The Public Switched
Telephone Network (PSTN) Validation Protocol (PVP)jdrosen.netMonmouthNJUSjdrosen@jdrosen.nethttp://www.jdrosen.netCisco170 West Tasman DriveSan JoseCA95134USA+1 408 421-9990fluffy@cisco.comStonyfishmarc@stonyfish.com
RAI
VIPROne of the main challenges in inter-domain federation of
Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) calls is that many domains
continue to utilize phone numbers, and not email-style SIP
URI. Consequently, a mechanism is needed that enables secure
mappings from phone numbers to domains. The main technical
challenge in doing this securely is to verify that the domain in
question truly is the "owner" of the phone number. This
specification defines the PSTN Validation Protocol (PVP), which
can be used by a domain to verify this ownership by means of a
forward routability check in the PSTN. This documents and the information contained therein are provided on
an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS
OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND
THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE
INFORMATION THEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED
WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.The validation protocol is the key security mechanism in ViPR. It is
used to couple together PSTN calls with IP destinations based on shared
knowledge of a PSTN call. This document relies heavily on the concepts
and terminology defined in and will not make
sense if you have not read that document first.The protocol assumes that two enterprises, the originating one
(enterprise O) initiates a call on the PSTN to an E.164 number ECALLED
that terminates on the terminating enterprise (enterprise T). Each
enterprise has a ViPR server, acting as a P2P node. The node in
enterprise O is PO, and the node in enterprise T is PT. This PSTN call
completes successfully, and knowledge of this call is known to PO and
PT. Later on, PO will query the P2P network with number ECALLED. It
comes back with a Node-ID PCAND for a node. At this time, PO can't know
for sure that PCAND is in fact PT. All it knows is that some node,
PCAND, wrote an entry into the DHT claiming that it was the owner of
number ECALLED. The objective of the protocol is for PO to determine
that node PCAND can legitimately claim ownership of number ECALLED, by
demonstrating knowledge of the previous PSTN call. It demonstrates that
knowledge by demonstrating it knows the start time, stop timer, and
possibly caller ID for the PSTN call made previously.If node PCAND can demonstrate such knowledge, then enterprise O can
assume that node PCAND had in fact received the call, which could only
have happened if it had knowledge of the call to number ECALLED, which
could only have happened if PCAND is in enterprise T, and thus it is PT.
This is because PSTN routing is assumed to be "secure", in that, if
someone calls some number through the PSTN, it will in fact reach a
terminating line (whether it be analog, PRI, or other) which is the
rightful "owner" of that number. If enterprise T was not the owner of
the number, if would not have received the call, would not know its
start/stop/caller ID, not be able to provide that information to PT, and
not be able to satisfy the knowledge proof. This basic approach is shown
in Figure 102.A first question commonly asked is, why not just do regular
authentication? What if we give each node a certificate, and then have
the nodes authenticate each other? The answer is that a certificate
certifies that a particular node belongs to a domain - for example, that
node PT is part of example.com. A certificate does not assert that, not
only is PT example.com, but example.com owns the following phone
numbers. Therefore simple certificate authentication does not provide
any guarantee over ownership of phone numbers.In principle, it might be possible to ask certificate authorities,
such as Verisign, to assert just that. However, traditionally,
certificate authorities have been extremely hesitant to certify much at
all. The reason is, the certifier needs to be able to assure that the
information is correct. How can a certifier like Verisign verify that,
in fact, a particular enterprise owns phone numbers? It could make a few
test calls, perhaps, to check if they look right. However, these test
calls are disruptive to users that own the numbers (since their phones
will ring!). If the test calls are done for a subset of the numbers, it
is not secure. If the certifier simply required, as part of the business
agreement, that the enterprises provided correct information, the
certifier might avoid legal liability, but the legitimacy of the service
will be compromised and customers will stop using it. Furthermore, it
has proven incredibly hard to do this kind of certification worldwide
with a single certificate authority.ViPR has, as a goal, to work anywhere in the world and do guarantee
correct call routing with five nines of reliability. Consequently,
traditional certificates and authentication do not work. It turns out to
be quite hard to design a secure version of this validation protocol. To
demonstrate this, we will walk through some initial attempts at it, and
show how they fail.The first attempt one might make is the following. PO takes the
caller ID for the call, ECALLING and called number ECALLED for the call,
and sends them to candidate node PCAND. These two identifiers - the
called number E and the caller ID, form a unique handle that can be used
to identify the call in question. Node PCAND looks at all of the ViPR Call Records (VCRs) of
the calls over the last 48 hours, and takes those with the given called
party number and calling party number. If there is more than one match,
the most recent one is used. We now have a unique call.Now, node PCAND demonstrates knowledge of this call by handing back
the start and stop times for this call in a message back to PO. This
approach is shown in Figure 103.Unfortunately, this method has a major problem, shown in Figure
104.Consider an attacker BadGuy PBAD. PBAD joins the P2P network, and
advertises a number prefix they do NOT own, but which is owned by
enterprise T and node PT. Now, when PO queries the DHT with number
ECALLED, it comes back with two results - the one from PBAD and the one
from node PT. Details of querying the DHT are provided in . It begins
validation procedures with both. PBAD will now be asked to show the
start and stop times for the call, given ECALLED and ECALLING. It
doesn't know that information. However, node PT does. So now, PBAD,
acting as if it where the originating party, begins the validation
protocol with node PT. It passes the calling and called numbers sent by
PO. PT finds a match and returns the call start and stop times to PBAD.
PBAD, in turn, relays them back to PO. They are correct, and as a
consequence, PO has just validated PBAD!Typically, the first response to this is, "Well the problem is, you
let two separate people write the same number into the DHT. Why don't
you make sure on the right one is allowed to write it in?". That is not
possible, since there is no mechanism by which an arbitrary node in the
DHT can determine who is the rightful owner of this number. "OK", the
reader responds, "So instead, why don't you define a rule that says, if
there are two entries in the DHT for a particular number, consider this
an attack and don't try to validate the number". That would prevent the
attack above. However, it introduces a Denial of service attack. An
attacker can pick a target number, write it into the DHT, and prevent
successful validation from happening towards that number. They can't
misroute calls, but they can stop ViPR from working for targeted
numbers. That is not acceptable. ViPR has to be immune from attacks like
this; it should not be possible, through simple means such as
configuration, for an attacker to cause a targeted number to never be
validated.One might be tempted to add a signature over the call start and stop
times, but it does not help. BadGuy can just resign them and relay them
on.In essence, this simple approach is like a login protocol where the
client sends the password in the clear. Such mechanisms have serious
security problems.Realizing the similarities between the validation protocol and a
login protocol, a next attempt would be to use a much more secure login
mechanism - digest authentication. To do this, domain O takes the called
number E and the caller ID, and send them to node P. Node P treats these
as a "username" of sorts - an index to find a single matching call. The
start time and stop times of the call become the "password". Enterprise
O also sends a big random number - a nonce - to node P. Node P then
takes the random number, takes the password, hashes them together, and
sends back the hash. All of this is done over a TLS connection between
enterprise O and node P. Digest over TLS is very secure, so surely this
must be secure too, right? Wrong!It is not. Indeed it is susceptible to EXACTLY the same attack
described previously. This is shown in Figure 105.In a similar attack, PBAD could pick a random called number it is
interested in, query the P2P network for it, find node PT. Then, provide
node PT the number ECALLED to attack, and ECALLING, assuming it can
guess a likely caller ID. It then takes the received digest response, and
goes through every possible start/stop time over the last 24 hours,
running them through the hash function. When the hash produces a match,
the PBAD has just found a full VCR for node PT. It can then write into
the DHT using number E as a key, pointing to itself, and satisfy
validation requests against it, without even needing to ask node P
again. Our first attempt is susceptible to this attack too.The problem here is that the call start and stop times have "low
entropy" - they are not very random and are easily guessable, just like
a poorly chosen password.What we really want to do here is have a "login" protocol that
creates a secure connection between a client and a server, where we use
the called number and caller ID as a "username" to identify a PSTN call,
and then use the start and stop times as a "password". But our login
protocol has to have some key features: Someone posing as a server, but which does not have the username
and password, cannot determine the username and password easily as a
consequence of an authentication operation started by a valid
client, aside from successfully guessing in the one attempt it is
given on each connection attempt.Someone posing as a client, but which does not have the username
and password, cannot determine the username and password as a
consequence of an authentication operation started against a valid
server, aside from guessing in the one attempt it is given on each
TLS connection attempt.An active MITM, who is explicitly on the path of the exchanges
and has visibility and the ability to modify messages, cannot obtain
the shared secret, nor can it observe or modify information passed
between the client and real server.It is impossible for a passive observer to view the exchange and
obtain the shared secret or any of the material that is
exchanged.It is impossible for a rogue client or rogue server to
participate in a login with a legitimate peer, and then take the
messages exchanged, and run an offline dictionary attack to work
through every possible combination of start and stop times.
Fortunately, these properties are provided by a class of password
authentication protocols called Encrypted Key Exchange or EKE
protocols.EKE protocols were proposed in 1992 by Steve Bellovin. Since their
proposal, numerous variations have been defined. One of them, the Secure
Remote Password protocol, was standardized by the IETF in RFC 2945. A TLS mode of SRP was later defined in
RFC 5054. It is the latter protocol which
is actually used by ViPR. A high level overview of EKE protocols is
shown in Figure 106. Alice and Bob share a shared secret P. Alice
generates a public/private keypair. She then takes her public key, and
encrypts it using her password as a symmetric encryption key. She sends
this encrypted key to Bob. Bob, who shares the password, uses it as a
symmetric key and decrypts the message, obtaining Alice's new public
key. Bob then constructs a big random number R, which is to be used as a
session key. Bob then encrypts R with the public key he just got from
Alice, and sends that to Alice. Now, Alice, using her public key,
decrypts the message and obtains the session key R.At this point Alice and Bob share a session key R which can be used
for authentication (by having Alice and Bob prove to each other that
they have the same value for R) or for encrypting data back and forth.
How does this help? Consider our man-in-the-middle attack again, in
Figure 107. Once again, Alice shares a password with legitimate user
Bob. However, she begins the "login" process with BadGuy. She passes
E(PUB,P) to BadGuy. BadGuy doesn't know P, so he can't decrypt the
message. More importantly, he can't run through each possible password P
and decrypt the message. If he did, he wouldn't be able to tell if he
got it right, since PUB appears random; the decryption process would
produce a random string of bits whether it was successful or not. So for
now, BadGuy can only pass it on. BadGuy now intercepts E(R,PUB). Now,
BadGuy can try the following. He can run through each P, decrypt
E(PUB,R), obtain PUB. However, since we are using asymmetric encryption
(i.e., public key encryption), even with PUB he cannot DECRYPT E(R,PUB)!
BadGuy does not have the private key, which he needs to decrypt. Given a
public key, he cannot guess the private key either. That is how
public/private keying systems work. That is the secret here to making
this work. So, once again, BadGuy has no choice but to pass the message
on. Now, Alice and Bob share R but it is unknown to BadGuy. Bob now
takes his Node-ID, encrypts it with R, and sends to Alice. Once again,
BadGuy doesn't have R and can't get it, so he has no choice but to pass
it on. Alice decrypts this Node-ID with R, and now knows that she is
actually talking to Bob - since she has Bob's Node-ID. Other data can be
substituted for the Node-ID, and indeed this is what happens in the
actual validation protocol.However, the main point of this exercise is to demonstrate that EKE
protocols have the desired properties.The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in .The validation protocol begins with the following assumptions:Node PO wishes to validate with node PCAND, and has its Node-ID
(which it obtained via the DHT) and VServiceID (which it also
obtained via the DHT Fetch).Node PO and PCAND have a series of call records over the last 48
hours, uploaded by their call agents. Each call record contains an
E.164 calling and called party number, and a start and stop time in
NTP time. On the terminating side, each call record is also
associated with a VServiceID.Node PO is seeking to validate a call to called number ECALLED
with caller ID ECALLING.The validation protocol operates by having the originating node make
a series of attempts to connect to, and "login" to the terminating node.
Each "login" attempt consists of establishment of a TCP connection, and
then execution of TLS-SRP procedures over that connection. TLS-SRP relies on a shared secret - in the form of a
username and password - in order to secure the connection. In ViPR, the
username and password are constructed by using information from a target
VCR along with the VServiceID learned from the DHT. The "username",
instead of identifying a user, identifies a (hopefully) unique VCR
shared between the originating and terminating nodes. The "password" is
constructed from the VCR such that it knowledge of the information is
unique to knowledge of the VCR itself.Unfortunately, it is difficult to construct usernames and passwords
that always uniquely identify a VCR. To deal with this, the validation
protocol requires the originator to construct a series of usernames and
passwords against a series of different nodes and their corresponding IP
addresses and ports, and then run through them until a connection is
securely established.ViPR provides two different algorithms for mapping from a particular
VCR to a username and password:Method A: This method makes use of the called party and calling
party number to form the username, and the start and stop times of
the call to form the password.Method B: This method makes use of the called party number, along
with a point in time in the middle of the call, as the username, and
then the start and stop times to form the password.The originating node will first try validations with method A, and if
those all fail, then try with method B. The method itself, along with
necessary information on how to use the method, is encoded into the
username itself. The format of the username is (using ABNF ):This format starts with the method, followed by a colon, followed by
a sequence of characters that are specific to the method. Both methods a
and b rely on conveyance of information attributes that make up the
username. Each attribute follows a specific format.Examples include:Both methods use a rounding factor R. This is used to round the start
and stop times in the password to a specific nearest multiple of R
(which is in milliseconds). This rounding is done because the passwords
need to be bit exact and we need to compensate for different measured
values.If we will fallback to method B (which works more often), why have
both? There are two answers:The caller ID mechanism (method A) will work, and the non-caller ID
(method B) won't work, for numbers like 8xx.Method A has much higher entropy (see analysis in ). Validating with it provides greater
confidence in the validity of the number. In this phase, nothing is
done with this "confidence". However, in later phases, it is
anticipated that low-confidence numbers will require multiple
validations for different calls to occur before they are trusted. To
allow for this feature to be added later, validation with both
methods must be present in the initial release.The sections below detail precisely how these are constructed.Most of the work for validation is on the side of the originator. It
establishes connections and performs a series of validation checks.
The first step in the process is to establish a TCP connection to PCAND.
To do that, PO sends a RELOAD AppAttach message targeted towards PCAND, using the Application-ID defined in .
Once connected, TLS-SRP is run over the connection.
When a terminating node receives a username in a format it doesn't
understand, it fails the validation. This allows for graceful upgrade
to new mechanisms in the future. The PO examines the VCR it is using for validation. It extracts
the calling and called party numbers, both of which are E.164 based.
This VCR will have been uploaded at a previous point in time. PO
then examines the VCRs posted in the time since this one was
uploaded, and looks for any more recent VCRs with the same calling
and called party numbers regardless of VService. If it finds one or
more, it takes the most recent one (as measured by its end time). If
it finds no more recent, it uses the VCR which triggered the
validation in the first place.Why do this? This deals with the following case. User A calls
user B, causing a VCR to be uploaded. The originating node sets a
timer, which fires 12 hours later. However, within that 12 hour
period, A called B again. If node A provides the caller ID and called
party numbers as the "key" to select a VCR, it will match multiple
records over the past day. We need to pick one, so the most recent
is always used. This requires the originating node to know and use
the most recent VCR. Furthermore, we must choose the most recent VCR
regardless of its VService, because the originating Upload VCRs are
sent using an arbitrary VService. Thus, the more recent call may
have been done using a different VService than the one which
triggered the validation. Since the actual Vservices are not common
between originating and terminating sides, we must choose the VCR on
the originating side regardless of VService. The username is
constructed by using the syntax for method A described above. The
calling party number is set to "op", and the called party number is
set to "tp", and "r" is the value of Tr as an integral number of
milliseconds. The VServiceID learned from the dictionary entry is
used as the value of "vs".This username will select the identical VCR at the terminating
node, under the following conditions:PT is aware of all calls made to the called party number.
This property is true so long as each incoming number is handled by
a single call agent within a domain, and furthermore, the VCR
for calls to that number is always posted to a ViPR server which
advertises that number into the DHT. These properties are
readily met by ViPR for typical single user numbers. For 8xx
numbers, which are translated within the PSTN and may route to a
multiplicity of non-8xx numbers, it is more difficult. ViPR will
only work with 8xx numbers if all calls to those numbers get
sent to agents which share the same ViPR server.PO is aware of all calls made to the called party number with
the given caller ID. This property can be hard to meet. If the
caller ID for a call is set to the number of the calling phone, and
all VCRs made from that phone are posted to the same ViPR
server, that server will know about all calls made by the
domain with the given DID in the caller ID. However, in
domains that set the PSTN caller ID to the attendant line
number, it is possible that there would be two separate
agents, each utilizing different ViPR servers. A user in each
agent calls the same number, and the same PSTN caller ID is
used. However, one ViPR server knows about one of the calls, and
a different ViPR server knows about the other call. However, PT
knows about both. In that case, validation from one of the ViPR
servers will fail, and from the other, succeed.There were no calls on the PSTN to the called party which
spoofed the caller ID to match the caller ID used by the valid
enterprise. In that case, PT will have a VCR for a call with a
matching calling/called party number, but this VCR is unknown to
PO since the call was not actually made by the originating
enterprise. This attack is described in more detail in XXXX.Next, the password is selected. The password is basically the
start and stop times for the call. However, the SRP protocol
requires a bit exact agreement on the password. Unfortunately, the
calling and called parties will not have the same values for the
start and stop times, for several reasons:The call start time at the originating and terminating ends
will differ by the propagation delay of the call acceptance
message through the PSTN. This can be several hundreds of
milliseconds.The clocks at the originating and terminating ends may not be
synchronized, which can also introduce different values for the
start and stop times.The call termination time at the originating and terminating
ends will also differ by the propagation time; this propagation
time may in fact be different for the call acceptance and
termination.It is also important to note that agreement on a call acceptance
and termination time assumes an explicit signaling message is sent
for these two events. In the case of analog FXO ports, there is no
signaling at all, and consequently, these points in time cannot be
measured. It is possible to agree upon other call characteristics
when analog lines are in use, but they have much worse accuracy and
consequently much, much lower entropy. For this reason, this
specification of ViPR only works in telephony systems with explicit
messaging for call acceptance and termination, which includes PRI,
SS7, BRI, analog trunks with answer and disconnect supervision, and
CAS trunks.To deal
with these inaccuracies in timing, the start and stop times need to
be rounded. Let Tr be the rounding interval, so that each time is
rounded to the value of N*Tr for integral N, such that N*Tr is less
than the start or stop time, and (N+1)*Tr is greater than it. In
other words, "round down". If Tr=1 second, this would round down to
the nearest second.Unfortunately, rounding doesn't fully help. Lets say that the
difference between the start times on the originating and
terminating nodes is delta. We can still have different values for
the start time if one side rounds to one value, and the other side
to a different value. If delta=100ms and Tr=1s, consider a start
time of 10.08 seconds on one side, and 9.98 on the other side. One
side will round to 10 seconds and the other to nine seconds. The
probability of this happening is approximately delta/Tr. We could
just make Tr really large to compensate, but this reduces the
entropy of the system (see below).To deal with this, the originating node will actually compute
FOUR different passwords. For the start time and stop time both, the
originating node will round down as follows. Let T be the time in
question. Let N be the value such that N*Tr <= T < (N+1)*Tr.
In other words, N*Tr is the nearest round-down value, and (N+1)*Tr
is the nearest round up. Let T1 and T2 be the two rounded values of
T. We have:In other words, if T is in the top half of the rounding interval,
we try the rounded values above and below. If T is in the bottom
half, we try the rounded values below, and below again.
Pictorially:These are tried in the following sequence:Try Tstart-1 and Tend-1.Try Tstart-2 and Tend-1.Try Tstart-1 and Tend-2.Try Tstart-2 and Tend-2.For example, if the originating side has a start time of 10.08
and a stop time of 30.87, the four start and stop times with Tr=1s
are:StartStop10309301031931Each of these times is represented in 64 bit NTP time (Tr can be
configured to less than 1s in which case there will be non-zero
values in the least significant 32 bits). Each password is then
computed by taking the 64 bit start time, followed by the 64 bit end
time, resulting in a 128 bit word. This word is base64 encoded to
produce an ASCII string representation of 21 characters. To perform
the caller ID based validation, the SRP-TLS procedure is done four
times, once with each of the four username/password combinations (of
course the username is identical in all four cases). As long as
delta is less than Tr/2, one of this is guaranteed to work.Unfortunately, in many cases caller ID cannot be used as an
identifier for the VCR. This is because:CallerID is frequently suppressed in the PSTN, and not
delivered. This is especially true in international cases.CallerID is sometimes munged by the PSTN, and delivered, but
with a different value than was sent by the originator. This
happens in certain arbitrage interexchange carriers.Consequently, if no caller ID was delivered at all, the
terminating side will not have a matching record. In that
case, it informs the calling side that it should abort and
revert to method B. If munged, it will also abort for the
same reason.If the caller ID attempt aborts, PO now tries
a different approach. In this approach, the "username" is the
combination of the called party number and a point during the call,
selected at random. The password is equal to the start and stop
times of the call. This method uses the method-tag "B" in the
username.Unlike method A, with method B, the VCR which triggered the
validation is used, regardless of whether there were other, more
recent, calls to the same calledparty number! This is because, in
method B (unlike method A), the time itself is used as a key to
select a VCR. Furthermore, using a more recent VCR does not interact
properly with multi-tenancy. The called number and point during that
call will select an identical VCR on the terminating side if the
following conditions are met:For the called party number, there was not more than one call
in progress made to that number at the same time. This is
generally true for numbers for a single user; typically there is
only one active call at a time. Of course, it is possible a user
receives a call, and then gets another. It then puts the first
on hold while the second call is taken. In these cases, it is
possible that the "username" will select a different VCR on PT,
in which case the validation fails. More troubling are numbers
representing call centers, conference bridges, 8xx numbers, and
attendant numbers, all of which frequently have multiple calls
in progress to them at the same time. As a consequence, for
these types of called numbers, validation is typically only
going to work if caller ID is delivered. Fortunately, 8xx
numbers are only national in the first place, so it is likely
that this will work.PO is aware of all calls made from within its enterprise to
ECALLED. This can fail if there are multiple ViPR servers
serving different agents, and a call is made from one
agent, sent to one ViPR server, and a call to that same number
is made on a different agent, send to a different ViPR server.
As in the caller ID case, this will still be OK in many cases -
the validation from one ViPR server succeeds, the other
fails.PT is aware of all calls made to ECALLED. The same caveats as
described above for the caller ID mechanism apply. PO takes the
VCR, and chooses a time Tkey which is uniformly distributed
between Tstart+Tr and Tstop-Tr. The usage of the Tr here is to
make sure that Tkey is squarely inside of the call start and
stop for PT as well. Note that, because Tkey is not a password,
it is sent in the clear and does not need to be rounded.The username encodes the called party number, Tkey, the DHT, and
the VServiceID learned from the DHT query. The password is computed
identically to method A.Once the SRP-TLS connection is up, data is exchanged. This is done
through a single VAP transaction initiated by PO. This transaction is
only VAP in the sense that it utilizes the basic syntax (the header
and TLV attribute structure), and its request/response model. Other
than that, it is effectively a different protocol - the validation
protocol.PO sends a VAP request with method ValExchange (0x00d). It contains
one attribute, Domain. The originating ViPR server obtains this domain
by looking at the VService of the VCR that was eventually used for the
validation. Note that, in cases where the VCR which triggered the
validation, is different than the one actually used for validation
(because a more recent VCR to the same number was found), it is
important to use the VService associated with the VCR which was
actually used for validation, and NOT the VService associated with the
VCR which triggered the attempt. Multi-tenancy does not work properly
without this. The domain from the VService is placed into the message.
This is basically the domain name of the originating enterprise. It is
included since it is needed by PT to compute the ticket.PO will then receive a response. If it never receives a response
within a timeout, it considers the validation to have failed, and
continues to the next choice. If it receives any kind of error
response, including a rejection due to a blacklisted domain, it
considers validation to have failed, and continues to the next choice.
If it is a success response, it will contain one attribute -
ServiceContent, which contains a ValInfo XML object. ValInfo is an XML
object which contains the SIP URIs and the ticket. The ViPR server must
parse the ValInfo XML object and perform verification on it to avoid
attacks. The following checks are done:Extract the <number> element. This will contain a single
number. That value is compared with the E.164 called party number which
was just validated. If they do not match, this is a potential
attack, and the XML is discarded and the ViPR server acts as if
validation failed. However it does not generate an alarm.Remove any extensions to the XML which are not supported by the
ViPR server (no extensions defined, so in this version, any
elements except for the <ticket>, <number>,
<route>s and their embedded <SIPURI> are removed.Verify that the <route> element contains a single
element, <SIPURI>.Verify that the SIP URI is not larger than 614 characters,
contains a domain name that is a valid set of domain name
characters, contains a user part that is a valid set of
characters, if it contains maddr, that the maddr is a valid domain
or IP and less than 255 characters, and if there is a port, it is
within 0-65535. This is for security purposes; to make sure a
malicious ViPR server on the terminating side cannot send invalid
URI and attack the call agent.Verify that each SIP URI contains the same domain name. Once the
checks and fixes are done, the patched XML is passed to
subscribers in a Notify as described in .
PT will wait for an AppAttach request on the Application-ID defined in and the connection is established, it begins waiting for SRP-TLS.
The TLS messaging will provide PT with a username.
It parses the username and determines the method. If the value of
the method is not "a" or "b", this is a new method not supported by
the node. The SRP-TLS procedures should be failed. If the
method is "a", it is the caller ID mechanism. The called number,
calling number, VService, and rounding time are extracted. PT then
searches through its VCRs over the last 48 hours for one with a
matching called number and caller ID and VService whose VServiceID
matches the one from the username:If none are found, PT proceeds with the SRP-TLS exchange, but
using a fake username and password. This will cause the validation
to eventually fail.If one is found, it is used.If more than one is found, the one with the most recent end
time is used.The start and stop times from the selected VCR are taken. Using the
value of Tr from the username, both times are rounded down to the
nearest multiple of Tr. Note that, this rounding is different than the
one used on the originating side. The values are ALWAYS rounded down.
So if the stop time is 10.99 and Tr is one second, the rounded down
value of 10 is used. The start and stop times are then represented as
64 bit NTP times (after rounding), concatenated, and base64ed to
produce a 21 character password. This is the password used with
SRP-TLS.Note that, the originating node will try up to four different
password combinations. One of these should work, the others will cause
SRP-TLS to fail due to differing shared secrets. However, it is the
job of the originator to perform these four; to the terminating node,
they are four separate attempts. Processing of SRP-TLS login attempts
is stateless on the terminating side. This means that each attempt is
treated independently by PT. It performs identical processing on each
SRP-TLS attempt - examine the username, find a matching VCR, extract
password, and fail the attempt or continue to success. The originating
side has the main burden of sequencing through the various
mechanisms.If the method is "b", PT uses the extracted called party ID and a
time in the middle of the call. It searches through all VCR records
whose called number matches and whose VServiceID matches, and of
those, takes the ones where Tkey is between Tstart and Tstop. Of
those, if more than one match, the one with the most recent Tstop is
used. Tstart and Tstop for that VCR are extracted, and converted to a
password just as is done for the PO. The resulting SRP-TLS procedure
will then either succeed or fail. Note that, if a domain has
multiple Vservices that contain the same number, there will be multiple
VCRs for calls to that number, and there will be multiple validation
attempts, one for each of the Vservices.
Note that there could be multiple successful validations coming from different domains for one specific VCR, so VCRs should not be removed before the end of the 48 hours period.
This can happen when a calling domain uses a PSTN provider that is itself VIPR enabled.
PT listens for incoming VAP/validation requests once the TLS
connection is up. It rejects anything but a ValExchange method with a
400 response. This allows for future extensibility of the validation
protocol. If the request was ValExchange, it extracts the domain name.
This will be something like "example.com". PT knows the VCR against
which validation succeeded. That VCR is associated with a VService.
The ViPR server checks the domain in the ValExchange request against
the black/white list associated with that VService. If no VService is
currently active, the ValExchange is rejected with a 403. If there is
one active, and if the domain appears on the black list, or does not
appear in the white list, the ViPR server rejects the ValExchange
request with a 403 error response, indicating that this domain is not
allowed to call.If the domain was in the whitelist or not in the blacklist, or
there was no whitelist/blacklist, PT constructs a successful response
to the ValExchange request. It contains one attribute: ServiceContent.
It has a ValInfo XML object, which contains a number, a ticket, and a
series of routes.The number is always the E.164 number which was just validated,
including the plus sign. Note that this will also appear in the
ticket. The route element is the sequence of route elements for each
instance associated with the vservice.Details of the ticker are provided in but the
ticket attribute is constructed as follows: A ticket unique ID TLV is created, containing a randomly chosen
128 bit value as the ticket ID. That is the first TLV in the
ticket.A salt TLV is created, containing a random 32 bit value. This
is the second TLV in the ticket.The validity has the start time set using the current time as
the start time, and the current time + the ticket lifetime as the
end time. The ticket lifetime is a per-DHT configurable parameter.
The terminating ViPR server will have performed the validation
using a particular VService; the DHT for that VService is used to
find the right value for this parameter.Number: This is the terminating number, in E.164 format, which
was just validated.Granting node: this is set to one of the Node-IDs associated
with this ViPR server. Any will do.Granting domain: This value is taken from the domain part of
the SIP URI associated with the VService in which the validated
VCR was found.Granted-To domain: This is formed using the Domain sent in the
ValExchange request.Epoch: This is the current epoch associated with the
password.Integrity: Using the current password, this is computed from
the rest of the Ticket.The resulting sequence of TLVs is base64 encoded and that is placed
into the ticket element in the ServiceContent attribute in the
ValExchange response.This section enumerates the methods and attributes used by PVP.The methods and their corresponding method values, are:The attribute names and corresponding types are:[[This section is mostly missing and needs to be done.]][[The entropy obtained in the information from the PSTN calls
significantly impacts the security of this protocol. This section
needs to provide an analysis of how much entropy actually exists in
this information.]][[Defines the worst case of conference calls and resulting
entropy]][[Describe the idea of doing multiple validations to
aggregate entropy]][[Discuss forward routing security in PSTN and explain how this
protocol is reliant on that.]][[TBD Define ports used.]]Thanks to Patrice Bruno for his comments, suggestions and questions that helped to improve this document.Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement LevelsHarvard University1350 Mass. Ave.CambridgeMA 02138- +1 617 495 3864sob@harvard.edu
General
keyword
In many standards track documents several words are used to signify
the requirements in the specification. These words are often
capitalized. This document defines these words as they should be
interpreted in IETF documents. Authors who follow these guidelines
should incorporate this phrase near the beginning of their document:
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL
NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in
RFC 2119.
Note that the force of these words is modified by the requirement
level of the document in which they are used.
Augmented BNF for Syntax Specifications: ABNFBrandenburg InternetWorking675 Spruce Dr.SunnyvaleCA94086US+1.408.246.8253dcrocker@bbiw.netTHUS plc.1/2 Berkeley Square, 99 Berkeley StreetGlasgowG3 7HRUKpaul.overell@thus.netABNFAugmentedBackus-NaurFormelectronicmailInternet technical specifications often need to define a formal
syntax. Over the years, a modified version of Backus-Naur Form
(BNF), called Augmented BNF (ABNF), has been popular among many
Internet specifications. The current specification documents ABNF.
It balances compactness and simplicity, with reasonable
representational power. The differences between standard BNF and
ABNF involve naming rules, repetition, alternatives, order-
independence, and value ranges. This specification also supplies
additional rule definitions and encoding for a core lexical analyzer
of the type common to several Internet specifications.
Using the Secure Remote Password (SRP) Protocol for TLS AuthenticationThis memo presents a technique for using the Secure Remote Password protocol as an authentication method for the Transport Layer Security protocol. This memo provides information for the Internet community.Verification Involving PSTN Reachability: Requirements and Architecture OverviewThe Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) has seen widespread deployment within individual domains, typically supporting voice and video communications. Though it was designed from the outset to support inter-domain federation over the public Internet, such federation has not materialized. The primary reasons for this are the complexities of inter-domain phone number routing and concerns over security. This document reviews this problem space, outlines requirements, and then describes a new model and technique for inter-domain federation with SIP, called Verification Involving PSTN Reachability (ViPR). ViPR addresses the problems that have prevented inter-domain federation over the Internet. It provides fully distributed inter- domain routing for phone numbers, authorized mappings from phone numbers to domains, a new technique for automated VoIP anti-spam, and privacy of number ownership, all while preserving the trapezoidal model of SIP. Legal This documents and the information contained therein are provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION THEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.Verification Involving PSTN Reachability: The ViPR Access Protocol (VAP)Verification Involving PSTN Reachability (ViPR) is a technique for inter-domain SIP federation. ViPR hybridizes the PSTN, P2P networks, and SIP, and in doing so, addresses the phone number routing and VoIP spam problems that have been a barrier to federation. The ViPR architecture uses a server, the ViPR server, which performs P2P and validation services on behalf of call agents, which acts as clients to the server. Such an architecture requires a client/server protocol between call agents and the ViPR server. That protocol, defined here, is called the ViPR Access Protocol (VAP). Legal This documents and the information contained therein are provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION THEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)
Extensions for Blocking VoIP Spam Using PSTN Validation
RAI
VIPRVerification Involving PSTN Reachability (ViPR) is a new
technique for inter-domain federation of SIP calls. ViPR makes
use of the PSTN as an introduction mechanism to verify the
correctness of mappings from phone numbers to domains. The PSTN
introduction mechanism can also be used as a technique for
blocking spam - a SIP caller is only authorized when its
calling domain has previously called that same number over the
PSTN. This document describes an extension to SIP which enables
authorization of SIP calls based on a prior PSTN introduction.
This documents and the information contained therein are provided on
an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS
OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND
THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE
INFORMATION THEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED
WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.A Usage of Resource Location and Discovery (RELOAD) for Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) Verification
RAI
VIPR
Verification Involving PSTN Reachability (VIPR) is a technique for inter-domain SIP federation.
VIPR makes use of the RELOAD protocol to store unverified mappings from phone numbers to RELOAD nodes, with whom a validation process can be run.
This document defines the usage of RELOAD for this purpose.
This documents and the information contained therein are provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE CONTRIBUTOR, THE ORGANIZATION HE/SHE REPRESENTS OR IS SPONSORED BY (IF ANY), THE INTERNET SOCIETY, THE IETF TRUST AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION THEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.The SRP Authentication and Key Exchange SystemThis document describes a cryptographically strong network authentication mechanism known as the Secure Remote Password (SRP) protocol. [STANDARDS-TRACK]This section must be removed before publication as an RFC.Added text explaining that VCRs should not be removed before the end of the 48 hours delay.Inserted Terminology section.Fixed the timekey ABNF.Specified that rounding-time cannot be equal to 0.Moved to new Working Group.Nits.Shorter I-Ds references.Removed sentence saying that Tkey is converted to base64.Added ValExchange method and Domain attribute definitions.Fixed the last sentence of 7.2 - the ticket goes into the ticket element in the ServiceContent attribute.Expanded first usage of VCR initialism.Replaced any insteance of peerID by Node-ID.Rewrote the ABNF.