Elliptic Curve Cryptography Subject Public Key Information
draft-ietf-pkix-ecc-subpubkeyinfo-11

Answers to Document Shepherd Write-Up questions (Questions listed in the end):
1.a - Stefan Santesson is the document Shepherd.  He has personally reviewed the document and asserts that it is ready for IESG publication.
1.b - The document has been reviewed by key WG members and has passed WG LC.
There are no concerns about depth or breadth of the reviews.
1.c - There is no need for wider review.
1.d - There are no specific concerns that the AD and/or IESG should be aware of.  The object identifier for the ASN.1 modules will be assigned/inserted during AUTH48 (Provided by Russ Housley).
1.e - The WG consensus is solid.
1.f - There has been no threat of appeal.
1.g - The document satisfies all ID nits with a few minor warnings.
1.h - The document splits its references and all normative references are complete and approved documents.
1.i - The document has an IANA consideration and it is consistent with the main body (there are no IANA considerations).
1.j - The ASN.1 modules compile.

Technical Summary

The subjectPublicKeyInfo field of an X.509 certificate carries three data
items: an algorithm identifier, optional parameters, and a bit string that represents the public key.  The parameters are specific to the algorithm and this field usually contains simple values needed to characterize the public key algorithm, e.g., the generator and modulus for Diffie-Hellman. However,
X.509 does not constrain the scope of this parameters field. The ANSI X9.62 standards allow parameters to name the curve via an object identifier, inherit the curve from an issuer, or fully specify the curve.  To fully specify the curve a complex structure is required.  Further, the ANSI X9.62 standards committee elected to use this field to express potentially complex limitations on how the public key in the certificate can be used, e.g., which key derivation functions can be applied to the bit string that results from a Diffie-Hellman key exchange.

After considerable debate the PKIX WG decided to limit the number of parameter choices to: name the curve with an object identifier (namedCurve) and inherit the curve from issuer (inheritCurve).  This decision was based on implementers desire to use well known curves from NIST and the complexity of the specifiedCurve field (not to mention the 20+ pages it saved).

The WG also decided to restrict the number of algorithm identifiers to
three: id-ecPublicKey, id-ecDH, and id-ECMQV.  The id-ecPublicKey object identifier is when a CA does not want to limit the key for use with a particular ECC algorithm.  ECDSA will use this object identifier, as it is already widely implemented.  The id-ecDH and id-ecMQV object identifiers are used to restrict the key for use with ECDH and ECMQV, respectively.

The SHA-224, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512 algorithms and the NIST curves were added to the ASN.1 modules.

Working Group Summary

This ID was discussed extensively on the PKIX WG mailing list.  A poll was taken to remove the specifiedCurve option.  The WG was in favor of the change.  The other comments were about document quality.

Document Quality

This document is a fairly length update of three sections of RFC 3279 (Sections 2.3.5, 3, and 5) and includes 4 ASN.1 modules.  The quality of the draft is comparable in quality to its predecessor.






Document Shepherd Write-Up Questions (Version of September, 17 2008)

    (1.a) Who is the Document Shepherd for this document? Has the
          Document Shepherd personally reviewed this version of the
          document and, in particular, does he or she believe this
          version is ready for forwarding to the IESG for publication?
    (1.b) Has the document had adequate review both from key WG members
          and from key non-WG members? Does the Document Shepherd have
          any concerns about the depth or breadth of the reviews that
          have been performed?
    (1.c) Does the Document Shepherd have concerns that the document
          needs more review from a particular or broader perspective,
          e.g., security, operational complexity, someone familiar with
          AAA, internationalization or XML?
    (1.d) Does the Document Shepherd have any specific concerns or
          issues with this document that the Responsible Area Director
          and/or the IESG should be aware of? For example, perhaps he
          or she is uncomfortable with certain parts of the document, or
          has concerns whether there really is a need for it. In any
          event, if the WG has discussed those issues and has indicated
          that it still wishes to advance the document, detail those
          concerns here. Has an IPR disclosure related to this document
          been filed? If so, please include a reference to the
          disclosure and summarize the WG discussion and conclusion on
          this issue.
    (1.e) How solid is the WG consensus behind this document? Does it
          represent the strong concurrence of a few individuals, with
          others being silent, or does the WG as a whole understand and
          agree with it?
    (1.f) Has anyone threatened an appeal or otherwise indicated extreme
          discontent? If so, please summarise the areas of conflict in
          separate email messages to the Responsible Area Director. (It
          should be in a separate email because this questionnaire is
          entered into the ID Tracker.)
    (1.g) Has the Document Shepherd personally verified that the
          document satisfies all ID nits? (See
          http://www.ietf.org/ID-Checklist.html and
          http://tools.ietf.org/tools/idnits/). Boilerplate checks are
          not enough; this check needs to be thorough. Has the document
          met all formal review criteria it needs to, such as the MIB
          Doctor, media type and URI type reviews?
    (1.h) Has the document split its references into normative and
          informative? Are there normative references to documents that
          are not ready for advancement or are otherwise in an unclear
          state? If such normative references exist, what is the
          strategy for their completion? Are there normative references
          that are downward references, as described in [RFC3967]? If
          so, list these downward references to support the Area
          Director in the Last Call procedure for them [RFC3967].
    (1.i) Has the Document Shepherd verified that the document IANA
          consideration section exists and is consistent with the body
          of the document? If the document specifies protocol
          extensions, are reservations requested in appropriate IANA
          registries? Are the IANA registries clearly identified? If
          the document creates a new registry, does it define the
          proposed initial contents of the registry and an allocation
          procedure for future registrations? Does it suggest a
          reasonable name for the new registry? See [RFC5226]. If the
          document describes an Expert Review process has Shepherd
          conferred with the Responsible Area Director so that the IESG
          can appoint the needed Expert during the IESG Evaluation?
    (1.j) Has the Document Shepherd verified that sections of the
          document that are written in a formal language, such as XML
          code, BNF rules, MIB definitions, etc., validate correctly in
          an automated checker?
    (1.k) The IESG approval announcement includes a Document
          Announcement Write-Up. Please provide such a Document
          Announcement Write-Up? Recent examples can be found in the
          "Action" announcements for approved documents. The approval
          announcement contains the following sections:

          Technical Summary
            Relevant content can frequently be found in the abstract
            and/or introduction of the document. If not, this may be
            an indication that there are deficiencies in the abstract
            or introduction.
          Working Group Summary
            Was there anything in WG process that is worth noting? For
            example, was there controversy about particular points or
            were there decisions where the consensus was particularly
            rough?
          Document Quality
            Are there existing implementations of the protocol? Have a
            significant number of vendors indicated their plan to
            implement the specification? Are there any reviewers that
            merit special mention as having done a thorough review,
            e.g., one that resulted in important changes or a
            conclusion that the document had no substantive issues? If
            there was a MIB Doctor, Media Type or other expert review,
            what was its course (briefly)? In the case of a Media Type
            review, on what date was the request posted?