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+Network Working Group D. Conrad
+Request for Comments: 3225 Nominum, Inc.
+Category: Standards Track December 2001
+
+
+ Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC
+
+Status of this Memo
+
+ This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
+ Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
+ improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
+ Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
+ and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.
+
+Copyright Notice
+
+ Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2001). All Rights Reserved.
+
+Abstract
+
+ In order to deploy DNSSEC (Domain Name System Security Extensions)
+ operationally, DNSSEC aware servers should only perform automatic
+ inclusion of DNSSEC RRs when there is an explicit indication that the
+ resolver can understand those RRs. This document proposes the use of
+ a bit in the EDNS0 header to provide that explicit indication and
+ describes the necessary protocol changes to implement that
+ notification.
+
+1. Introduction
+
+ DNSSEC [RFC2535] has been specified to provide data integrity and
+ authentication to security aware resolvers and applications through
+ the use of cryptographic digital signatures. However, as DNSSEC is
+ deployed, non-DNSSEC-aware clients will likely query DNSSEC-aware
+ servers. In such situations, the DNSSEC-aware server (responding to
+ a request for data in a signed zone) will respond with SIG, KEY,
+ and/or NXT records. For reasons described in the subsequent section,
+ such responses can have significant negative operational impacts for
+ the DNS infrastructure.
+
+ This document discusses a method to avoid these negative impacts,
+ namely DNSSEC-aware servers should only respond with SIG, KEY, and/or
+ NXT RRs when there is an explicit indication from the resolver that
+ it can understand those RRs.
+
+ For the purposes of this document, "DNSSEC security RRs" are
+ considered RRs of type SIG, KEY, or NXT.
+
+
+
+Conrad Standards Track [Page 1]
+
+RFC 3225 Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC December 2001
+
+
+ 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 [RFC2119].
+
+2. Rationale
+
+ Initially, as DNSSEC is deployed, the vast majority of queries will
+ be from resolvers that are not DNSSEC aware and thus do not
+ understand or support the DNSSEC security RRs. When a query from
+ such a resolver is received for a DNSSEC signed zone, the DNSSEC
+ specification indicates the nameserver must respond with the
+ appropriate DNSSEC security RRs. As DNS UDP datagrams are limited to
+ 512 bytes [RFC1035], responses including DNSSEC security RRs have a
+ high probability of resulting in a truncated response being returned
+ and the resolver retrying the query using TCP.
+
+ TCP DNS queries result in significant overhead due to connection
+ setup and teardown. Operationally, the impact of these TCP queries
+ will likely be quite detrimental in terms of increased network
+ traffic (typically five packets for a single query/response instead
+ of two), increased latency resulting from the additional round trip
+ times, increased incidences of queries failing due to timeouts, and
+ significantly increased load on nameservers.
+
+ In addition, in preliminary and experimental deployment of DNSSEC,
+ there have been reports of non-DNSSEC aware resolvers being unable to
+ handle responses which contain DNSSEC security RRs, resulting in the
+ resolver failing (in the worst case) or entire responses being
+ ignored (in the better case).
+
+ Given these operational implications, explicitly notifying the
+ nameserver that the client is prepared to receive (if not understand)
+ DNSSEC security RRs would be prudent.
+
+ Client-side support of DNSSEC is assumed to be binary -- either the
+ client is willing to receive all DNSSEC security RRs or it is not
+ willing to accept any. As such, a single bit is sufficient to
+ indicate client-side DNSSEC support. As effective use of DNSSEC
+ implies the need of EDNS0 [RFC2671], bits in the "classic" (non-EDNS
+ enhanced DNS header) are scarce, and there may be situations in which
+ non-compliant caching or forwarding servers inappropriately copy data
+ from classic headers as queries are passed on to authoritative
+ servers, the use of a bit from the EDNS0 header is proposed.
+
+ An alternative approach would be to use the existence of an EDNS0
+ header as an implicit indication of client-side support of DNSSEC.
+ This approach was not chosen as there may be applications in which
+ EDNS0 is supported but in which the use of DNSSEC is inappropriate.
+
+
+
+Conrad Standards Track [Page 2]
+
+RFC 3225 Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC December 2001
+
+
+3. Protocol Changes
+
+ The mechanism chosen for the explicit notification of the ability of
+ the client to accept (if not understand) DNSSEC security RRs is using
+ the most significant bit of the Z field on the EDNS0 OPT header in
+ the query. This bit is referred to as the "DNSSEC OK" (DO) bit. In
+ the context of the EDNS0 OPT meta-RR, the DO bit is the first bit of
+ the third and fourth bytes of the "extended RCODE and flags" portion
+ of the EDNS0 OPT meta-RR, structured as follows:
+
+ +0 (MSB) +1 (LSB)
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+ 0: | EXTENDED-RCODE | VERSION |
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+ 2: |DO| Z |
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+
+ Setting the DO bit to one in a query indicates to the server that the
+ resolver is able to accept DNSSEC security RRs. The DO bit cleared
+ (set to zero) indicates the resolver is unprepared to handle DNSSEC
+ security RRs and those RRs MUST NOT be returned in the response
+ (unless DNSSEC security RRs are explicitly queried for). The DO bit
+ of the query MUST be copied in the response.
+
+ More explicitly, DNSSEC-aware nameservers MUST NOT insert SIG, KEY,
+ or NXT RRs to authenticate a response as specified in [RFC2535]
+ unless the DO bit was set on the request. Security records that
+ match an explicit SIG, KEY, NXT, or ANY query, or are part of the
+ zone data for an AXFR or IXFR query, are included whether or not the
+ DO bit was set.
+
+ A recursive DNSSEC-aware server MUST set the DO bit on recursive
+ requests, regardless of the status of the DO bit on the initiating
+ resolver request. If the initiating resolver request does not have
+ the DO bit set, the recursive DNSSEC-aware server MUST remove DNSSEC
+ security RRs before returning the data to the client, however cached
+ data MUST NOT be modified.
+
+ In the event a server returns a NOTIMP, FORMERR or SERVFAIL response
+ to a query that has the DO bit set, the resolver SHOULD NOT expect
+ DNSSEC security RRs and SHOULD retry the query without EDNS0 in
+ accordance with section 5.3 of [RFC2671].
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Conrad Standards Track [Page 3]
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+RFC 3225 Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC December 2001
+
+
+Security Considerations
+
+ The absence of DNSSEC data in response to a query with the DO bit set
+ MUST NOT be taken to mean no security information is available for
+ that zone as the response may be forged or a non-forged response of
+ an altered (DO bit cleared) query.
+
+IANA Considerations
+
+ EDNS0 [RFC2671] defines 16 bits as extended flags in the OPT record,
+ these bits are encoded into the TTL field of the OPT record (RFC2671
+ section 4.6).
+
+ This document reserves one of these bits as the OK bit. It is
+ requested that the left most bit be allocated. Thus the USE of the
+ OPT record TTL field would look like
+
+ +0 (MSB) +1 (LSB)
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+ 0: | EXTENDED-RCODE | VERSION |
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+ 2: |DO| Z |
+ +--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+
+
+Acknowledgements
+
+ This document is based on a rough draft by Bob Halley with input from
+ Olafur Gudmundsson, Andreas Gustafsson, Brian Wellington, Randy Bush,
+ Rob Austein, Steve Bellovin, and Erik Nordmark.
+
+References
+
+ [RFC1034] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names - Concepts and Facilities",
+ STD 13, RFC 1034, November 1987.
+
+ [RFC1035] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names - Implementation and
+ Specifications", STD 13, RFC 1035, November 1987.
+
+ [RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
+ Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
+
+ [RFC2535] Eastlake, D., "Domain Name System Security Extensions", RFC
+ 2535, March 1999.
+
+ [RFC2671] Vixie, P., "Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS0)", RFC
+ 2671, August 1999.
+
+
+
+
+
+Conrad Standards Track [Page 4]
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+RFC 3225 Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC December 2001
+
+
+Author's Address
+
+ David Conrad
+ Nominum Inc.
+ 950 Charter Street
+ Redwood City, CA 94063
+ USA
+
+ Phone: +1 650 381 6003
+ EMail: david.conrad@nominum.com
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+Conrad Standards Track [Page 5]
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+RFC 3225 Indicating Resolver Support of DNSSEC December 2001
+
+
+Full Copyright Statement
+
+ Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2001). All Rights Reserved.
+
+ This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
+ others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
+ or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published
+ and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any
+ kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are
+ included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this
+ document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
+ the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
+ Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of
+ developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for
+ copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be
+ followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than
+ English.
+
+ The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
+ revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.
+
+ This document and the information contained herein is provided on an
+ "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING
+ TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING
+ BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION
+ HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
+ MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
+
+Acknowledgement
+
+ Funding for the RFC Editor function is currently provided by the
+ Internet Society.
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+Conrad Standards Track [Page 6]
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