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Path Signals
draft-iab-path-signals-00

The information below is for an old version of the document.
Document Type
This is an older version of an Internet-Draft that was ultimately published as RFC 8558.
Author Ted Hardie
Last updated 2018-05-16
RFC stream Internet Architecture Board (IAB)
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draft-iab-path-signals-00
Network Working Group                                     T. Hardie, Ed.
Internet-Draft                                              May 16, 2018
Intended status: Informational
Expires: November 17, 2018

                              Path Signals
                       draft-iab-path-signals-00

Abstract

   This document discusses the nature of signals seen by on-path
   elements, contrasting implicit and explicit signals.  For example,
   TCP's state mechanics uses a series of well-known messages that are
   exchanged in the clear.  Because these are visible to network
   elements on the path between the two nodes setting up the transport
   connection, they are often used as signals by those network elements.
   In transports that do not exchange these messages in the clear, on-
   path network elements lack those signals.  This document recommends
   that explict signals be used by transports which encrypt their state
   mechanics.  It also recommends that a signal be exposed to the path
   only when the signal's originator intends that it be used by the
   network elements on the path.

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-
   Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.

   Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
   and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
   time.  It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
   material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."

   This Internet-Draft will expire on November 17, 2018.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2018 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents

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   (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
   publication of this document.  Please review these documents
   carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
   to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
   include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.

Table of Contents

   1.  Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   2.  Introduction  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   2
   3.  Signals Type Inferred . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   3
     3.1.  Session Establishment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
       3.1.1.  Session Identity  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
       3.1.2.  Routability and Consent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
       3.1.3.  Flow Stability  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
       3.1.4.  Resource Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   4
     3.2.  Network Measurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
       3.2.1.  Path Latency  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
       3.2.2.  Path Reliability and Consistency  . . . . . . . . . .   5
   4.  Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
     4.1.  Do Not Restore These Signals  . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   5
     4.2.  Replace These With Network Layer Signals  . . . . . . . .   6
     4.3.  Replace These With Per-Transport Signals  . . . . . . . .   6
     4.4.  Create a Set of Signals Common to Multiple Transports . .   6
   5.  Recommendation  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   6
   6.  IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   7.  Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   8.  Acknowledgements  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7
   9.  References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     9.1.  Normative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
     9.2.  Informative References  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   8
   Author's Address  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   9

1.  Terminology

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [RFC2119].

2.  Introduction

   This document discusses the nature of signals seen by on-path
   elements, contrasting implicit and explicit signals.  For example,
   TCP's state mechanics uses a series of well-known messages that are
   exchanged in the clear.  Because these are visible to network
   elements on the path between the two nodes setting up the transport

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   connection, they are often used as signals by those network elements.
   In transports that do not exchange these messages in the clear, on-
   path network elements lack those signals.  This document recommends
   that explict signals be used by transports which encrypt their state
   mechanics.  It also recommends that a signal be exposed to the path
   only when the signal's originator intends that it be used by the
   network elements on the path.

   The interpretation of TCP [RFC0793] by on-path elements is an exmple
   of implicit signal usage.  It uses cleartext handshake messages to
   establish, maintain, and close connections.  While these are
   primarily intended to create state between two communicating nodes,
   these handshake messages are visible to network elements along the
   path between them.  It is common for certain network elements to
   treat the exchanged messages as signals which relate to their own
   functions.

   A firewall may, for example, create a rule that allows traffic from a
   specific host and port to enter its network when the connection was
   initiated by a host already within the network.  It may subsequently
   remove that rule when the communication has ceased.  In the context
   of TCP handshake, it sets up the pinhole rule on seeing the initial
   TCP SYN acknowledgement and then removes it upon seeing a RST or FIN
   & ACK exchange.  Note that in this case it does nothing to re-write
   any portion of the TCP packet; it simply enables a return path that
   would otherwise have been blocked.

   When a transport encrypts the fields it uses for state mechanics,
   these signals are no longer accessible to path elements.  The
   behavior of path elements will then depend on which signal is not
   available, on the default behavior configured by the path element
   administrator, and by the security posture of the network as a whole.

3.  Signals Type Inferred

   The following list of signals which may be inferred from transport
   state messages includes those which may be exchanged during sessions
   establishment and those which derive from the ongoing flow.

   Some of these signals are derived from the direct examination of
   packet trains, such as using a sequence number gap pattern to infer
   network reliability; others are derived from association, such as
   inferring network latency by timing a flow's packet inter-arrival
   times.

   This list is not exhaustive, and it is not the full set of effects
   due to encrypting data and metadata in flight.  Note as well that
   because these are derived from inference, they do not include any

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   path signals which would not be relevant to the end point state
   machines; indeed, an inference-based system cannot send such signals.

3.1.  Session Establishment

   One of the most basic inferences made by examination of transport
   state is that a packet will be part of an ongoing flow; that is, an
   established session will continue until messages are received that
   terminate it.  Path elements may then make subsidiary inferences
   related to the session.

3.1.1.  Session Identity

   Path elements that track session establishment will typically create
   a session identity for the flow, commonly using a tuple of the
   visible information in the packet headers.  This is then used to
   associate other information with the flow.

3.1.2.  Routability and Consent

   A second common inference that session establishment provides is that
   the communicating pair of hosts can each reach each other and are
   interested in continuing communication.  The firewall example given
   above is a consequence of the inference of consent; because the
   internal host initiates the connection, it is presumed to consent to
   return traffic.  That, in turn justifies the pinhole.

   Some other on-path elements ( assume that a host which asked to
   communicate with a remote address consents to establish incoming
   communications from any other host (Endpoint-Independent Mapping/
   Endpoint-Independent Filtering).  This is, for example, the default
   behavior in NAT64.

3.1.3.  Flow Stability

   Some on-path devices that are responsible for load-sharing or load-
   balancing may be instructed to preserve the same path for a given
   flow, rather than dispatching packets belonging to the some flow on
   multiple paths as this may cause packets in the flow to be delivered
   out of order..

3.1.4.  Resource Requirements

   An additional common inference is that network resources will be
   required for the session.  These may be requirements within the
   network element itself, such as table entry space for a firewall or
   NAT; they may also be communicated by the network element to other

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   systems.  For networks which use resource reservations, this might
   result in reservation of radio air time, energy, or network capacity.

3.2.  Network Measurement

   Some network elements will also observe transport messages to engage
   in measurement of the paths which are used by flows on their network.
   The list of measurements below is illustrative, not exhaustive.

3.2.1.  Path Latency

   There are several ways in which a network element may measure path
   latency using transport messages, but two common ones are examining
   exposed timestamps and associating sequence numbers with a local
   timer.  These measurements are necessarily limited to measuring only
   the portion of the path between the system which assigned the
   timestamp or sequence number and the network element.

3.2.2.  Path Reliability and Consistency

   A network element may also measure the reliability of a particular
   path by examining sessions which expose sequence numbers;
   retransmissions and gaps are then associated with the path segments
   on which they might have occurred.

4.  Options

   The set of options below are alternatives which optimize very
   different things.  Though it comes to a preliminary conclusion, this
   draft intends to foster a discussion of those tradeoffs and any
   discussion of them must be understood as preliminary.

4.1.  Do Not Restore These Signals

   It is possible, of course, to do nothing.  The transport messages
   were not necessarily intended for consumption by on-path network
   elements and encrypting them so they are not visible may be taken by
   some as a benefit.  Each network element would then treat packets
   without these visible elements according to its own defaults.  While
   our experience of that is not extensive, one consequence has been
   that state tables for flows of this type are generally not kept as
   long as those for which sessions are identifiable.  The result is
   that heartbeat traffic must be maintained to keep any bindings (e.g.
   NAT or firewall) from early expiry.  When those bindings are not
   kept, methods like QUIC's connection-id [QUIC] may be necessary to
   allow load balancers or other systems to continue to maintain a
   flow's path to the appropriate peer.

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4.2.  Replace These With Network Layer Signals

   It would be possible to replace these implicit signals with explicit
   signals at the network layer.  Though IPv4 has relatively few
   facilities for this, IPv6 hop-by-hop headers [RFC7045] might suit
   this purpose.  Further examination of the deployability of these
   headers may be required.

4.3.  Replace These With Per-Transport Signals

   It is possible to replace these implicit signals with signals that
   are tailored to specific transports, just as the initial signals are
   derived primarily from TCP.  There is a risk here that the first
   transport which develops these will be reused for many purposes
   outside its stated purpose, simply because it traverses NATs and
   firewalls better than other traffic.  If done with an explicit intent
   to re-use the elements of the solution in other transports, the risk
   of ossification might be slightly lower.

4.4.  Create a Set of Signals Common to Multiple Transports

   Several proposals use UDP [RFC0768] as a demux layer, onto which new
   transport semantics are layered.  For those transports, it may be
   possible to build a common signalling mechanism and set of signals,
   such as that proposed in "Transport-Independent Path Layer State
   Management" [PLUS].

   This may be taken as a variant of the re-use of common elements
   mentioned in the section above, but it has a greater chance of
   avoiding the ossification of the solution into the first moving
   protocol.

5.  Recommendation

   Fundamentally, this paper recommends that implicit signals should be
   replaced with explicit signals, but that a signal should be exposed
   to the path only when the signal's originator intends that it be used
   by the network elements on the path.  For many flows, that may result
   in signal being absent, but it allows them to be present when needed.

   Discussion of the appropriate mechanism(s) for these signals is
   continuing but, at minimum, any method should aim to adhere to these
   basic principles:

   o  The portion of protocol signaling that is intended for end system
      state machines should be protected by confidentiality and
      integrity protection such that it is only available to those end
      systems.

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   o  Anything exposed to the path should be done with the intent that
      it be used by the network elements on the path.  This information
      should be integrity protected.

   o  Signals exposed to the path should be decoupled from signals that
      drive the protocol state machines in endpoints.  This avoids
      creating opportunities for additional inference.

   o  Intermediate path elements should not add visible signals which
      identify the user, origin node, or origin network [RFC8164].

6.  IANA Considerations

   This document contains no requests for IANA.

7.  Security Considerations

   Path-visible signals allow network elements along the path to act
   based on the signaled information, whether the signal is implicit or
   explicit.  If the network element is controlled by an attacker, those
   actions can include dropping, delaying, or mishandling the
   constituent packets of a flow.  It may also characterize the flow or
   attempt to fingerprint the communicating nodes based on the pattern
   of signals.

   Note that actions that do not benefit the flow or the network may be
   perceived as an attack even if they are conducted by a responsible
   network element.  Designing a system that minimizes the ability to
   act on signals at all by removing as many signals as possible may
   reduce this possibility.  This approach also comes with risks,
   principally that the actions will continue to take place on an
   arbitrary set of flows.

   Addition of visible signals to the path also increases the
   information available to an observer and may, when the information
   can be linked to a node or user, reduce the privacy of the user.

   When signals from end points to the path are independent from the
   signals used by endpoints to manage the flow's state mechanics, they
   may be falsified by an endpoint without affecting the peer's
   understanding of the flow's state.  For encrypted flows, this
   divergence is not detectable by on-path devices.

8.  Acknowledgements

   In addition to the editor listed above, this document incorporates
   contributions from Brian Trammell, Mirja Kuehlwind, Martin Thomson,
   Aaron Falk, Mohamed Boucadair and Joe Hildebrand.  These ideas were

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   also discussed at the PLUS BoF, sponsored contributions from Brian
   Trammell, Mirja Kuehlwind, Martin Thomson, Aaron Falk and Joe
   Hildebrand.  These ideas were also discussed at the PLUS BoF,
   sponsored by Spencer Dawkins.  The ideas around the use of IPv6 hop-
   by-hop headers as a network layer signal benefited from discussions
   with Tom Herbert.  The description of UDP as a demuxing protocol
   comes from Stuart Cheshire.

   All errors are those of the editor.

9.  References

9.1.  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/info/rfc2119>.

9.2.  Informative References

   [PLUS]     Kuehlewind, M., Trammell, B., and J. Hildebrand,
              "Transport-Independent Path Layer State Management",
              draft-trammell-plus-statefulness-04 (work in progress),
              November 2017.

   [QUIC]     Iyengar, J. and M. Thomson, "QUIC: A UDP-Based Multiplexed
              and Secure Transport", draft-ietf-quic-transport-11 (work
              in progress), April 2018.

   [RFC0768]  Postel, J., "User Datagram Protocol", STD 6, RFC 768,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC0768, August 1980,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc768>.

   [RFC0793]  Postel, J., "Transmission Control Protocol", STD 7,
              RFC 793, DOI 10.17487/RFC0793, September 1981,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc793>.

   [RFC7045]  Carpenter, B. and S. Jiang, "Transmission and Processing
              of IPv6 Extension Headers", RFC 7045,
              DOI 10.17487/RFC7045, December 2013,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7045>.

   [RFC8164]  Nottingham, M. and M. Thomson, "Opportunistic Security for
              HTTP/2", RFC 8164, DOI 10.17487/RFC8164, May 2017,
              <https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8164>.

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Author's Address

   Ted Hardie (editor)

   Email: ted.ietf@gmail.com

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