ietf-dkim
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Re: [ietf-dkim] DKIM/ADSP edge case writeup at CircleID

2009-03-25 08:33:12
SM wrote:
At 16:40 24-03-2009, J.D. Falk wrote:
Pointing to an RFC rarely mitigates real-world concerns.

I commented on why the problem occurs.  I could argue that header 
field should not be present in a RFC 5322 message at the signing 
stage.  RFC 4871 lists some header fields that should be signed.  It 
also contains a list of header fields that should not be signed.  The 
Return-Path header field is listed in there.

If you believe this is a real-world concern that should be addressed, 
you could specify that the Return-Path header field must not be 
included in the signature.

I think this is the sort of "errata" material is worth the cause.

 From my experience, Return-Path should not be included in the 
signature.  But then again, we started as a UUCP/UUCICO system where 
"From " was part of the model and was replaced with Return-Path only 
for the router for failure to delivery purposes.  But the router does 
not resend it back out. For us, its "meta" data.

But over the years, you can see the evolution of more and more systems 
adding it and keeping it there all the way to the MUA to see.

So in my book, due to the history behind it, it is probably better to 
have a MUST NOT for this. SHOULD NOT is probably not strong enough for 
a mail integrity application.  Signing return-path might cause issues 
as Mark Martinec highlighted with non DKIM-aware software

But there are others in the SHOULD NOT list, for example, BCC, that 
really should be in a MUST NOT list simply because it is not expected 
to be there otherwise we are violating User Expectation for privacy.

Legally speaking, in the USA, this would be US EPCA protected item. 
BCC definitely should never be signed and it should not be in the 
headers after the mail is submitted for processing.  The distribution 
list should be expanded and the 8222 headers prepared properly for the 
  non-blind and blind distribution.   Definitely a process that should 
be done any DKIM SIGNING design consideration.

-- 
Sincerely

Hector Santos
http://www.santronics.com


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