Problem Statement for Digitized Emblems
draft-haberman-digital-emblem-ps-03
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| Authors | Brian Haberman , Tommy Jensen , Bill Woodcock | ||
| Last updated | 2024-11-18 | ||
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draft-haberman-digital-emblem-ps-03
Network Working Group B. Haberman, Ed.
Internet-Draft JHU/APL
Intended status: Informational T. Jensen
Expires: 22 May 2025 Microsoft
B. Woodcock
PCH
18 November 2024
Problem Statement for Digitized Emblems
draft-haberman-digital-emblem-ps-03
Abstract
International law defines a number of emblems, such as the blue
helmets of United Nations peacekeeping forces, the blue and white
shield of UNESCO, and the Red Cross of the International Committee of
the Red Cross, as indicative of special protections under the Geneva
Conventions. Similar protections attach to journalists who wear
"Press" protective emblems on the battlefield, under Article 79 of
Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions and Resolution 2222 of the
United Nations Security Council. The emblems of national governments
and inter-governmental organizations protect diplomatic pouches,
couriers, and envoys under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic
Relations. Other marks enjoy protections against mis-use under the
Paris Convention, the Madrid Protocol, and the Trade-Related Aspects
of Intellectual Property Rights.
Such physical emblems have a number of weaknesses and do not
translate to the digital realm. This document provides a summary of
the problems and documents identified requirements from a number of
stakeholders for a digital emblem which addresses the shortcomings of
the physical emblems and makes possible the indication of protections
of digital assets under international law.
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 22 May 2025.
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document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
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Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1. Conventions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Threat Model for Physical Emblems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2.1. Authenticity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2.2. Visibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2.3. Mis-use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2.4. Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. Notional Requirements for Digital Emblems . . . . . . . . . . 4
3.1. Identification Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.2. Distribution Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3.3. Trust model requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
6. Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
7. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
8. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
8.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
8.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Appendix A. Use Cases for a digital emblem . . . . . . . . . . . 8
A.1. International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) . . . . . 8
A.1.1. Labeling web servers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A.1.2. Labeling personal-use devices . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A.1.3. Labeling power-constrained devices . . . . . . . . . 9
A.1.4. Labeling networks from within . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A.1.5. Labeling networks from without . . . . . . . . . . . 9
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A.1.6. Miscellaneous . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A.2. United Nations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
A.3. United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural
Organization (UNESCO) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
A.4. Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
(OPCW) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
A.5. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) . . . . . . . . 10
A.6. Basel Convention . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
A.7. Press . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
A.8. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) . . . . . 11
A.9. International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) . . . . 11
A.10. World Health Organization (WHO) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
1. Introduction
International law defines a number of emblems, such as the blue
helmets of United Nations (UN) peacekeeping forces [BLUEHELMET], the
blue and white shield of UNESCO [BLUESHIELD], and the Red Cross of
the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) [REDCROSS], as
indicative of special protections under international law. Similar
protections attach to journalists who wear "Press" protective emblems
on the battlefield [PRESS]. The emblems of national governments and
inter-governmental organizations protect diplomatic pouches,
couriers, and envoys [DIPLOMAT], and international law protects
certain marks against counterfeiting.
1.1. Conventions
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
"OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP
14 [RFC2119][RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all
capitals, as shown here.
2. Threat Model for Physical Emblems
Physical emblems have served a number of key functions over hundreds
of years. The design/use of those physical emblems were limited by
the available resources and capabilities during the time of their
inceptions. As technology advances and newer capabilities become
available, it is beneficial to examine limitations with existing
emblems and identify potential needs going forward.
The following describes a number of weaknesses with physical emblems.
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2.1. Authenticity
It is generally not possible to evaluate the authenticity of a
physical emblem in real-time. Physical emblems do not carry any type
of attestation from an authorized party indicating the validity of
emblem. Mis-use of a physical emblem requires a post-facto
investigation.
2.2. Visibility
Physical emblems may not always be visible to an observing party.
They can be difficult or impossible to see in the dark. The physical
emblem may be deployed on the opposite side of an object from an
observing party. They may be difficult to observe from a distance or
at an oblique angle. The visibility of a physical emblem may be
affected by wear, vandalism, or obfuscation.
2.3. Mis-use
Physical emblems do not provide sufficient context to indicate the
validity of their observed use. Physical emblems requested for use
in a specific location and/or at a certain time can be re-used at
other locations or times that are not authorized. No mechanism
exists to correlate the validity of a physical emblem with specific
locations, times, items, or people subject to protection. Such abuse
is similar to known security attacks (replay, time-shifting, and
location-shifting attacks).
2.4. Management
As noted above, potential mis-use of a physical emblem typically
requires a post-facto investigation. There is no mechanism to revoke
the instance of a physical emblem that has been abused, compromised,
or is no longer valid.
3. Notional Requirements for Digital Emblems
The above list of weaknesses highlights the need for an emblem
approach that meets a number of requirements to perform its function
properly under international law. Because there are multiple use
cases for digital emblems, some of which are fundamentally different
from one another, it is not presumed that any one use of a digital
emblem would necessarily have every single one of these requirements
for a given implementation.
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3.1. Identification Requirements
A digital emblem capable of acting as an official marking of legal
significance needs to be identifiable by its intended legal purpose
and what assets it applies to. To do this, digital emblems...
* MUST provide a clearly detectable and unambiguous marking mappable
to enable verification,
* MUST be machine-readable to enable automated verification,
* MUST be capable of carrying a visual representation of the
physical emblem it represents,
* MUST carry an unambiguous indication of the international law or
laws conferring protection upon the entity marked with the emblem,
* MUST be possible to associate with a range or specific quantity of
persons or items,
* MUST be possible to associate with online services (e.g.,
websites, email servers, databases),
* MUST be possible to associate with data in transit or at rest,
* MUST be possible to associate with network-addressable equipment
(e.g., routers, servers, laptops, IoT devices),
* MUST be possible to associate with a physical object (e.g.,
building, vehicle, container),
* MUST be possible to associate with a person or group of people
3.2. Distribution Requirements
A digital emblem applicable to a variety of physical and digital
assets will need to support a variety of discovery mechanisms to
ensure emblem verification is a practical process international law
can enforce. Practicality can mean multiple things, including
minimizing the risk that verifying emblems will disclose verifier
presence or behavior, minimizing the cost of verifying digital
emblems, and ensuring universal access to emblem-bearing for legally
entitled assets.
To accomplish practical emblem distribution, digital emblems...
* MUST NOT impose an undue cost to verify,
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* MUST NOT impose an undue cost to apply to or remove from an asset,
* MUST NOT impose an undue cost to acquire authority to deploy,
* MUST NOT require verifiers of the emblem to reveal to the emblem
bearer that existence checking is occurring,
* SHOULD be possible to view an emblem in-band via a communications
network, optically (e.g., QR code), or wirelessly (e.g., RFID).
3.3. Trust model requirements
A digital emblem needs to be trustworthy in order to provide any
value. This means that parties verifying the presence of emblems
need to know that the asset bearing an emblem is entitled to do so
for the declared asset, time frame, and other scopes. Therefore,
digital emblems...
* MUST be authorized by a party that has the legal authority to
issue it,
* MUST identify the authorizing party that issued it to ensure
accountability of emblem use,
* MUST carry an unambiguous indication of the international law or
laws conferring protection upon the entity marked with the emblem,
* MUST be capable of providing a reference to additional relevant
information (e.g., photographs, unique identifiers) which can be
used to corroborate the association of the digital emblem with the
entity bearing it,
* MUST be revocable when they are no longer valid,
* MUST be restrictable by temporal scope,
* MUST be restrictable by geographic scope,
* MUST be robust against being replayed by invalid bearers,
* MUST be robust against forgery of its various properties.
4. IANA Considerations
This document makes no requests of the IANA.
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5. Security Considerations
A key part of this document highlights the risks surrounding physical
emblems. Technical implementations of digital emblems will
undoubtedly incur their own security considerations. However, this
document does not propose technical solutions; it enumerates the use
cases that justify creating technical solutions and what requirements
are imposed on such solutions.
6. Contributors
Allison Mankin provided significant input on the issues surrounding
physical emblems and the criteria for a digital emblem. Tony
DeSimone, Kerstin Vignard, and Erin Hahn provided insight into the
legal and policy issues surrounding emblems. Felix Linker and Mauro
Vignati provided many of the requirements that derive from digital
asset use cases.
7. Acknowledgments
8. References
8.1. Normative References
[RFC2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119,
DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, March 1997,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2119>.
[RFC8174] Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC
2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174,
May 2017, <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8174>.
8.2. Informative References
[BLUEHELMET]
Doctors Without Borders, "The Practical Guide to
Humanitarian Law", n.d., <https://guide-humanitarian-
law.org/content/article/3/peacekeeping/>.
[BLUESHIELD]
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization, "Enhanced Protection - Cultural Property of
Highest Importance to Humanity", n.d.,
<https://www.unesco.org/en/heritage-armed-conflicts/
enhanced-protection-cultural-property-highest-importance-
humanity>.
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[DIPLOMAT] Cornell Law School - Legal Information Institute,
"Personnel of Foreign Governments and International
Organizations and Special Treatment for Returning
Individuals", n.d.,
<https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/19/148.83>.
[PRESS] Reporters Without Borders, "RSF Resource for Journalists'
Safety", n.d., <https://safety.rsf.org/appendix-i-
protection-of-journalists-in-war-zones/>.
[REDCROSS] International Committee of the Red Cross, "The Protection
of the Red Cross / Red Crescent Emblems", n.d.,
<https://www.icrc.org/en/doc/assets/files/other/
protection_emblems.pdf>.
Appendix A. Use Cases for a digital emblem
Digital emblems are verifiable labels that can be associated with an
entity so that a verifier can prove that the entity (person, place,
or thing) has some property the digital emblem represents. This is a
list of use cases that necessitate the creation of one or more
standards for digital emblems to be used to express some status of
the entity bearing them. Each use case contains a list of potential
attributes to associate with the entity as a part of the emblem. It
is assumed that each use case would contain a link or reference to
the law, regulation, or policy that governs the protections granted
under the emblem.
These use cases come from discussions with the organizations
identified. This is a representative (not exhaustive) list of use
cases for a digital emblem.
A.1. International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)
The ICRC is responsible for the visual Red Cross, Red Crescent, and
Red Crystal emblems used to label physical assets such as buildings
and vehicles so that wartime combatants know that International
Humanitarian Law (IHL) forbids attacking that asset. The ICRC has
been challenging private industry and academic researchers to create
a digital equivalent to these visual emblems that can be used to
label digital assets as protected under IHL the same way they can
label physical assets today.
* Indication of location
* Textual description
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The ICRC has shared the following concrete use cases as part of their
industry and academic research engagement.
A.1.1. Labeling web servers
Ensuring that attackers targeting a server hosting websites the
attacker wishes to compromise know that the server hosting those
sites is IHL protected.
A.1.2. Labeling personal-use devices
Doctors use laptops to process IHL protected data both on hospital
premises and on the move.
A.1.3. Labeling power-constrained devices
IoT devices are used to manage various equipment within hospitals,
and their power constraints may pose unique limitations on digital
emblem solutions.
A.1.4. Labeling networks from within
A device on a network that was compromised by a non-network path
(such as malware loaded from a USB device) needs to discover that it
compromised a network that is IHL protected (distinct from
discovering the compromised device is protected).
A.1.5. Labeling networks from without
Attackers trying to compromise a network through a network path can
discover an emblem for an IP address for a NAT or gateway behind
which are IHL protected assets.
A.1.6. Miscellaneous
Other valuable use cases may exist across the following areas:
protections of buildings (e.g., hospitals), people (e.g., aid
workers), vehicles (e.g., ambulances), objects (e.g., medical
devices), digital services (e.g., family reunification services), and
data at-rest & in-transit. Permission to use an emblem is delegated
to each UN member nation.
A.2. United Nations
UN Peacekeepers may require protective markings in theater as well as
facilities associated with the mission.
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A.3. United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO)
Requires protections for items of cultural heritage, both physical
and digital. Priority is on buildings and physical artworks. These
can be denoted with location information, descriptions, and linked
images. There is a special concern with repatriating stolen works,
which would benefit from a provenance trail via an emblem. Their is
also an interest in ensuring that a physical instantiation of an
emblem accompany each artwork and leverage the digital emblem to
track the current location and any special handling needed.
* Indication of location
* Image(s)
* Textual description
* Chain-of-custody / provenance
A.4. Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)
Requires protection of Schedule 1 chemicals in transit between
signatory countries for research, medical, pharmaceutical, or
protective purposes. Emblem would identify place, date, and volume
of production. Also a need to encrypt the description/
characteristics of the items for access only by the receiving customs
agencies and material handlers. This encryption precludes other
actors from determining the contents being transported.
* Indication of location (dynamic as materials are moved)
* Indication of quantity
* Textual description
A.5. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
IAEA administers several treaties, especially related to the
controlled shipment of atomic fuels and wastes across borders.
Similar use case as OPCW.
A.6. Basel Convention
Regulates the trans-boundary movement of hazardous wastes. Use cases
are functionally identical to OPCW and IAEA.
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A.7. Press
Journalists in conflict zones require protective markings that
indicate their status as a non-combatant.
A.8. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)
WIPO administers 26+ treaties with different protections for
different things. Brands that are protected under international law
(e.g., Madrid Protocol) can mark their shipments with an emblem
allowing customs agents to positively identify legitimate products.
* Copyright/Brand image
* Textual description
* Chain-of-custody / provenance
A.9. International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO)
Requires protection of civil aviation flights and the ability to
assert that they are not dual-use (i.e., not carrying military
cargo). Digital emblem would carry a geographic description of the
flight plan, its current location, and an indicator of its identity
(i.e., tail number). Potential need for the emblem to reference a
flight manifest.
* Indication of location
- Flight plan is static
- Current location is dynamic
* Textual description (i.e., manifest, identifying characteristics
such as tail number)
A.10. World Health Organization (WHO)
Similar use case as the ICRC.
Authors' Addresses
Brian Haberman (editor)
JHU/APL
Email: brian@innovationslab.net
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Tommy Jensen
Microsoft
Email: tojens@microsoft.com
Bill Woodcock
PCH
Email: woody@pch.net
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