
Kerberos Working Group                                     Matt Crawford
Internet Draft                                                  Fermilab
                                                       10 September 2003

              Passwordless Initial Authentication to Kerberos
                       by Hardware Preauthentication
                     <draft-ietf-krb-wg-hw-auth-03.txt>



Status of this Memo

    This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
    all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.  Internet-Drafts are
    working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its
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Abstract

    This document specifies an extension to the Kerberos protocol for
    performing initial authentication of a user without using that
    user's long-lived password.  Any "hardware preauthentication" method
    may be employed instead of the password, and the key of another
    principal must be nominated to encrypt the returned credential.

    The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
    "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
    document are to be interpreted as described in [KWORD].


1.  Motivation

    Many sites using Kerberos for authentication have users who are
    often, or even always, away from the site.  Sometimes these users



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    may need to connect to their site while they have no immediate
    access to a computer with Kerberos software or any other trusted
    secure remote-access mechanism.  Requiring hardware
    preauthentication in addition to a password for all such users is an
    incomplete solution because an eavesdropper with access to both the
    remote users' path to the host in the site and that host's path to
    the KDC can still steal the user's credential.

    This document specifies a method by which a Kerberos application
    server can request that a KDC authenticate a user using a hardware
    preauthentication method and use a key held by the server in the
    decryption of the KDC's reply, in place of the user's password.


2.  Definitions

    The following terms used here are defined in [KRB5] and [KRB5bis]:

        KDC_ERR_PREAUTH_FAILED, KDC_ERR_PREAUTH_REQUIRED, KRB_AS_REQ,
        KRB_ERROR, PrincipalName, e-data, enc-part, error-code, kdc-
        options, padata-type, padata-value.

    These terms are defined in [KRB5bis]:

        PA-SAM-CHALLENGE, PA-SAM-RESPONSE.

    The term "service" denotes some Kerberos service which normally
    requires a client/server authentication exchange [KRB5] for access
    and which is capable of both communicating with the KDC's
    Authentication Service and interacting with the user to the extent
    required to carry out a single-use authentication mechanism (SAM).
    It must have access to some principal's long-lived key.  Telnet and
    FTP services are examples.

    The Kerberos Authentication Service will be denoted by "AS" to avoid
    confusion with the service.


3.  Method

    This mechanism is intended to be employed when a user connects to a
    service which normally allows only Kerberos-authenticated access.
    When the service determines that the user will not authenticate (for
    example, it receives a telnet "WONT AUTHENTICATION" command
    [TELAUTH], or an FTP "USER" command without a preceding "AUTH"
    command [FTPSEC]), it may accept a user principal name and attempt
    to perform passwordless hardware authentication in the following
    manner.



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3.1.  Initial AS Request and reply

    The service, on behalf of the user, prepares a KRB_AS_REQ [KRB5]
    message with the flag OPT-HARDWARE-AUTH set in the kdc-options
    field, in addition to any other desired options and lifetimes.  The
    service sends this message to a KDC.  If the KDC's policy permits
    this form of authentication for the user named in the request, and
    the request is acceptable in all other respects, the KDC determines
    what hardware preauthentication methods are available for the user
    principal and constructs a KRB_ERROR message with the error-code set
    to KDC_ERR_PREAUTH_REQUIRED.  The e-data field of this KRB_ERROR
    message contains a sequence of PA-DATA which includes an element
    with padata-type equal to PA-ALT-PRINC and an empty padata-value.
    In addition to that are any elements needed for hardware
    preauthentication of the user.  Typically this will consist of an
    element with padata-type PA-SAM-CHALLENGE and padata-value
    appropriate to the authentication method.


3.2.  Second AS Request

    The service, upon receiving the KRB_ERROR message from the KDC, must
    process the PA-ALT-PRINC element by selecting a principal whose
    long-lived key it has access to, and which is in the same realm as
    the client.  This principal will be referred to as the alternate
    principal.  It processes the PA-SAM-CHALLENGE normally, except that
    whenever the user's long-lived (password-derived) encryption key is
    called for, it uses the alternate principal's key instead.

    The service constructs a second KRB_AS_REQ, again with the OPT-
    HARDWARE-AUTH flag set in the kdc-options field, and this time with
    a padata field which includes at least these two PA-DATA items, in
    this order:

        One with padata-type equal to PA-ALT-PRINC and as padata-value
        the encoded PrincipalName of the alternate principal,

        One with padata-type equal to PA-SAM-RESPONSE and padata-value
        constructed as it would be for normal hardware
        preauthentication, but with the alternate principal's key used
        in place of the user's key.

    Other PA-DATA may be present before, between or after these items.

    The service sends this second KRB_AS_REQ to a KDC.






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3.3.  Final AS Reply

    The KDC begins processing the AS request normally.  When the PA-ALT-
    PRINC field is encountered, the KDC does the following:

        First, if this use of the alternate principal named in the
        request is against local policy, or if the alternate principal
        does not exist in the database, a KRB_ERROR message with error-
        code KDC_ERR_PREAUTH_FAILED is returned and processing ends.

        Then, the alternate principal's key is fetched from the database
        and held for use in subsequent processing.  It will be needed to
        process the PA-SAM-RESPONSE and to encrypt the enc-part of the
        KRB_AS_REP if authentication is successful.

    The remainder of the AS request processing is normal, with the noted
    substitution of the alternate principal's key for the user's.

    The service, upon receiving a KRB_AS_REP, uses the alternate
    principal's key to decrypt the enc-part, saves the user's credential
    and takes appropriate measures to ensure that the KRB_AS_REP came
    from a legitimate KDC and not an imposter.


4.  IANA Considerations

    As of this writing, management of Kerberos protocol parameters has
    not been delegated to IANA.  No new naming or numbering spaces are
    created by this specification.  Two new values from existing spaces
    are defined:

        The flag OPT-HARDWARE-AUTH is a previously unused bit in the
        kdc-options field of a KDC-REQ-BODY [KRB5].  The assignment of
        bit 11 is expected [BCN].

        The preauthentication type PA-ALT-PRINC is denoted by padata-
        type 24 [KRB5bis].


5.  Security Considerations

    There are no means provided here for protecting the traffic between
    the user and the service, so it may be susceptible to eavesdropping,
    hijacking and alteration.  This authentication mechanism is not
    intended to be used as an alternative to the Kerberos client/server
    authentication exchange, but as an improvement over making an
    unprotected connection with a Kerberos password alone, or a password
    plus a single-use authenticator.



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    The alternate principal's key MUST be involved in construction of
    the PA-SAM-RESPONSE padata-value, to prevent an adversary
    constructing a KRB_AS_REQ using that data but a different alternate
    principal.  In practice, this means that the response data alone
    must not determine the encryption key for the padata-value.

    A service impersonator can obtain a presumably-valid SAM response
    from the user which may (or may not) be usable for impersonating the
    user at a later time.  And of course in the case of successful
    authentication the service obtains access to the user's credentials.
    As always, if the service host is compromised, so are the
    credentials; but at least the service host never has access to the
    user's password.

    A service host which accepts a Kerberos password for access
    typically protects itself against an impostor KDC by using the
    received ticket-granting credential to get a ticket for a service
    for which it has the key.  This step may be unnecessary when the
    service host has already successfully used such a key to decrypt the
    ticket-granting credential itself.

    Use of this authentication method employs the service's long-term
    key, providing more ciphertext in that key to an eavesdropper.  This
    key is generally of better quality than a password-derived key and
    any remaining concerns about the strength of the KRB_AS_REP are
    better addressed by a general mechanism applicable to all AS
    exchanges.


6.  Acknowledgments

    The first implementation of this extension grew from a beginning by
    Ken Hornstein, which in turn was built on code released by the MIT
    Kerberos Team.


7.  References

    [BCN]     Newman, C., private communication.

    [FTPSEC]  Horowitz, M. and S. Lunt, "FTP Security Extensions", RFC
              2228.

    [KRB5]    Kohl, J., and C. Neuman, "The Kerberos Network
              Authentication Service (V5)", RFC 1510.

    [KRB5bis] Neuman, C., T. Yu, S. Hartman, and K. Raeburn, "The
              Kerberos Network Authentication Service (V5)", Work in



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              progress.  (Currently draft-ietf-krb-wg-kerberos-
              clarifications-04.txt.)

    [KWORD] S. Bradner, "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
        Requirement Levels," RFC 2119, March 1997.

    [TELAUTH] Ts'o, T. and J. Altman, "Telnet Authentication Option",
              RFC 2941.

8.  Author's Address

    Matt Crawford
    Fermilab MS 369
    PO Box 500
    Batavia, IL 60510
    USA

    Phone: +1 630 840-3461
    EMail: crawdad@fnal.gov
































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