The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Multiple Certificate Status Request Extension
RFC 6961
Document | Type |
RFC - Proposed Standard
(June 2013; Errata)
Obsoleted by RFC 8446
|
|
---|---|---|---|
Author | Yngve Pettersen | ||
Last updated | 2016-12-13 | ||
Stream | IETF | ||
Formats | plain text html pdf htmlized bibtex | ||
Reviews | |||
Stream | WG state | WG Document | |
Document shepherd | No shepherd assigned | ||
IESG | IESG state | RFC 6961 (Proposed Standard) | |
Consensus Boilerplate | Unknown | ||
Telechat date | |||
Responsible AD | Sean Turner | ||
IESG note | Document Shepherd - Joe Salowey (jsalowey@cisco.com) | ||
Send notices to | (None) | ||
IANA | IANA review state | IANA - Review Needed | |
IANA action state | RFC-Ed-Ack |
Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) Y. Pettersen Request for Comments: 6961 June 2013 Category: Standards Track ISSN: 2070-1721 The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Multiple Certificate Status Request Extension Abstract This document defines the Transport Layer Security (TLS) Certificate Status Version 2 Extension to allow clients to specify and support several certificate status methods. (The use of the Certificate Status extension is commonly referred to as "OCSP stapling".) Also defined is a new method based on the Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) that servers can use to provide status information about not only the server's own certificate but also the status of intermediate certificates in the chain. Status of This Memo This is an Internet Standards Track document. This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has received public review and has been approved for publication by the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Further information on Internet Standards is available in Section 2 of RFC 5741. Information about the current status of this document, any errata, and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6961. Pettersen Standards Track [Page 1] RFC 6961 Multiple Certificate Status Extension June 2013 Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2013 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 (http://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. This document may contain material from IETF Documents or IETF Contributions published or made publicly available before November 10, 2008. The person(s) controlling the copyright in some of this material may not have granted the IETF Trust the right to allow modifications of such material outside the IETF Standards Process. Without obtaining an adequate license from the person(s) controlling the copyright in such materials, this document may not be modified outside the IETF Standards Process, and derivative works of it may not be created outside the IETF Standards Process, except to format it for publication as an RFC or to translate it into languages other than English. 1. Introduction The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Extension [RFC6066] framework defines, among other extensions, the Certificate Status extension (also referred to as "OCSP stapling") that clients can use to request the server's copy of the current status of its certificate. The benefits of this extension include a reduced number of roundtrips and network delays for the client to verify the status of the server's certificate and a reduced load on the certificate issuer's status response servers, thus solving a problem that can become significant when the issued certificate is presented by a frequently visited server. There are two problems with the existing Certificate Status extension. First, it does not provide functionality to request the status information about intermediate Certification Authority (CA) certificates, which means the client has to request status information through other methods, such as Certificate Revocation Lists (CRLs), introducing further delays. Second, the current format of the extension and requirements in the TLS protocol prevent a client from offering the server multiple status methods. Pettersen Standards Track [Page 2] RFC 6961 Multiple Certificate Status Extension June 2013 Many CAs are now issuing intermediate CA certificates that not only specify the publication point for their CRLs in a CRL Distribution Point [RFC5280] but also specify a URL for their OCSP [RFC6960] server in Authority Information Access [RFC5280]. Given that client-cached CRLs are frequently out of date, clients would benefit from using OCSP to access up-to-date status information about intermediate CA certificates. The benefit to the issuing CA is less clear, as providing the bandwidth for the OCSP responder can be costly, especially for CAs with many high-traffic subscriber sites, and this cost is a concern for many CAs. There are cases where OCSPShow full document text