Comment by lxgr

Comment by lxgr 2 days ago

Thanks for the condescension, but I know how to do all of this. I've done it before. And because of that, I can first hand attest that it's way too complicated.

No non-sophisticated user is able to run their own local CA, and that's why their NAS, IoT setup etc. all run over HTTP only, which in turn has implications for available web APIs (thanks to "secure origin only" policies and no exemption for local IPs/zeroconf domains) and many other things.

It also doesn't work for at least modern Android apps, since Android no longer makes user-provided CA certificates available to (non-browser) apps anymore, I believe, unless they're compiled with a special debugging parameter. On iOS it's still possible, but I'm not sure how long it's going to stay that way.

stephenmac98 2 days ago

If a user set up a NAS they should be capable of googling

"Openssl how to set up a CA" > First link fully explains it https://arminreiter.com/2022/01/create-your-own-certificate-...

"How to import CA into iPhone" > First link fully explains it https://www.ibm.com/docs/en/mpf/7.1.0?topic=certificates-ins...

"Android app customize trusted CAs" > First link fully explains it https://developer.android.com/privacy-and-security/security-...

The barrier to entry on PKI isn't that it's hard, it seems to be that people just can't be bothered, PKI is among the most google-able tech processes out there

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lxgr 2 days ago

Setting up a NAS means buying one on Amazon and plugging it in.
You're completely out of touch with the majority of the userbase of these products if you think even one in 10 NAS users will set up their own CA using OpenSSL (in a secure way that doesn't expose themselves to being MITMed even on public sites such as that of their bank down the road).

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- stephenmac98 2 days ago
  
  In that case the NAS company should, at a minimum, be loading their NAS with a certificate signed by a CA owned by the NAS company, where the trust chain for their NAS's certificates are easily available for users to grab and install.
  In an ideal world they would load a letencrypt certificate and set up the tooling required to automatically pull down a new one when required.
  A NAS company owned CA doesn't offer much of a benefit directly for the plug-n-play users, but it's still better than just a self signed cert, and for people who care about their security even a little bit it can significantly protection.
  Most Plug-n-Play NAS solutions will integrate with a web api and/or an app, and it's more common than it should be that NAS'es are exposed to the internet.
  Once you control both the NAS and it's clients, there's absolutely no reason not to preload a complete PKI implementation. Even just an installation app which loaded the chain onto any device you wanted to interact with the NAS would be sufficient.
  If NAS'es are intended for non-technical people, then any NAS sold should be secure by default.
  
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  lxgr 2 days ago
  
  My point is precisely that current browsers and OSes make it impossible to ship a secure-by-default device running a local web server, NAS or otherwise.
  Requiring users to install a globally trusted CA is a disaster from a security point of view (now my NAS vendor or anyone that hacks them can pose as google.com!), and for this reason doesn’t even work with modern Android apps anymore, for example.
  
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