>I can also forsee a world where there is so much junk e-mail floating
>around that people regularly refuse or de-prioritize e-mail which isn't
>encrypted to them personally. A public key database would be a
>convenient "grep and send" magnet for the marketeers of the world.
this is a very real threat to commercial operators of the services in this
area, in
terms of misuse of information provided, and also affiliated denial of
service attacks.
The key issues seems to be, when offering public services which seek
to offer a medium or high level of availability, that one enforces
a restricted openness policy. Monitoring protections are also inevitably
also required.
Offering a public key database access protocol (option) might ensure
that the requestor has already possesion of key words concerning the
single element search/lookup (elements of the RDN to be searched on for the
key, with
no browsing options).
That an implementation monitors usage, and holds the user accountable
for strange behaviour (e.g. Visa phones you up having monitored for
your mutual interests that you suddenly bought 400 gallons of petrol at
14 gas stations yesterday, and have you lost your card or your mind!?)
should be expected for a commercial operator operating in a public
service framework subject to regulation and sanction designed to ensure
a vital service to legit users is not unduly attacked by miscreants.
But yes. availability attacks are hard to counter, as are the
complementary attacks which prejudice and otherwise abuse the intent of
the service, and the availability to legit users.
The Internet Worm is the world's single most effective attack on
availability of networked IS systems yet seen. there is no reason to belive
that such attacks will not continue with yet further consequences
to assets at risk, as business comes onto the net.
The net services have to offer some domains and circuits which are not
wholly anarchic and wholly open, when addressing the concerns of
business which are risking their assets.
Now this isnt a net we are all used to, however.