PID: A Generic Naming Schema for Information-centric Network
draft-zhang-icnrg-pid-naming-scheme-01

ICN Research Group                                              X. Zhang
Internet-Draft                                              R. Ravindran
Intended status: Informational                       Huawei Technologies
Expires: August 23, 2013                                          H. Xie
                                                           Huawei & USTC
                                                                 G. Wang
                                                     Huawei Technologies
                                                       February 19, 2013

      PID: A Generic Naming Schema for Information-centric Network
                 draft-zhang-icnrg-pid-naming-scheme-01

Abstract

   In Information-centric network (ICN), everything is an identifiable
   object with a name such as a named data chunk.  Different from host-
   centric connectivity, ICN connects named entities using name-based
   routing and forwarding.  At the same time, network entities, end
   devices, and applications have variant demands to verify the
   integrity, authenticity, and validation of these entities through
   names.  This document proposes a generic naming schema, called PID,
   which supports security provenance, content lookup, routing, and
   inter-domain resolution for ICN.  With PID schema, a name consists of
   three components: principal(s), identifier(s), and domain(s).  In
   this draft, we only illustrate the principles and concepts of PID and
   the functional role of each component, and leave encoding approaches
   as implementation options.

Status of this Memo

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Copyright Notice

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Table of Contents

   1.  Design Principles  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
     1.1.  Naming in ICN  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
     1.2.  Design Principles for Naming in ICN  . . . . . . . . . . .  4
   2.  PID Naming Schema  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
     2.1.  Naming Format  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
     2.2.  Routing Names  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  6
     2.3.  Content Store and PIT  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
     2.4.  Dynamic Content Routing  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
     2.5.  Towards Generic Naming Schema  . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  9
   3.  Trust Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
   4.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   5.  IANA Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   6.  Conclusions  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   7.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

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1.  Design Principles

1.1.  Naming in ICN

   In ICN design, a name has been required to serve for many purposes:
   ICN requires unique names to identify mutable or immutable content or
   information objects; in data caching, a name is used to look up and
   access the data; in routing and forwarding, a name is used for
   reaching the information object; for security, a provenance between
   name and data is established and verified via cryptographic
   credentials associated with a name.  We summarize the following roles
   that a name may be desired from different users or stakeholder in
   ICN:

   o  R1 (unique): A name identifies an object or entity with uniqueness
      in some scope (e.g., within a domain or Internet).

   o  R2 (locatable): A name enables interested entities to locate the
      identified object in a network.  For this purpose, the name is
      either routable to reach the object, or includes information to
      derive the routable location(s) of the object.

   o  R3 (readable): A name enables a user or application to easily
      identify and indicate the content of an object, even without
      knowing the content itself beforehand or before the content is
      generated.  For this, the name may be required to be human-
      readable.

   o  R4 (authenticable): A name has strong binding with the content
      itself (either the publisher or owner of the content, or the
      content itself), in order to provide content access
      authentication, to let receiver verify the provenance, and to
      prevent denial-of-service attacks in an ICN [ICN-name].

   o  R5 (trustable): A name includes information on how to derive the
      trust of a content object, e.g., by an end user who retrieves the
      content from ICN.  The trust can be built on mechanisms out of ICN
      primitives.

   There may be many different naming schemes towards all or subset of
   the above roles.  For example, flat names are used in [1] for global
   uniqueness and authentication, but does not provide readability,
   routing, and trust-deriving information.  Hierarchical flat name is
   proposed in [2] to use nested flat names for routing purposes.
   Hierarchical human-readable names are proposed in CCN and NDN [3],
   but they do not provide authentication and trust-deriving
   information.  A generalized form of name is proposed in [4] to bind
   authentication with content names via a signature.

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1.2.  Design Principles for Naming in ICN

   We follow several principles for defining naming schema in ICN.

   o  A naming schema satisfies necessary but not more than necessary
      aforementioned roles: in our view, a single-component name cannot
      satisfy all roles at the same time.

   o  A content name identifies a content object in persistent way, such
      that this name does not change with the mobility and multi-home of
      corresponding content, device, or host.  A client can always use
      this name to retrieve the content from network and verify the
      binding of the content and the name.

   o  A naming schema should give certain level of flexibility to
      support different networks, considering variant network
      architectures have been proposed and multiple ICNs and current
      Internet may co-exist.  Ideally, a name can include any form of
      identifier, including flat, hierarchical, human readable or non-
      readable.  The identifier can be chosen by content owner or
      publisher with the uniqueness within certain domain or within an
      application-specific scope.

   o  The network does not use persistent content name for routing
      directly; instead, a "routing name" (or routable address/location/
      label/tag) is network architecture dependent, which is usually
      routable within the network, such that a network node or client
      can reach the content with it.  Usually, a routing name is the
      real location (or locator) of the content in the network.

   o  Per-domain-based (globally or locally) naming resolution services
      (NRS) should be available, to map a persistent content name to
      routing name or location.  While per-domain NRS updates the
      routing labels for a content name, it creates a late-binding
      routing behavior.  We note that a single content name can be
      mapped to multiple routing names.  How to implement name
      resolution service is out of the scope of this document.

2.  PID Naming Schema

2.1.  Naming Format

   Based on these principles, we propose a P:I:D (or simply PID) naming
   schema for ICN.  Each name is specified by three components of PID,
   where:

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   o  P is the principal to bind the object with complete name for
      security purpose, for different relationships, e.g., ownership,
      administration, and social relations.  P is usually constructed by
      hashing the public key of the principal, or the hashing the
      content object itself if it is static.  We call the relationship
      between P and the object as "security binding".

   o  I is the identifier of the object in variant forms and is referred
      by end user, applications, or other entities.  It can be something
      chosen by publisher or a network service, or other administrative
      authorities.  It can be hierarchical or flat, user-readable or
      non-readable, and usually location-independent.  We call the
      relationship between I and the object as "application-binding".

   o  D is the domain that provides resolution from identifier to the
      real location of the object by routers.  For persistence purpose,
      D can be in any of the following forms:

      *  The locator of the target object if the locator is persistent;

      *  A resolution service name or location which maps the content
         identifier (I) to its real location, if the resolution service
         name is persistent;

      *  A resolution service name that maps the content identifier (I)
         to another resolution service name or location, that is, a
         meta-domain;

      *  Any combinations of above.

      We call the relationship between D and the content object as
      "network-binding".

   For example, D can be the domain name of the publisher's domain
   gateway, service, host that can resolve P:I, or a redirection
   gateway, service or host to preserve name persistence or to deal with
   mobility or hosted services.  D is the "fall back" used for name-
   resolution if P:I is not resolvable in the local cache of the
   requesting domain.  D is usually routable (globally or locally), such
   that, when an application or network node first receives an interest
   with the content name, it can query a resolution service by routing
   with D and obtain the real location or locator of the named object.
   In case the resolution service is not static, a recursive name
   resolution may be performed, i.e., the D points to a static
   resolution service, which in turn points to a dynamic resolution
   service, which points to the location of the object.  D is optional,
   if I is routable within a given domain.

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   D can be in the same namespace of I, but in general it can be
   different.  For example, in one case, D is the container of a set of
   objects which can locate and resolve objects [5].

   We note that the domain concept in our naming schema is more general
   than the administration domain in current Internet architecture.  In
   PID, the relationship between a named object and its domain D is for
   location resolution and routing purpose.  It can be the same as the
   administration domain of the content object, or a 3rd party
   resolution service provider, where the designated domain provides
   resolution service.  In more generally way, the domain of a name can
   have social-, admin-, owner-, host- relationships with the named
   object, which implies that the domain provides resolution service to
   locate a content object with its name.  A domain can provide a DNS-
   like service that maps a content identifier to the location of the
   object or the resolution service.  Different from current Internet's
   centralized DNS, a domain-based resolution can be more general with a
   distributed implementation.  Furthermore, the meta-domain of a
   content object can be personal profile, e.g., as in social network
   service, an enterprise directory service, a cloud service provider,
   or a web hosting service.  For example, to support the Example 2 of
   [6], the domain part of the content name is simply the service name
   or location of the lookup database, which is more persistent than the
   mapping of a content identifier to location.  Note that in [6], the
   lookup database is assumed to be static and pre-known by the network,
   which we believe is not realistic and flexible enough.

2.2.  Routing Names

   As aforementioned, our naming schema differentiates content names and
   routing names, where the former is persistent to specify a content
   object, while the later is location-based for routing purpose.
   Instead of a very specific format of routing names, our schema
   supports variant routable names (or routing labels), e.g., a network
   address or a locator.  For a content name P:I:D, the D resolves P:I
   to one or many routing labels, and application or network router can
   choose one to reach the content or more for multicast.  A routing
   label for a content object can be dynamic, and can be changed from
   domain to domain.  For example, a single domain may by default set a
   gateway routing label to all the clients it is serving.  The gateway
   may then replace it with some other label.  Through this way, the
   routing label can allow policy-based intra/inter-domain routing, late
   binding for mobility, and delay-tolerant content routing.

   With a content name provided by a content requester, the network
   first returns the real location of the named object via resolution
   services specified by the domain information (D) in the name.  This
   location information is then augmented in the head field of a PDU

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   (e.g., an interest in CCN).  The network then uses location to reach
   the object, retrieve the named content, and forward back to the
   requester.  Resolving the location from name and augmenting the PDU
   can be transparent to applications.

   In general with P:I:D the resolution process works as follows: with a
   content name P:I:D, a client forwards request to a network node
   (e.g., an access router), if not resolvable in the local cache, the
   router first routes to a naming resolution service (NRS) with D. With
   the input of P:I, the NRS returns the routing name or routing label
   of the content object, e.g., a location or a locator.  Upon receiving
   this, the network node inserts this label in the head of the interest
   packet.  The network then uses this routing label to reach the next
   hop, to retrieve the named content by using P:I at each hop, and to
   forward data back to the requester.  In case the routing name
   resolved from the NRS is another name resolution service named with
   D', the network node sends the request to this revolved NRS with D'
   in interest head, obtains the location of the target object, and then
   inserts the location into interest head to obtain the content object.
   This process happens recursively until the location of the named
   object can be reached.  In another case, where a separate locator
   address space is not managed, a per-hop forwarding can be adopted,
   where a content router tries to resolve the content name identifier
   (I or P:I) locally in its cache, if it is unresolvable, use I:D or
   just D to route to domain D, in the latter case once the interest
   reaches D, the request I:D can be used to route to location(s) of the
   content object.

   Therefore, logically, a data PDU could be of form <P:I:D, <Routing
   Label>, C, Sign_P(I:D,C), Metadata >, where C is the content payload,
   Sign_P is a signature generated from the private key corresponding to
   P on C and persistent content name, and the metadata includes other
   meta attribute information.  With this hybrid naming approach, our
   schema achieves the benefits of both pure self-certified names and
   hierarchical names.  Specifically, similar to hierarchical human-
   readable name, the P:I part of our name schema can achieve global
   unique and readability (if needed).  With D, our name schema achieves
   persistent locatability without real location of the content in name.
   With the P part, our name schema can achieve strong binding between
   content and its name for security and data integrity.  Note that
   trust management is built on some external mechanism out of the
   naming schema.

   In a special case, the D of a content name P:I:D could also serve as
   a routing label, i.e., D can serve dual purposes: a resolution/
   redirection point, and a routing label as well, e.g., D could
   directly resolve to a container (server).  This avoids one RTT to
   obtain the Routing Labels of the content name.

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   While D can serve the same purpose of routing label that is proposed
   in [6], our PID schema has two improvements:

   o  P:I:D has better persistence property since it separates routing
      labels from content names, while in [6], a content ID includes
      both routing labels and identifier.  When the routing label of a
      content is changed, e.g., the host service is changed, or a new
      host service is added, the content ID has to be changed, which
      destroys the name persistency.

   o  P:I:D has stronger security binding of name and content via
      principal field.

   Note: We focus on the logical semantics of fields in a naming in this
   document.  In implementation, variant formats of P:I:D can be
   options.  For example, I:D can be in a single component, which acts
   as a resolvable identifier.

2.3.  Content Store and PIT

   With a content name of P:I:D, a router can use the full name to index
   and look up cached content chunks and pending interests in content
   sore (CS) and pending interest table (PIT) (e.g., in [3]).
   Optionally, a router can only use P and I for the same purposes.
   This achieves location independency in data storage and forwarding,
   e.g., when a content chunk with P and I can satisfy any request of
   P:I:D with any D. That is, two content objects with same P and I are
   considered as the same and thus only one is cached at anytime, even
   though they may have different Ds.

2.4.  Dynamic Content Routing

   The P:I:D naming lends itself to allow consuming and producing
   applications to choose naming semantic that meets requirements in
   terms of reliability, security or performance metrics.  The naming
   format follows a P:I:D format, where I identifies the named entity
   with a local or global scope, and D is the authority which could
   resolve the entity's location(s), and P securely binds the content
   object to I. For content routing I:D is the relevant portion.  As I
   could be a hierarchical or flat name, several options for content
   routing are possible.  In one case separate ICN domains can be built
   that is optimized to deal with either flat or hierarchical, here
   name-resolution service allows the request to be directed to the
   appropriate domain criterion determined by the publisher, consumer or
   based on certain routing policies.  In another case, a content
   routing domain can be built where the name-resolution infrastructure
   is enabled to deal with both flat and hierarchical names, here
   irrespective of the type of naming, a separate locator space exists

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   to resolve the content name to its location(s).

   If the combination of I:D is hierarchical, the content routing can
   follow the resolution mechanism similar to CCN.  To resolve an
   interest, either I itself could be routable if it is globally unique,
   or the combination of I:D should be routable, which shall be
   interpretable by the name resolution service handling hierarchical
   names.  Such ICN domains can leverage longest prefix match to take
   advantage of name-prefix aggregation mitigating routing scalability
   issue.

   If I is flat, then the resolution through D should return a routing
   label(s), which can be appended to the interest packet for intra- and
   inter-domain name based routing on a fast path, or the name
   resolution can be handled by the global name resolution
   infrastructure through inter-domain cooperation on a slow path.

   There are several considerations for dynamic name based routing.
   Based on the particular naming construct, hierarchical vs flat vs
   hybrid each of these considerations achieves the same objectives
   respectively with different mechanisms.

2.5.  Towards Generic Naming Schema

   As mentioned before, one object may have several names.  Different
   names are assigned from different domains and served for different
   purposes.  Logically, for a single object (e.g., a content, a device,
   an application, a service, a network nodes, or a user), it can have
   multiple identifiers, For example, a mobile device may have
   identifier of IMEI, a phone number, an IP address, a human readable
   name (e.g., Alice's iPhone), and an organizational device id (e.g.,
   if the device belongs to a company).  A user generated content can
   have a user chosen ID, a URL, and a tinyURL.  All these identifiers
   can have a single principal.  Therefore the name of the object can be
   P:(I1:...:In):D, where Ix is an identifier, D is a domain that
   provides name resolution service, and P is the principal.

   In very general case, each identifier can be associated with
   different principals, and multiple locators can be used for a single
   content object, e.g., for load balance and duplication.  For example,
   the Abel's iPhone have different public keys for different names it
   may use for different network services, one for Abel's personal use,
   and another from the enterprise.  Therefore, the relationships
   between the object, identifier, and principals can be illustrated as
   follows.

   As one object may have many persistent domains (e.g., a content is
   stored at different host services or CDNs), and one object may also

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   have many IDs, in this generic schema, both domain and identifier may
   be a multi-element set, and content routers and consumers can select
   variant elements for content routing and forwarding (based on locally
   defined policy).

   Note that there can be mapping relationships between multiple names
   of a single object.  For example, an object may have a hierarchical
   identifier within its local domain owned by an enterprise, but has a
   flat identifier (hash of its content) with a DHT service.  There can
   be a mapping service to link these two names towards the same object.

   In general, mapping function between different names of a single
   object can be used to build flexible relationships between names,
   such as:

   o  An identifier can be derived from another identifier, which forms
      nested or tunneled names.

   o  A principal can be signed by another principal, to build trust
      between different principals, such as for ownership,
      administration, and social relationships.

   o  A domain name can point to another domain name for the same
      object.

   The P:I:D schema can support these levels of flexibility.  However,
   we consider these are extensions of core naming schema.

3.  Trust Management

   Naming schema design and implementation is independent from the trust
   management infrastructure.  The trust of a content object is derived
   from the trust of the principal, i.e., the public key of the
   principal.  Either network nodes or end users can verify the trust of
   a content object, according to different security requirements.  The
   trust management infrastructure is out of the scope of PID naming
   schema.

   Similar to [3], the public key of a principal can be regular ICN
   data, also with the name of P:I:D. For the name of a certified public
   key, its I can be some domain- or realm-based name, D can be the name
   (if static) of the certificate directory service of a CA, or a domain
   that resolves the location of a public key certificate, and the P is
   the hash the CA's public key.

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4.  Security Considerations

   Security issues are not discussed in this memo.

5.  IANA Considerations

   This document makes no specific request of IANA.

6.  Conclusions

   In this draft, we propose PID, a naming schema for ICN.  With this
   schema, an object name includes a prinicapl P, an identifier I, and a
   domain D. The princial P acts for security binding, e.g., to verify
   if the object is bounded with its name, and to derive the trust of
   the object with possible trust managemnet mechanisms.  The identifier
   I identifies the object within certain scope, and can be used for
   application binding such as caching retrievial.  The D referes to a
   name resolution service that can drive the realtime location of the
   object, directly or recrusively.  While this draft lays out the basic
   design pinciples and workflows of PID, we leave its encoding and
   implementation details to other documentations, such as [5].

7.  Informative References

   [1]  Koponen, I., "A Data-Oriented (and Beyond) Network
        Architecture.", Proc. of ACM SIGCOMM 2007.

   [2]  Ghodsi, A., "Naming in Content-Oriented Architectures.", Proc.
        of ACM ICN Workshop 2011.

   [3]  Jacobson, V., "Networking named content.", Proc. of ACM
        CoNEXT 2009.

   [4]  "Securing Network Content.", PARC Technical Report 2009.

   [5]  "Container Assisted Naming and Routing for ICN.",  http://
        www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/
        draft-yao-icnrg-naming-routing-00.txt. 2013.

   [6]  "NDN and IP Routing, Can it Scale?", http://trac.tools.ietf.org/
        group/irtf/trac/raw-attachment/wiki/icnrg/
        IRTF%20-%20CCN%20And%20IP%20Routing%20-%202.pdf 2011.

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Authors' Addresses

   Xinwen Zhang
   Huawei Technologies
   2330 Central Expressway
   Santa Clara, CA  95050
   USA

   Phone:
   Email: xinwen.zhang@huawei.com

   Ravi Ravindran
   Huawei Technologies
   2330 Central Expressway
   Santa Clara, CA  95050
   USA

   Phone:
   Email: ravi.ravindran@huawei.com

   Haiyong Xie
   Huawei & USTC
   2330 Central Expressway
   Santa Clara, CA  95050
   USA

   Phone:
   Email: haiyong.xie@huawei.com

   Guoqiang Wang
   Huawei Technologies
   2330 Central Expressway
   Santa Clara, CA  95050
   USA

   Phone:
   Email: gq.wang@huawei.com

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