RFC Errata
RFC 8446, "The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Protocol Version 1.3", August 2018
Source of RFC: tls (sec)
Errata ID: 6205
Status: Reported
Type: Editorial
Publication Format(s) : TEXT
Reported By: Martin Thomson
Date Reported: 2020-06-04
Section 4.3.2 says:
Servers which are authenticating with a PSK MUST NOT send the CertificateRequest message in the main handshake, though they MAY send it in post-handshake authentication (see Section 4.6.2) provided that the client has sent the "post_handshake_auth" extension (see Section 4.2.6).
It should say:
Servers which are authenticating with a resumption PSK MUST NOT send the CertificateRequest message in the main handshake, though they MAY send it in post-handshake authentication (see Section 4.6.2) provided that the client has sent the "post_handshake_auth" extension (see Section 4.2.6). Servers which are authenticating with an external PSK MUST NOT send the CertificateRequest message either in the main handshake or request post-handshake authentication. Future specifications MAY provide an extension to permit this.
Notes:
The lack of qualification on "authenticating with a PSK" implies that the statement applies equally to both external and resumption PSKs. However, there are two conditions being governed: whether a certificate can be requested during the handshake, and whether a certificate can be requested post-handshake. The latter of these requires different rules depending on the type of PSK.
We know from the analysis of resumption (see https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/msg/tls/TugB5ddJu3nYg7chcyeIyUqWSbA/) that combining a PSK handshake of either type with a client certificate is not safe. Thus, the prohibition on CertificateRequest during the handshake applies equally to both resumption and external PSKs.
For post-handshake, Appendix E.1 already discusses the risks of combining PSKs with certificates, citing the same analysis as above.
[...] It is unsafe to use certificate-based client
authentication when the client might potentially share the same
PSK/key-id pair with two different endpoints.
For this reason an external PSK is not safe to use with post-handshake authentication. A resumption PSK does not have this property, so the same prohibition doesn't apply.
Splitting the requirements as proposed makes this split clearer.