On Sunday 21 Jul 2013 23:20:40 Robert Hailey wrote:
> 
> I'm not 100% sure how this might work, but having opennet require a security 
> device might be publicly acceptable, and might also serve as the monetary 
> disincentive to an opennet sybil attack.
> 
> Without looking too much into it, I supporting a smartcard interface from 
> java (across many platforms) would be problematic. A one-time-password (OTP) 
> solution might work, though.
> 
> One such device I have experience with:
> http://www.yubico.com/products/yubikey-hardware/yubikey/
> 
> Such an onboarding user story might look like this:
> (1) a new user browses the freenet site and finds out that freenet generally 
> requires a yubikey
> (2) they install freenet, but it doesn't work (or works poorly), and also 
> says something about needing a yubikey
> (3) we lose a bunch of lookie-loos with an interest in freenet that is 
> <$15+time, but security-interested folks might be further interested in 
> getting "the security device that freenet requires" anyway
> (4) so those that remain order a yubikey (min quantity 1),
> (5) a few days later, the device arrives (quick-ish, as singletons are mailed 
> in an envelope)
> (6) they go back to freenet, click in the "yubikey field" and mash the 
> "button" (it's actually a capacitance sensor, I think)
> (7) through some mechanism not visible to the user, the OTP is verified and 
> an opennet certificate is issued
> 
> Maybe at some semi-obvious state change (like a machine reboot, or the 
> yubikey being used on another N machines?) or period (monthly), the field 
> would popup again to make it seem important & remind the user that a yubikey 
> is needed to spread freenet.
> 
> The generated OTP has a prefix that uniquely identifies it (sorta like a 
> serial number), and can only be verified *once* (it is then, by definition, 
> stale).
> 
> If we use the default "short-press" identity that comes with the key, then we 
> would be implicitly trusting YubiCo to not hand out gobs of identities to an 
> attacker (i.e. without paying). In fact, that's the only option really... we 
> could not use a custom identity, b/c either we would have to supply/program 
> the keys or we'd be right back to a sybil attack (they just put the OTP algo 
> in software).
> 
> The implementation of step #7 really depends on wether or not we trust our 
> seed nodes, and wether or not making a conventional http/https connection is 
> acceptable. NB: we could always bundle a public key in with  freenet to make 
> it "safe" to hand off an encrypted OTP for delivery back to the mothership... 
> I mean, "central server".

I don't see why this would help.

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