routing security

The IETF is engaged in an effort to analyze the security of routing protocol authentication according to design guidelines discussed in RFC 6518, "Keying and Authentication for Routing Protocols (KARP) Design Guidelines". Developing an operational and management model for routing protocol security that works with all the routing protocols will be critical to the deployability of these efforts. This document gives recommendations to operators and implementors regarding management and operation of router authentication. These recommendations will also assist protocol designers in understanding management issues they will face.

This document specifies the information contained in a conceptual database of long-lived cryptographic keys used by many different routing protocols for message security. The database is designed to support both manual and automated key management. In addition to describing the schema for the database, this document describes the operations that can be performed on the database as well as the requirements for the routing protocols that wish to use the database. In many typical scenarios, the protocols do not directly use the long-lived key, but rather a key derivation function is used to derive a short-lived key from a long-lived key.

This document analyzes TCP-based routing protocols, the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP), the Label Distribution Protocol (LDP), the Path Computation Element Communication Protocol (PCEP), and the Multicast Source Distribution Protocol (MSDP), according to guidelines set forth in Section 4.2 of "Keying and Authentication for Routing Protocols Design Guidelines", RFC 6518.

Different routing protocols employ different mechanisms for securing protocol packets on the wire. While most already have some method for accomplishing cryptographic message authentication, in many cases the existing methods are dated, vulnerable to attack, and employ cryptographic algorithms that have been deprecated. The "Keying and Authentication for Routing Protocols" (KARP) effort aims to overhaul and improve these mechanisms. This document does not contain protocol specifications. Instead, it defines the areas where protocol specification work is needed. This document is a companion document to RFC 6518, "Keying and Authentication for Routing Protocols (KARP) Design Guidelines"; together they form the guidance and instruction KARP design teams will use to review and overhaul routing protocol transport security.

This document analyzes OSPFv2 and OSPFv3 according to the guidelines set forth in Section 4.2 of the "Keying and Authentication for Routing Protocols (KARP) Design Guidelines" (RFC 6518). Key components of solutions to gaps identified in this document are already underway.

This document is one of a series concerned with defining a roadmap of protocol specification work for the use of modern cryptographic mechanisms and algorithms for message authentication in routing protocols. In particular, it defines the framework for a key management protocol that may be used to create and manage session keys for message authentication and integrity. This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is published for informational purposes.

Routing protocols are subject to attacks that can harm individual users or network operations as a whole. This document provides a description and a summary of generic threats that affect routing protocols in general. This work describes threats, including threat sources and capabilities, threat actions, and threat consequences, as well as a breakdown of routing functions that might be attacked separately. This memo provides information for the Internet community.