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I can see that one can put information associated with a
signature outside the hashed area but I cannot see that one
should do so and I doubt that this will improve security.
First the key-ID. Why should I have it outside the signature?
It's possibly not security-critical. But if it is the only exception
why not put it into the signature, that would not reduce security.
But having none unhashed subpacket would help to increase the trust of
users in the reliability of certificates which had been undermined
by problems related to unhashed packets.
Second, an URL to find a certificate in a more secure place than
keyservers is a good idea, especially if you think about the problems
I mentioned earlier, but you do not change this URL every five minutes,
and therefore it can be in the selfsignature. And, as Len pointed out
you can consider this as security critical depending on what you call
security.
Third, the countersignature, its simply a technical problem that you
cannot have a hash value unless you know what to put into it.
But why should this famous thing be in my signature at all?
If the hashed part is used to protect information the signature
should verify that no alteration has taken place.
If my signature needs signing for whatever reason I would like to see
this as a seperate signature with no unhashed part.
I doubt that all security revant problems associated with unhashed
packets are figured out (in theory) and have been tested intensely in
their implementations respectively.
And why should I have a container in my certificate ready to
be blown up with arbitrary information of indefinite lenght
(as RFC-2440 allows) when the purpose of a certificate is to
help to create trust.
Trust in the crypto system depends on having a reliable means to check
that the certificate is not changed in a way unauthorized by the owner
and this would be far more easier and more transparent if there were
no unhashed packets.
Yes, I fear, advocating unhashed packets in signatures is the wrong
track and we shall try thinking about what makes sense more often
than thinking about what is possible (or useful).
Ralf
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
* Ralf Senderek <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> * What is privacy *
* http://senderek.de * without *
* Tel.: 02432-3960 Sandstr. 60 D-41849 Wassenberg * PGP-2.6.3i? *
*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*.*
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