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Re: [ietf-dkim] I think we can punt the hard stuff as out of scope.

2007-06-05 11:36:47

On Jun 5, 2007, at 10:19 AM, Hallam-Baker, Phillip wrote:

We already know how to wildcard NOMAIL. If we find that only 5% of domains actually need to wildcard a DKIM policy for domains that do not exist then we simply direct people to the existing solutions for declaring NOMAIL (MXdot, SenderID/SPF) that work with wildcard.

Neither MX dot or SPF represents a safe solution!!!! All unused sub- domains would be included in an assertion that implies "Don't bother processing a signature or mail from these domains, they're bogus." This means a 5% estimate is off by a large margin!

At that point we can solve 95% of all problems today with no infrastructure changes with the TXT/XPTR/TXT search, and the coverage will reach 100% in the future as infrastructure is upgraded.

The XPTR solution requires a wildcard RR be published at _every_ DNS node. There was little interest within the DNS WG to automate this construct. This will also have a significant impact upon the size of a typical DNS zone and all the related caching. It would be highly prudent to seek advice from the DNS WG on this matter.

We don't need to propose any thrashing about the DNS tree of the type that rightly upsets DNS folk. We set a clean precedent for the future. We get the benefit of an improved admin model. We build out infrastructure that is DNSSEC friendly.

Changes to infrastructure is not needed when the SMTP service and policy are anchored to the MX record. Email represents a rather unique problem as it pushes a vast amount of information without prior arrangement. It is not clear there are other protocols that benefit from introducing of a new type of DNS wildcard. In each case, there are likely other solutions that impose less risk as most other protocols pull information.

As email is rather unique, it might be possible to establish an interim solution for email where policy is anchored to an A record. However, the adoption timeframe will be long, where obsoleting the use of A records as an alternative to MX records should also be possible when a little pressure is applied. Less is more with respect to security.

-Doug

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