]> Google LLC

bbe@google.com

Google LLC

davidben@google.com

Google LLC

asymmetric@google.com

Security Transport Layer Security This document defines the TLS Trust Anchors extension, a mechanism for relying parties and subscribers to convey trusted certification authorities. It describes individual certification authorities more succinctly than the TLS Certificate Authorities extension. Additionally, to support TLS clients with many trusted certification authorities, it supports a mode where servers describe their available certification paths and the client selects from them. Servers may describe this during connection setup, or in DNS for lower latency. About This Document The latest revision of this draft can be found at . Status information for this document may be found at . Discussion of this document takes place on the Transport Layer Security Working Group mailing list (), which is archived at . Subscribe at . Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at .

Introduction TLS endpoints typically authenticate using X.509 certificates . These are assertions by a certification authority (CA) that associate a TLS key with DNS names or other identifiers. If the peer trusts the CA, it will accept this association. The authenticating party (usually the server) is known as the subscriber and the peer (usually the client) is the relying party. defines the certificate_authorities extension, which allows the subscriber, who may have multiple certificates available, to select the correct certificate for the relying party. However, this extension’s size is impractical for some applications. Without such a negotiation mechanism, the subscriber must somehow obtain certificates which simultaneously satisfy all relying parties. This is a challenge for subscribers when relying parties are diverse. This translates to analogous challenges for CAs and relying parties:

• For a new CA to be usable by subscribers, all relying parties must trust it. This is particularly challenging for older, un-updatable relying parties. Existing CAs face similar challenges when rotating or deploying new keys.
• When a relying party must update its policies to meet new security requirements, it must choose between compromising on user security or imposing a significant burden on subscribers that still support older relying parties.

The certificate_authorities extension’s size becomes impractical due to two factors. First, X.509 names are large. Second, many clients, notably web browsers, trust a large number of CAs. As of August 2023, the Mozilla CA Certificate Program contained 144 CAs, with an average name length of around 100 bytes. This document introduces Trust Anchor Identifiers, which aims to address both of these challenges. There are four parts to this mechanism:

1. defines trust anchor identifiers, which are short, unique identifiers for X.509 trust anchors.
2. defines a TLS extension that communicates the relying party’s requested trust anchors, and the subscriber’s available ones. When the relying party is a TLS client, it can mitigate large lists by sending a, possibly empty, subset of its trust anchors to the TLS server. The server provides its list of available trust anchors in response so that the client can retry on mismatch.
3. allows TLS servers to advertise their available trust anchors in HTTPS or SVCB DNS records. TLS clients can then request an accurate initial subset and avoid a retry penalty.
4. defines an ACME extension for provisioning multiple certification paths, each with an associated trust anchor identifier.

Together, they extend the certificate_authorities mechanism to a broader set of applications, enabling a more flexible and robust PKI.

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 when, and only when, they appear in all capitaIs, as shown here. This document additionally uses the TLS presentation language, defined in , and ASN.1, defined in .

Terminology and Roles This document discusses three roles:

Subscriber:

The party whose identity is being validated in the protocol. In TLS, this is the side sending the Certificate and CertificateVerify message.

Relying party:

The party authenticating the subscriber. In TLS, this is the side that validates a Certificate and CertificateVerify message.

Certification authority (CA):

The service issuing certificates to the subscriber.

Additionally, there are several terms used throughout this document to describe this proposal:

Trust anchor:

A pre-distributed public key or certificate that relying parties use to determine whether a certification path is trusted.

Certification path:

An ordered list of X.509 certificates starting with the target certificate. Each certificate is issued by the next certificate, except the last, which is issued by a trust anchor.

Trust Anchor Identifiers This section defines trust anchor identifiers, which are short, unique identifiers for a trust anchor. To simplify allocation, these identifiers are defined with object identifiers (OIDs) and IANA-registered Private Enterprise Numbers (PENs) : A trust anchor identifier is an OID under the OID arc of some PEN. For example, an organization with PEN 32473 might define a trust anchor identifier with the OID 1.3.6.1.4.1.32473.1. Trust anchor identifiers have ASCII text representations, for use in text-based formats, and binary representations, for use in a binary protocol such as TLS. For compactness, both representations use relative object identifiers (see Section 33 of ), relative to the OID prefix 1.3.6.1.4.1. The text representation is the relative object identifier in dotted decimal notation. The above example’s text representation would be 32473.1. The binary representation consists of the contents octets of the relative object identifier's DER encoding, as described in Section 8.20 of . For example, the binary representation of 32473.1 would be the four-octet sequence {0x81, 0xfd, 0x59, 0x01}.

Relying Party Configuration Relying parties are configured with one or more supported trust anchors. Each trust anchor which participates in this protocol must have an associated trust anchor identifier. When trust anchors are self-signed X.509 certificates, the X.509 trust anchor identifier extension MAY be used to carry this identifier. The trust anchor identifier extension has an extnID of id-trustAnchorIdentifier and an extnValue containing a DER-encoded TrustAnchorIdentifier structure, defined below. The TrustAnchorIdentifier is a relative object identifier, determined as in . This extension MUST be non-critical. Relying parties MAY instead or additionally configure trust anchor identifiers via some application-specific out-of-band information. Relying parties MAY support trust anchors without associated trust anchor identifiers, but such trust anchors will not participate in this protocol. Those trust anchors MAY participate in other trust anchor negotiation protocols, such as the certificate_authorities extension.

Subscriber Configuration Subscribers are configured with one or more candidate certification paths to present in TLS, in some preference order. This preference order is used when multiple candidate paths are usable for a connection. For example, the subscriber may prefer candidates that minimize message size or have more performant private keys. Each candidate path which participates in this protocol must be provisioned with the trust anchor identifier for its corresponding trust anchor. To carry this information, this document defines the trust_anchor_identifier property for a CertificatePropertyList . This data field of the property contains the binary representation of the trust anchor identifier of the certification path’s trust anchor, as described in . Subscribers MAY have candidate certification paths without associated trust anchor identifiers, but such paths will not participate in this protocol. Those paths MAY participate in other trust anchor negotiation protocols, such as the certificate_authorities extension. [[TODO: Move the definition of CertificatePropertyList from the trust expressions draft to here, if this ends up being the canonical one. When doing so, also import media type definition.]]

TLS Extension This section defines the trust_anchors extension, which is sent in the ClientHello, EncryptedExtensions, CertificateRequest, and Certificate messages in TLS 1.3 or later.

Overview The trust_anchors extension is sent in ClientHello, CertificateRequest, or Certificate messages, defined using the structures below: ; TrustAnchorIdentifier TrustAnchorIdentifierList<0..2^16-1>; ]]> When the extension is sent in the ClientHello or CertificateRequest messages, the extension_data is a TrustAnchorIdentifierList and indicates that the sender supports the specified trust anchors. The list is unordered, and MAY be empty. When the extension is sent in EncryptedExtensions, the extension_data is a TrustAnchorIdentifierList containing the list of trust anchors that server has available, in the server’s preference order, and MUST NOT be empty. When the extension is sent in Certificate, the extension_data MUST be empty and indicates that the sender sent the certificate because the certificate matched a trust anchor identifier sent by the peer. When used in this form, the extension may only be sent in the first CertificateEntry. It MUST NOT be sent in subsequent ones.

Certificate Selection A trust_anchors extension in the ClientHello or CertificateRequest is processed similarly to the certificate_authorities extension. The relying party indicates some set of supported trust anchors in the ClientHello or CertificateRequest trust_anchors extension. The subscriber then selects a certificate from its candidate certification paths (see ), as described in and . This process is extended as follows: If the ClientHello or CertificateRequest contains a trust_anchors extension, the subscriber SHOULD send a certification path whose trust anchor identifier appears in the relying party’s trust_anchors extension. If the ClientHello or CertificateRequest contains both trust_anchors and certificate_authorities, certification paths that satisfy either extension’s criteria may be used. This additionally applies to future extensions which play a similar role. If no certification paths satisfy either extension, the subscriber MAY return a handshake_failure alert, or choose among fallback certification paths without considering trust_anchors or certification_authorities. See for additional guidance on selecting a fallback when the ClientHello contains trust_anchors. Sending a fallback allows the subscriber to retain support for relying parties that do not implement any form of trust anchor negotiation. In this case, the subscriber must find a sufficiently ubiquitous trust anchor, if one exists. However, only those relying parties need to be considered in this ubiquity determination. Updated relying parties may continue to evolve without restricting fallback certificate selection. If the subscriber sends a certification path that matches the relying party’strust_anchors extension, as described in , the subscriber MUST send an empty trust_anchors extension in the first CertificateEntry of the Certificate message. In this case, the certificate_list flexibility described in no longer applies. The certificate_list MUST contain a complete certification path, issued by the matching trust anchor, correctly ordered and with no extraneous certificates. That is, each certificate MUST certify the one immediately preceding it, and the trust anchor MUST certify the final certificate. The subscriber MUST NOT send the trust_anchors extension in the Certificate message in other situations. If a relying party receives this extension in the Certificate message, it MAY choose to disable path building and validate the peer's certificate list as pre-built certification path. Doing so avoids the unpredictable behavior of path-building, and helps ensure CAs and subscribers do not inadvertently provision incorrect paths.

Retry Mechanism When the relying party is a client, it may choose not to send its full trust anchor identifier list due to fingerprinting risks (see ), or because the list is too large. The client MAY send a subset of supported trust anchors, or an empty list. This subset may be determined by, possibly outdated, prior knowledge about the server, such as or past connections. To accommodate this, when receiving a ClientHello with trust_anchors, the server collects all candidate certification paths which:

• Have a trust anchor identifier, and
• Satisfy the conditions in , with the exception of certification_authorities, and any future extensions that play a similar role

If this collection is non-empty, the server sends a trust_anchors extension in EncryptedExtensions, containing the corresponding trust anchor identifiers in preference order. When a client sends a subset or empty list in trust anchors, it SHOULD implement the following retry mechanism: If the client receives either a connection error or an untrusted certificate, the client looks in server’s EncryptedExtensions for a trust anchor identifier that it trusts. If there are multiple, it selects an option based on the server’s preference order and its local preferences. It then makes a new connection to the same endpoint, sending only the selected trust anchor identifier in the ClientHello trust_anchors extension. If the EncryptedExtensions had no trust_anchor extension, or no match was found, the client returns the error to the application. Clients SHOULD retry at most once per connection attempt. [[TODO: Retrying in a new connection is expensive and cannot be done from within the TLS stack in most implementations. Consider handshake modifications to instead retry within the same connection.]] This mechanism allows the connection to recover from a certificate selection failure, e.g. due to the client not revealing its full preference list, at additional latency cost. describes an optimization which can avoid this cost. This mechanism also allows servers to safely send fallback certificates that may not be as ubiquitously acceptable. Without some form of trust anchor negotiation, servers are limited to selecting certification paths that are ubiquitously trusted in all supported clients. This often means sending extra cross-certificates to target the lowest common denominator at a bandwidth cost. If the ClientHello contains trust_anchors, the server MAY opportunistically send a less ubiquitous, more bandwidth-efficient path based on local heuristics, with the expectation that the client will retry when the heuristics fail.

DNS Service Parameter This section defines the tls-trust-anchors SvcParamKey . TLS servers can use this to advertise their available trust anchors in DNS, and aid the client in formulating its trust_anchors extension (see ). This allows TLS deployments to support clients with many trust anchors without incurring the overhead of a reconnect.

Syntax The tls-trust-anchors parameter contains an ordered list of one or more trust anchor identifiers, in server preference order. The presentation value of the SvcParamValue is a non-empty comma-separated list (). Each element of the list is a trust anchor identifier in the text representation defined in . Any other value is a syntax error. To enable simpler parsing, this SvcParam MUST NOT contain escape sequences. The wire format of the SvcParamValue is determined by prefixing each trust anchor identifier with its length as a single octet, then concatenating each of these length-value pairs to form the SvcParamValue. These pairs MUST exactly fill the SvcParamValue; otherwise, the SvcParamValue is malformed. For example, if a TLS server has three available certification paths issued by 32473.1, 32473.2.1, and 32473.2.2, respectively, the DNS record in presentation syntax may be: The wire format of the SvcParamValue would be the 17 octets below. In the example, the octets comprising each trust anchor identifier are placed on separate lines for clarity ## Configuring Services Services SHOULD include the trust anchor identifier for each of their available certification paths, in preference order, in the tls-trust-anchors of their HTTPS or SVCB endpoints. As TLS configuration is updated, services SHOULD update the DNS record to match. The mechanism for this is out of scope for this document, but services are RECOMMENDED to automate this process. Services MAY have certification paths without trust anchor identifiers, but those paths will not participate in this mechanism.

Client Behavior When connecting to a service endpoint whose HTTPS or SVCB record contains the tls-trust-anchors parameter, the client first computes the intersection between its configured trust anchors and the server’s provided list. If this intersection is non-empty, the client MAY use it to determine the trust_anchors extension in the ClientHello (see ). If doing so, the client MAY send a subset of this intersection to meet size constraints, but SHOULD offer multiple options. This reduces the chance of a reconnection if, for example, the first option in the intersection uses a signature algorithm that the client doesn’t support, or if the TLS server and DNS configuration are out of sync. Although this service parameter is intended to reduce trust anchor mismatches, mismatches may still occur in some scenarios. Clients and servers MUST continue to implement the provisions described in , even when using this service parameter.

ACME Extension We reuse the ACME extension defined in , except that each CertificatePropertyList will contain a trust_anchor_identifier property. [[TODO: Move this over from the trust expressions draft, if this ends up being the canonical one.]]

Use Cases See . [[TODO: Move the text here if this document ends up being the canonical one.]]

Privacy Considerations

Relying Parties The negotiation mechanism described in this document is analogous to the certificate_authorities extension (), but more size-efficient. Like that extension, it presumes the requested trust anchor list is not sensitive. The privacy implications of this are determined by how a relying party uses this extension. Trust anchors supported by a relying party may be divided into three categories:

1. Trust anchors whose identifiers the relying party sends unconditionally, i.e. not in response to the server’s HTTPS/SVCB record, trust anchor list in EncryptedExtensions, etc.
2. Trust anchors whose identifiers the relying party sends if the server offers them. For example, the relying party may indicate support for a trust anchor if its identifier is listed in the server’s HTTPS/SVCB record or trust anchor list in EncryptedExtensions.
3. Trust anchors that the relying party accepts but will never send a corresponding trust anchor identifier in trust_anchors. These are trust anchors which do not participate in this mechanism.

Each of these categories carries a different fingerprinting exposure: Trust anchor identifiers sent unconditionally can be observed passively. Thus, relying parties SHOULD NOT unconditionally advertise trust anchor lists which are unique to an individual user. Rather, such lists SHOULD be either empty or computed only from the trust anchors common to the relying party's anonymity set (). Trust anchor identifiers sent in response to the subscriber can only be observed actively. That is, the subscriber could vary its list and observe how the client responds, in order to probe for the client’s trust anchor list. This is similar to the baseline exposure for trust anchors that do not participate in negotiation. A subscriber in possession of a certificate can send it and determine if the relying party accepts or rejects it. Unlike this baseline exposure, trust anchors that participate in this protocol can be probed by only knowing the trust anchor identifier. Relying parties SHOULD determine which trust anchors participate in this mechanism, and whether to advertise them unconditionally or conditionally, based on their privacy goals. PKIs that reliably use the DNS service parameter () can rely on conditional advertisement for stronger privacy properties without a round-trip penalty. Additionally, a relying party that computes the trust_anchors extension based on prior state may allow observers to correlate across connections. Relying parties SHOULD NOT maintain such state across connections that are intended to be uncorrelated. As above, implementing the DNS service parameter can avoid a round-trip penalty without such state.

Subscribers If the subscriber is a server, the mechanisms in and enumerate the trust anchors for the server’s available certification paths. This mechanism assumes they are not sensitive. Servers SHOULD NOT use this mechanism to negotiate sensitive trust anchors. This does not apply if the subscriber is a client.

Security Considerations

Relying Party Policies and Agility The negotiation mechanism described in this document facilitates which certification path is served to relying parties, but has no impact on the relying party's trust preferences themselves. As a result, this enables a more flexible and agile PKI, which can better mitigate security risks to users. discusses some scenarios which benefit from the multi-certificate deployment this document enables. In general, robust trust anchor negotiation helps subscribers navigate differences in relying party requirements. This means security improvements for one set of relying parties can be deployed without needing to risk incompatibility or breakage for others. For example, agility reduces pressures on relying parties to sacrifice user security for compatibility. Suppose a subscriber currently uses some CA, but a relying party deems trusting that CA to pose an unacceptable security risk to its users. In a single-certificate deployment, those subscribers may be unwilling to adopt a CA trusted by the relying party, as switching CAs risks compatibility problems elsewhere. The relying party then faces compatibility pressure and adds this CA, sacrificing user security. However, in a multi-certificate deployment, the subscriber can use its existing CA in addition to another CA trusted by relying party B. This allows the ecosystem to improve interoperability, while still meeting relying party B's user-security goals.

Incorrect Selection Metadata If the subscriber has incorrect information about trust anchor identifiers, it may send an untrusted certification path. This will not result in that path being trusted, but does present the possibility of a degradation of service. However, this information is provisioned by the CA, which is already expected to provide accurate information.

Serving Multiple Certificates In a multi-certificate deployment, subscribers have a collection of certificates available to satisfy relying parties with potentially different security policies. It is possible that some of these policies will only be satisfied by certificates from CAs that have been distrusted by other relying parties, such as if the relying party is out of date but still important for the subscriber to support. If a certificate asserts the correct information about the subscriber (TLS key, DNS names, etc.), the subscriber can safely present it, even if the CA is otherwise untrustworthy. In particular, doing so does not allow the CA to decrypt or intercept the connection. However, the subscriber presenting a certificate is not an endorsement of the CA. The subscriber's role is to present a certificate which will convince the relying party of the correct subscriber information. Subscribers do not vet CAs for trustworthiness, only the correctness of their specific, configured certificates and the CA's ability to meet the subscriber's requirements, such as availability, compatibility, and performance. It is the responsibility of the relying party, and its corresponding root program, to determine the set of trusted CAs. Trusting a CA means trusting all certificates issued by that CA, so it is not enough to observe subscribers serving correct certificates. An untrustworthy CA may sign one correct certificate, but also sign incorrect certificates, possibly in the future, that can attack the relying party. Root program management is a complex, security-critical process, the full considerations of which are outside the scope of this document.

IANA Considerations

TLS ExtensionType Updates IANA is requested to create the following entry in the TLS ExtensionType Values registry, defined by :

Value	Extension Name	TLS 1.3	DTLS-Only	Recommended	Reference
TBD	trust_anchors	CH, EE, CR, CT	N	Y	[this-RFC]

CertificatePropertyType Registry [[TODO: Establish / add to the CertificatePropertyType registry]]

References Normative References ITU-T ITU-T This document specifies version 1.3 of the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol. TLS allows client/server applications to communicate over the Internet in a way that is designed to prevent eavesdropping, tampering, and message forgery. This document updates RFCs 5705 and 6066, and obsoletes RFCs 5077, 5246, and 6961. This document also specifies new requirements for TLS 1.2 implementations. This memo profiles the X.509 v3 certificate and X.509 v2 certificate revocation list (CRL) for use in the Internet. An overview of this approach and model is provided as an introduction. The X.509 v3 certificate format is described in detail, with additional information regarding the format and semantics of Internet name forms. Standard certificate extensions are described and two Internet-specific extensions are defined. A set of required certificate extensions is specified. The X.509 v2 CRL format is described in detail along with standard and Internet-specific extensions. An algorithm for X.509 certification path validation is described. An ASN.1 module and examples are provided in the appendices. [STANDARDS-TRACK] This document specifies the "SVCB" ("Service Binding") and "HTTPS" DNS resource record (RR) types to facilitate the lookup of information needed to make connections to network services, such as for HTTP origins. SVCB records allow a service to be provided from multiple alternative endpoints, each with associated parameters (such as transport protocol configuration), and are extensible to support future uses (such as keys for encrypting the TLS ClientHello). They also enable aliasing of apex domains, which is not possible with CNAME. The HTTPS RR is a variation of SVCB for use with HTTP (see RFC 9110, "HTTP Semantics"). By providing more information to the client before it attempts to establish a connection, these records offer potential benefits to both performance and privacy. Public Key Infrastructure using X.509 (PKIX) certificates are used for a number of purposes, the most significant of which is the authentication of domain names. Thus, certification authorities (CAs) in the Web PKI are trusted to verify that an applicant for a certificate legitimately represents the domain name(s) in the certificate. As of this writing, this verification is done through a collection of ad hoc mechanisms. This document describes a protocol that a CA and an applicant can use to automate the process of verification and certificate issuance. The protocol also provides facilities for other certificate management functions, such as certificate revocation. In many standards track documents several words are used to signify the requirements in the specification. These words are often capitalized. This document defines these words as they should be interpreted in IETF documents. This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. RFC 2119 specifies common key words that may be used in protocol specifications. This document aims to reduce the ambiguity by clarifying that only UPPERCASE usage of the key words have the defined special meanings. This document describes how Private Enterprise Numbers (PENs) are registered by IANA. It shows how to request a new PEN and how to modify a current PEN. It also gives a brief overview of PEN uses. Google LLC Google LLC Google LLC This document defines TLS trust expressions, a mechanism for relying parties to succinctly convey trusted certification authorities to subscribers by referencing named and versioned trust stores. It also defines supporting mechanisms for subscribers to evaluate these trust expressions, and select one of several available certification paths to present. This enables a multi-certificate deployment model, for a more agile and flexible PKI that can better meet security requirements. This document provides guidance and recommendations to developers building X.509 public-key certification paths within their applications. By following the guidance and recommendations defined in this document, an application developer is more likely to develop a robust X.509 certificate-enabled application that can build valid certification paths across a wide range of PKI environments. This memo provides information for the Internet community. This document offers guidance for developing privacy considerations for inclusion in protocol specifications. It aims to make designers, implementers, and users of Internet protocols aware of privacy-related design choices. It suggests that whether any individual RFC warrants a specific privacy considerations section will depend on the document's content. Informative References Mozilla Trinity College Dublin Akamai Technologies Meta Platforms, Inc. We define a well-known URI at which an HTTP origin can inform an authoritative DNS server, or other interested parties, about this origin's Service Bindings, i.e. its "HTTPS" DNS records. These instructions can include Encrypted ClientHello (ECH) configurations, allowing the origin, in collaboration with DNS infrastructure elements, to publish and rotate its own ECH keys.

Comparison to TLS Trust Expressions describes Trust Expressions, another trust anchor negotiation mechanism that aims to solve similar problems. The mechanisms differ in the following ways:

• trust_anchors is usable by more kinds of PKIs. Trust Expressions express trust anchor lists relative to named “trust stores”, maintained by root programs. Arbitrary lists may not be easily expressible. trust_anchors does not have this restriction.
• When used with large trust stores, the retry mechanism in trust_anchors requires a new connection. In most applications, this must be implemented outside the TLS stack, so more components must be changed and redeployed. In deployments that are limited by client changes, this may be a more difficult transition. [[TODO: See for an alternate retry scheme that avoids this.]]
• Trust Expressions works with static server configuration. An ideal trust_anchors deployment requires automation to synchronize a server’s DNS and TLS configuration. could be a starting point for this automation. In deployments that are limited by server changes, this may be a more difficult transition.
• Trust Expressions require that CAs continually fetch information from manifests that are published by root programs, while trust_anchors relies only on static pre-assigned trust anchor identifiers.
• trust_anchors, when trust anchors are conditionally sent, has different fingerprinting properties. See .
• trust_anchors can only express large client trust stores (for server certificates), not large server trust stores. Large trust stores rely on the retry mechanism described in , which is not available to client certificates.

The two mechanisms can be deployed together. A subscriber can have metadata for both mechanisms available, and a relying party can advertise both. [[TODO: remove this or move to supporting documentation if this becomes the canonical thing]]

Acknowledgements The authors thank Nick Harper, and Emily Stark for many valuable discussions and insights which led to this document.