Network Working Group                                    T. Ts'o, Editor
Internet-Draft                     Massachusetts Institute of Technology
draft-tso-telnet-krb5-00.txt                               February 1998


               Telnet Authentication: Kerberos Version 5

Status of this Memo

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1. Command Names and Codes

   Authentication Types

      KERBEROS_V5     2

   Sub-option Commands

      AUTH               0
      REJECT             1
      ACCEPT             2
      RESPONSE           3
      FORWARD            4
      FORWARD_ACCEPT     5
      FORWARD_REJECT     6

2.  Command Meanings

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION IS <authentication-type-pair> AUTH <Kerberos V5
   KRB_AP_REQ message> IAC SE

      This is used to pass the Kerberos V5 [1] KRB_AP_REQ message to the



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      remote side of the connection.  The first octet of the
      <authentication-type-pair> value is KERBEROS_V5, to indicate that
      Version 5 of Kerberos is being used.  The Kerberos V5
      authenticator in the KRB_AP_REQ message must contain a Kerberos V5
      checksum of the two-byte authentication type pair.  This checksum
      must be verified by the server to assure that the authentication
      type pair was correctly negotiated.  The Kerberos V5 authenticator
      must also include the optional subkey field, which shall be filled
      in with a randomly chosen key.  This key shall be used for
      encryption purposes if encryption is negotiated, and shall be
      assigned keyid 0 for the purposes of the telnet encryption option.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY <authentication-type-pair> ACCEPT IAC SE

      This command indicates that the authentication was successful.

      If the AUTH_HOW_MUTUAL bit is set in the second octet of the
      authentication-type-pair, the RESPONSE command must be sent before
      the ACCEPT command is sent.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY <authentication-type-pair> REJECT
   <optional reason for rejection> IAC SE

      This command indicates that the authentication was not successful,
      and if there is any more data in the sub-option, it is an ASCII
      text message of the reason for the rejection.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY <authentication-type-pair> RESPONSE
   <KRB_AP_REP message> IAC SE

      This command is used to perform mutual authentication.  It is only
      used when the AUTH_HOW_MUTUAL bit is set in the second octet of
      the authentication-type-pair.  After an AUTH command is verified,
      a RESPONSE command is sent which contains a Kerberos V5 KRB_AP_REP
      message to perform the mutual authentication.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION <authentication-type-pair> FORWARD <KRB_CRED
   message> IAC SE

      This command is used to forward kerberos credentials for use by
      the remote session.  The credentials are passed as a Kerberos V5
      KRB_CRED message which includes, among other things, the forwarded
      Kerberos ticket and a session key associated with the ticket. Part
      of the KRB_CRED message is encrypted in the key previously
      exchanged for the telnet session by the AUTH subobption.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION <authentication-type-pair> FORWARD_ACCEPT IAC
   SE

      This command indicates that the credential forwarding was



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      successful.

   IAC SB AUTHENTICATION <authentication-type-pair> FORWARD_REJECT
   <optional reason for rejection> IAC SE

      This command indicates that the credential forwarding was not
      successful, and if there is any more data in the sub-option, it is
      an ASCII text message of the reason for the rejection.


3.  Implementation Rules

   If the second octet of the authentication-type-pair has the AUTH_WHO
   bit set to AUTH_CLIENT_TO_SERVER, then the client sends the initial
   AUTH command, and the server responds with either ACCEPT or REJECT.
   In addition, if the AUTH_HOW bit is set to AUTH_HOW_MUTUAL, the
   server will send a RESPONSE before it sends the ACCEPT.

   If the second octet of the authentication-type-pair has the AUTH_WHO
   bit set to AUTH_SERVER_TO_CLIENT, then the server sends the initial
   AUTH command, and the client responds with either ACCEPT or REJECT.
   In addition, if the AUTH_HOW bit is set to AUTH_HOW_MUTUAL, the
   client will send a RESPONSE before it sends the ACCEPT.

   The Kerberos principal used by the server will generally be of the
   form "host/<hostname>@realm".  That is, the first component of the
   Kerberos principal is "host"; the second component is the fully
   qualified lower-case hostname of the server; and the realm is the
   Kerberos realm to which the server belongs.

   Any Telnet IAC characters that occur in the KRB_AP_REQ or KRB_AP_REP
   messages, the KRB_CRED structure, or the optional rejection text
   string must be doubled as specified in [2].  Otherwise the following
   byte might be mis-interpreted as a Telnet command.

4.  Examples

   User "joe" may wish to log in as user "pete" on machine "foo".  If
   "pete" has set things up on "foo" to allow "joe" access to his
   account, then the client would send IAC SB AUTHENTICATION NAME "pete"
   IAC SE IAC SB AUTHENTICATION IS KERBEROS_V5 AUTH <KRB_AP_REQ_MESSAGE>
   IAC SE

   The server would then authenticate the user as "joe" from the
   KRB_AP_REQ_MESSAGE, and if the KRB_AP_REQ_MESSAGE was accepted by
   Kerberos, and if "pete" has allowed "joe" to use his account, the
   server would then continue the authentication sequence by sending a
   RESPONSE (to do mutual authentication, if it was requested) followed
   by the ACCEPT.




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   If forwarding has been requested, the client then sends IAC SB
   AUTHENTICATION IS KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL FORWARD <KRB_CRED
   structure with credentials to be forwarded> IAC SE.  If the server
   succeeds in reading the forwarded credentials, the server sends
   FORWARD_ACCEPT else, a FORWARD_REJECT is sent back.

       Client                           Server
                                        IAC DO AUTHENTICATION
       IAC WILL AUTHENTICATION

       [ The server is now free to request authentication information.
         ]

                                        IAC SB AUTHENTICATION SEND
                                        KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL
                                        KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|ONE_WAY IAC
                                        SE

       [ The server has requested mutual Version 5 Kerberos
         authentication.  If mutual authentication is not supported,
         then the server is willing to do one-way authentication.

         The client will now respond with the name of the user that it
         wants to log in as, and the Kerberos ticket.  ]

       IAC SB AUTHENTICATION NAME
       "pete" IAC SE
       IAC SB AUTHENTICATION IS
       KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL AUTH
       <KRB_AP_REQ message> IAC SE

       [ Since mutual authentication is desired, the server sends across
         a RESPONSE to prove that it really is the right server.  ]

                                        IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY
                                        KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL
                                        RESPONSE <KRB_AP_REP message>
                                        IAC SE

       [ The server responds with an ACCEPT command to state that the
         authentication was successful.  ]

                                        IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY
                                        KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL ACCEPT
                                        IAC SE

       [ If so requested, the client now sends the FORWARD command to
         forward credentials to the remote site.  ]

       IAC SB AUTHENTICATION IS



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       KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL
       FORWARD <KRB_CRED message> IAC
       SE

       [ The server responds with a FORWARD_ACCEPT command to state that
         the credential forwarding was successful.  ]















































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                                        IAC SB AUTHENTICATION REPLY
                                        KERBEROS_V5 CLIENT|MUTUAL
                                        FORWARD_ACCEPT IAC SE
5. Security Considerations

   The selection of the random session key in the Kerberos V5 authenti-
   cator is critical, since this key will be used for encrypting the
   telnet data stream if encryption is enabled.  It is strongly advised
   that the random key selection be done using cryptographic techniques
   that involve the Kerberos ticket's session key.  For example, using
   the current time, encrypting it with the ticket session key, and then
   correcting for key parity is a strong way to generate a subsession
   key, since the ticket session key is assumed to be never disclosed to
   an attacker.

   Care should be taken before forwarding a user's Kerberos credentials
   to the remote server.  If the remote server is not trustworthy, this
   could result in the user's credentials being compromised.  Hence, the
   user interface should not forward credentials by default; it would be
   far safer to either require the user to explicitly request creden-
   tials forwarding for each connection, or to have a trusted list of
   hosts for which credentials forwarding is enabled, but to not enable
   credentials forwarding by default for all machines.
6. Acknowledgements

   This document was originally written by Dave Borman of Cray Research,
   Inc.  Theodore Ts'o of MIT revised it to reflect the latest implemen-
   tation experience.  Cliff Neuman and Prasad Upasani of USC's Informa-
   tion Sciences Institute developed the credential forwarding support.

   In addition, the contributions of the Telnet Working Group are also
   gratefully acknowledged.

7. References

   [1] Kohl, J. and B. Neuman, "The Kerberos Network Authentication Sys-
       tem (V5)", RFC 1510, USC/Information Sciences Institute, Sep-
       tember 1993.

   [2] Postel, J.B. and J. Reynolds, "Telnet Option Specifications", RFC
       855, STD 8, USC/Information Sciences Institute, May 1983.


Editor's Address

   Theodore Ts'o
   Massachusetts Institute of Technology
   MIT Room E40-343
   77 Massachusetts Avenue
   Cambridge, MA 02139



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   Phone: (617) 253-8091
   EMail: tytso@mit.edu



















































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