this RFC.
Note that PEM provides authentication, but virtually no protection from
trojan horses. All it gives you is some assurance of the pedigree of the
mail message, with which the end-user must decide how to proceed. There is
no way to automate this process.
I assert that work arounds are beyond the scope of this work. Although one
could imagine a "filter" for script languages in mail messages that would
identify "dubious" constructs, this filter could not possibly be definitive
in all cases. After all, one man's dubious construct is another man's
livelihood. This argument applies in general.
J. Galvin.... Any helpful words?
I hope this is helpful.
Jim