Use of ML-DSA in TLS 1.3
draft-ietf-tls-mldsa-01
| Document | Type | Active Internet-Draft (tls WG) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Authors | Tim Hollebeek , Sophie Schmieg , Bas Westerbaan | ||
| Last updated | 2025-09-26 | ||
| Replaces | draft-tls-westerbaan-mldsa | ||
| RFC stream | Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) | ||
| Intended RFC status | (None) | ||
| Formats | |||
| Additional resources | Mailing list discussion | ||
| Stream | WG state | WG Document | |
| Document shepherd | (None) | ||
| IESG | IESG state | I-D Exists | |
| Consensus boilerplate | Unknown | ||
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| Send notices to | (None) |
draft-ietf-tls-mldsa-01
Transport Layer Security§ T. Hollebeek
Internet-Draft DigiCert
Intended status: Informational S. Schmieg
Expires: 30 March 2026 Google
B. E. Westerbaan
Cloudflare
26 September 2025
Use of ML-DSA in TLS 1.3
draft-ietf-tls-mldsa-01
Abstract
This memo specifies how the post-quantum signature scheme ML-DSA
(FIPS 204) is used for authentication in TLS 1.3.
About This Document
This note is to be removed before publishing as an RFC.
The latest revision of this draft can be found at
https://tlswg.github.io/tls-mldsa/draft-ietf-tls-mldsa.html. Status
information for this document may be found at
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-tls-mldsa/.
Discussion of this document takes place on the Transport Layer
Security Working Group mailing list (mailto:tls@ietf.org), which is
archived at https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/browse/tls/. Subscribe
at https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/tls/.
Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at
https://github.com/tlswg/tls-mldsa.
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
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 30 March 2026.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2025 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
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Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions and Definitions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
3. ML-DSA SignatureScheme values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.1. Certificate chain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.2. Handshake signature . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3.3. TLS 1.2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
1. Introduction
ML-DSA is a post-quantum module-lattice-based digital signature
algorithm standardised by NIST in [FIPS204].
This memo specifies how ML-DSA can be negotiated for authentication
in TLS 1.3 via the signature_algorithms and signature_algorithms_cert
extensions.
2. Conventions and Definitions
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.
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3. ML-DSA SignatureScheme values
As defined in [RFC8446], the SignatureScheme namespace is used for
the negotiation of signature scheme for authentication via the
signature_algorithms and signature_algorithms_cert extensions. This
document adds three new SignatureScheme values for the three ML-DSA
parameter sets from [FIPS204] as follows.
+=================+===========+=================================+
| SignatureScheme | FIPS 204 | Certificate AlgorithmIdentifier |
+=================+===========+=================================+
| mldsa44(0x0904) | ML-DSA-44 | id-ML-DSA-44 |
+-----------------+-----------+---------------------------------+
| mldsa65(0x0905) | ML-DSA-65 | id-ML-DSA-64 |
+-----------------+-----------+---------------------------------+
| mldsa87(0x0906) | ML-DSA-87 | id-ML-DSA-87 |
+-----------------+-----------+---------------------------------+
Table 1: SignatureSchemes for ML-DSA
Note that these are different from the HashML-DSA pre-hashed variants
defined in Section 5.4 of [FIPS204].
3.1. Certificate chain
For the purpose of signalling support for signatures on certificates
as per Section 4.2.4 of [RFC8446], these values indicate support for
signing using the given AlgorithmIdentifier shown in Table 1 as
defined in [MLDSACERTS].
3.2. Handshake signature
When one of those SignatureScheme values is used in a
CertificateVerify message, then the signature MUST be computed and
verified as specified in Section 4.4.3 of [RFC8446], and the
corresponding end-entity certificate MUST use the corresponding
AlgorithmIdentifier from Table 1.
The context parameter defined in [FIPS204] Algorithm 2 and 3 MUST be
the empty string.
3.3. TLS 1.2
The schemes defined in this document MUST NOT be used in TLS 1.2
[RFC5246] or earlier versions. A peer that receives
ServerKeyExchange or CertificateVerify message in a TLS 1.2
connection with schemes defined in this document MUST abort the
connection with an illegal_parameter alert.
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4. Security Considerations
The security considerations of [RFC8446] (eg. appendix C.2) and
[FIPS204] (Section 3.6) apply.
5. IANA Considerations
This document requests new entries to the TLS SignatureScheme
registry, according to the procedures in Section 6 of [TLSIANA].
+========+=============+=============+================+
| Value | Description | Recommended | Reference |
+========+=============+=============+================+
| 0x0904 | mldsa44 | N | This document. |
+--------+-------------+-------------+----------------+
| 0x0905 | mldsa65 | N | This document. |
+--------+-------------+-------------+----------------+
| 0x0906 | mldsa87 | N | This document. |
+--------+-------------+-------------+----------------+
Table 2
6. References
6.1. Normative References
[FIPS204] "Module-lattice-based digital signature standard",
National Institute of Standards and Technology (U.S.),
DOI 10.6028/nist.fips.204, August 2024,
<https://doi.org/10.6028/nist.fips.204>.
[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>.
[RFC8446] Rescorla, E., "The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Protocol
Version 1.3", RFC 8446, DOI 10.17487/RFC8446, August 2018,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8446>.
6.2. Informative References
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[MLDSACERTS]
Massimo, J., Kampanakis, P., Turner, S., and B.
Westerbaan, "Internet X.509 Public Key Infrastructure -
Algorithm Identifiers for the Module-Lattice-Based Digital
Signature Algorithm (ML-DSA)", Work in Progress, Internet-
Draft, draft-ietf-lamps-dilithium-certificates-12, 26 June
2025, <https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-ietf-
lamps-dilithium-certificates-12>.
[RFC5246] Dierks, T. and E. Rescorla, "The Transport Layer Security
(TLS) Protocol Version 1.2", RFC 5246,
DOI 10.17487/RFC5246, August 2008,
<https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc5246>.
[TLSIANA] Salowey, J. A. and S. Turner, "IANA Registry Updates for
TLS and DTLS", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-
ietf-tls-rfc8447bis-15, 21 July 2025,
<https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-ietf-tls-
rfc8447bis-15>.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Alicja Kario, John Mattsson, Rebecca Guthrie, Alexander
Bokovoy, Niklas Block, Ryan Appel, and Loganaden Velvindron for their
review and feedback.
Authors' Addresses
Tim Hollebeek
DigiCert
Email: tim.hollebeek@digicert.com
Sophie Schmieg
Google
Email: sschmieg@google.com
Bas Westerbaan
Cloudflare
Email: bas@cloudflare.com
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