Re: [Debconf-discuss] Last call for keys for keysigning in New York City, USA during DebConf10

["Giacomo A. Catenazzi" <cate@debian.org>]

On 20.07.2010 16:33, John Goerzen wrote:
> On 07/20/2010 06:37 AM, Michael Fladerer wrote:
> > Hi Lars,
> >
> > On Mon Jul 19, 2010 at 23:47:42 -0700, Lars Wirzenius wrote:
> > > (I also hope that I've now verified that my new key is fine, except for
> > > lacking an expiration date. But I hope I can fix that without generating
> > > a new key.)
> > yes, that's pretty simple:
>
> I'd want to state here that I don't consider a key without an expiration
> date to be broken as such.  (Nor do I consider a key *with* an
> expiration date to be broken.)
>
> I don't really buy the argument that an expiration date improves
> security, and think that it may hurt it in some ways.

I totally agree. Key expiration dates has nothing to do with security.
A expired key without a published revocation certificate is not
really "expired" (e.g. it can be rendered again unexpired very
easily, by controlling the private key).

So I think the expiration field risk to confuse the user.

IMHO the only way to have time restricted key is to set-p an
internal Debian keyring policy, removing old keys [5-10 years]
(thus making them invalid for new stuff, but not to verify
integrity of old packages).

ciao
	cate