Re: Salsa update: no more "-guest" and more
Thomas Goirand <zigo@debian.org> writes:
> Now, if you want something safer, maybe we could implement something
> that involves crypto a smarter way, like SQRL, so we avoid storing any
> password in Salsa, even hashed:
> https://www.grc.com/sqrl/sqrl.htm
I don't know anything about SQRL (and am too lazy to try to digest the
PDFs on that web site), but I'll assume that this shares with PAKE schemes
the requirement that the client do crypto. PAKE has always looked like a
good idea up until one starts trying to tackle the problem of deploying
clients everywhere you need them, at which point it usually ends up
looking easier to just use TLS client certificates.
I realize the advantage of a PAKE-style scheme is that you don't need to
store a security artifact on a person's computer, just get them to enter
in a password, but personally I consider passwords to be a bug rather than
a feature. We're already at the point where remembering a strong password
is too difficult for the average person. I think it's more likely that
computer security will evolve towards using passwords only as
physical-presence-only PINs to unlock local secure storage, rather than
making an attempt to improve passwords as a network protocol.
That's effectively what a password manager simulates, albeit trading off
local secure storage for convenience while limiting the strong passwords
someone has to memorize to one. I would argue that the only functional
difference between a properly-configured password manager and using TLS
client certificates is that password managers have better UI. (Which is
important!)
> Because seriously, I'm more concerned with Salsa itself being hacked,
> and the password db of *all accounts* being stolen, or the Salsa SSO
> provider being hacked, rather than having a *single* idiot user falling
> into a phishing trap.
GitLab uses bcrypt (although with no pepper, at least that [1] mentions,
which is a shame), so if you're using randomly-generated passwords with a
password manager, I'm not sure why you're worried about theft of the
password database. It would be a problem for people using weak passwords,
but doesn't that go back to your argument that we can assume Salsa users
will generally follow good practices?
[1] https://docs.gitlab.com/ee/security/password_storage.html
The Salsa SSO provider being hacked is would allow the attacker to
impersonate anyone to anything protected by Salsa, but that's obviously
still true with SQRL, so it seems unrelated to the question of password
storage.
--
Russ Allbery (rra@debian.org) <https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>
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