RFC 7170, "Tunnel Extensible Authentication Protocol (TEAP) Version 1", May 2014

Note: This RFC has been updated by RFC 9427

Errata ID: 5767
Status: Held for Document Update
Type: Technical
Publication Format(s) : TEXT
Reported By: Jouni Malinen
Date Reported: 2019-06-28
Held for Document Update by: Paul Wouters
Date Held: 2024-04-01

Section 3.3.1 says:

   EAP method messages are carried within EAP-Payload TLVs defined in
   Section 4.2.10.  If more than one method is going to be executed in
   the tunnel, then upon method completion, the server MUST send an
   Intermediate-Result TLV indicating the result.

It should say:

   EAP method messages are carried within EAP-Payload TLVs defined in
   Section 4.2.10.  Upon completion of each EAP authentication method in
   the tunnel, the server MUST send an Intermediate-Result TLV
   indicating the result.

Notes:

TEAP description is somewhat vague in discussion about "EAP methods" vs. "EAP authentication methods" as it comes to the EAP methods performed in Phase 2 within the TLS tunnel. RFC 3748 defines Identity request/response as an EAP method. However, this method is not an "authentication method" which is a special case of an method where the Type is 4 or greater.

RFC 7170 uses correct terminology in the first paragraph of Section 3.3.1 when talking about multiple authentication methods not being allowed by RFC 3748 in a single EAP conversation. However, many, but not all, of the following "[EAP] method" instances are actually referring to "[EAP] authentication method". This results in incorrect claims on when the Intermediate-Result TLV and Crypto-Binding TLV are used. They are not used after an EAP non-authentication method like Identity (e.g., see the example in C.3); they are used after each EAP authentication method like EAP-pwd.

Furthermore, the comment about "more than one method is going to be executed in the tunnel" does not sound accurate. This applies even if only a single EAP authentication method is executed in the tunnel (Identity method is not required to be executed). The proposed text in this errata entry addresses these two issues in Section 3.3.1. The following additional changes would be needed to make rest of the specification use the terms more accurately:

3.3.3: "after each successful EAP method" --> "after each successful EAP authentication method"
3.8.3: "completion of the EAP method" --> "completion of the EAP authentication method"
4.2.11: "between multiple inner EAP methods within EAP" --> "after each inner EAP authentication method"
4.2.13: "after each successful EAP method" --> "after each successful EAP authentication method"

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