]> DataTrails

robinbryce@gmail.com

Security COSE Internet-Draft This specification describes the COSE encoding of proofs for post-order traversal binary Merkle trees, also known as history trees and Merkle mountain ranges. Proving and verifying are defined in terms of the cryptographic asynchronous accumulator described by ReyzinYakoubov. The technical advantages of post-order traversal binary Merkle trees are discussed in CrosbyWallachStorage and PostOrderTlog.

Introduction A post ordered binary merkle tree is, logically, the unique series of perfect binary merkle trees required to commit its leaves. Example, This illustrates MMR(8), which is comprised of two perfect trees rooted at 6 and 7. 7 is the root of a tree comprised of a single element. The peaks of the perfect trees form the accumulator. The storage of a tree maintained in this way is addressed as a linear array, and additions to the tree are always appends.

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 capitals, as shown here.

• A complete MMR(n) defines an mmr with n nodes where no equal height sibling trees exist.
• i shall be the index of any node, including leaf nodes, in the MMR
• g shall be the zero based height of a node in the tree.
• H(x) shall be the SHA-256 digest of any value x
• || shall mean concatenation of raw byte representations of the referenced values.

In this specification, all numbers are unsigned 64 bit integers. The maximum height of a single tree is 64 (which will have g=63 for its peak).

Verifiable Data Structure The integer identifier for this Verifiable Data Structure is 2.

Inclusion Proof The CBOR representation of an inclusion proof is Note that the inclusion path for the index leads to a single permanent node in the tree. This node will initially be a peak in the accumulator, as the tree grows it will eventually be "buried" by a new peak.

inclusion_proof_path inclusion_proof_path(i, c) is used to produce the verification paths for inclusion proofs and consistency proofs. Given:

• c the index of the last node in any tree which contains i.
• i the index of the mmr node whose verification path is required.

And the methods:

• index_height which obtains the zero based height g of any node.

And the constraints:

• i <= c

We define inclusion_proof_path as g: # The witness to the right sibling is offset behind i isibling = i - siblingoffset + 1 # The parent of a right sibling is stored immediately # after i += 1 else: # The witness to a left sibling is offset ahead of i isibling = i + siblingoffset - 1 # The parent of a left sibling is stored immediately after # its right sibling i += siblingoffset # When the computed sibling exceedes the range of MMR(C+1), # we have completed the path if isibling > c: return path path.append(isibling) # Set g to the height of the next item in the path. g += 1 ]]>

Receipt of Inclusion The cbor representation of an inclusion proof is: int &(vds: 395) => 2 * cose-label => cose-value } ]]>

• alg (label: 1): REQUIRED. Signature algorithm identifier. Value type: int.
• vds (label: 395): REQUIRED. verifiable data structure algorithm identifier. Value type: int.

The unprotected header for an inclusion proof signature is: inclusion-proofs } unprotected-header-map = { &(vdp: 396) => verifiable-proofs * cose-label => cose-value } ]]> The payload of an MMRIVER inclusion proof signature is the tree peak committing to the nodes inclusion, or the node itself where the proof path is empty. The algorithm included_root obtains this value. The payload MUST be detached. Detaching the payload forces verifiers to recompute the root from the inclusion proof, this protects against implementation errors where the signature is verified but the payload merkle root does not match the inclusion proof.

Verifying the Receipt of inclusion The inclusion proof and signature are verified in order. First the verifiers applies the inclusion proof to a possible entry (set member) bytes. If this process fails, the inclusion proof may have been tampered with. If this process succeeds, the result is a merkle root, which in the attached as the COSE Sign1 payload. Second the verifier checks the signature of the COSE Sign1. If the resulting signature verifies, the Receipt has proved inclusion of the entry in the verifiable data structure. If the resulting signature does not verify, the signature may have been tampered with. It is recommended that implementations return a single boolean result for Receipt verification operations, to reduce the chance of accepting a valid signature over an invalid inclusion proof. As the proof must be processed prior to signature verification the implementation SHOULD check the lengths of the proof paths are appropriate for the provided tree sizes.

included_root The algorithm included_root calculates the accumulator peak for the provided proof and node value. Given:

• i is the index the nodeHash is to be shown at
• nodehash the value whose inclusion is to be shown
• proof is the path of sibling values committing i.

And the methods:

• index_height which obtains the zero based height g of any node.
• hash_pospair64 which applies H to the new node position and its children.

We define included_root as g: # The parent of a right sibling is stored immediately after i = i + 1 # Set `root` to `H(i+1 || sibling || root)` root = hash_pospair64(i + 1, sibling, root) else: # The parent of a left sibling is stored immediately after # its right sibling. i = i + (2 << g) # Set `root` to `H(i+1 || root || sibling)` root = hash_pospair64(i + 1, root, sibling) # Set g to the height of the next item in the path. g = g + 1 # If the path length was zero, the original nodehash is returned return root ]]>

Consistency Proof A consistency proof shows that the accumulator, defined in ReyzinYakoubov, for tree-size-1 is a prefix of the accumulator for tree-size-2. The signature is over the complete accumulator for tree-size-2 obtained using the proof and the, supplied, possibly empty, list of right-peaks which complete the accumulator for tree-size-2. The receipt of consistency is defined so that a chain of cumulative consistency proofs can be verified together. The cbor representation of a consistency proof is:

consistency_proof_path Produces the verification paths for inclusion of the peaks of tree-size-1 under the peaks of tree-size-2. right-peaks are obtained by invoking peaks(tree-size-2 - 1), and discarding length(proofs) from the left. Given:

• ifrom is the last index of tree-size-1
• ito is the last index of tree-size-2

And the methods:

• inclusion_proof_path

And the constraints:

• ifrom <= ito

We define consistency_proof_paths as

Receipt of Consistency The cbor representation of an inclusion proof for MMRIVER is: int &(vds: 395) => 2 * cose-label => cose-value } ]]>

• alg (label: 1): REQUIRED. Signature algorithm identifier. Value type: int.
• vds (label: 395): REQUIRED. verifiable data structure algorithm identifier. Value type: int.

The unprotected header for an inclusion proof signature is: consistency-proof } unprotected-header-map = { &(vdp: 396) => verifiable-proofs * cose-label => cose-value } ]]> The payload MUST be detached. Detaching the payload forces verifiers to recompute the roots from the consistency proofs. This protects against implementation errors where the signature is verified but the payload is not genuinely produced by the included proof.

Verifying the Receipt of consistency Verification accommodates verifying the result of a cumulative series of consistency proofs. Perform the following for each consistency-proof in the list, verifying the signature with the output of the last.

1. Initialize current proof as the first consistency-proof.
2. Initialize accumulatorfrom to the peaks of tree-size-1 in the current proof.
3. Initialize ifrom to tree-size-1 - 1 from the current proof.
4. Initialize proofs to the consistency-paths from the current proof.
5. Apply the algorithm consistent_roots
6. Apply the peaks algorithm to obtain the accumulator for tree-size-2
7. From the peaks for tres-size-2, discard from the left the number of roots returned by consistent_roots.
8. Create the consistent accumulator by appending the remaining peaks to the consistent roots.
9. If there are no remaining proofs, use the consistent accumulator as the detached payload and verify the signature of the COSE Sign1.

It is recommended that implementations return a single boolean result for Receipt verification operations, to reduce the chance of accepting a valid signature over an invalid consistency proof. As the proof must be processed prior to signature verification the implementation SHOULD check the lengths of the proof paths are appropriate for the provided tree sizes.

consistent_roots consistent_roots returns the descending height ordered list of elements from the accumulator for the consistent future state. Implementations MUST require that the number of peaks returned by (ifrom) equals the number of entries in accumulatorfrom. Given:

• ifrom the last index in the complete MMR from which consistency was proven.
• accumulatorfrom the node values corresponding to the peaks of the accumulator for tree-size-1
• proofs the inclusion proofs for each node in accumulatorfrom for tree-size-2

And the methods:

• included_root

We define consistent_roots as ERROR roots = [] for i in range(len(accumulatorfrom)): root = included_root( frompeaks[i], accumulatorfrom[i], proofs[i]) if roots and roots[-1] == root: continue roots.append(root) return roots ]]>

Appending a leaf An algorithm for appending to a tree maintained in post order layout is provided. Implementation defined methods for interacting with storage are specified.

add_leaf_hash When a new node is appended, if its height matches the height of its immediate predecessor, then the two equal height siblings MUST be merged. Merging is defined as the append of a new node which takes the adjacent peaks as its left and right children. This process MUST proceed until there are no more completable sub trees. add_leaf_hash(f) adds the leaf hash value f to the tree. Given:

• f the leaf value resulting from H(x) for the caller defined leaf value x
• db an interface supporting the and implementation defined storage methods.

And the methods:

• index_height

We define add_leaf_hash as g: # Set ileft to the index of the left child of i, # which is i - 2^(g+1) ileft = i - (2 << g) # Set iright to the index of the the right child of i, # which is i - 1 iright = i - 1 # Set v to H(i + 1 || Get(ileft) || Get(iright)) # Set i to the result of invoking Append(v) i = db.append( hash_pospair64(i+1, db.get(ileft), db.get(iright))) # Set g to the height of the new i, which is g + 1 g += 1 return i ]]>

Implementation defined storage methods The following methods are assumed to be available to the implementation. Very minimal requirements are specified. Informally, the storage must be array like and have no gaps.

Get Reads the value from the tree at the supplied index. The read MUST be consistent with any other calls to Append or Get within the same algorithm invocation. Get MAY fail for transient reasons.

Append Appends new node to storage and returns the index that will be occupied by the node provided to the next call to append. The implementation MUST guarantee that the results of Append are immediately available to Get calls in the same invocation of the algorithm. Append MUST return the node i identifying the node location which comes next. The implementation MAY defer commitment to underlying persistent storage. Append MAY fail for transient reasons.

Node values Interior nodes in the MUST prefix the value provided to H(x) with pos. The value v for any interior node MUST be H(pos || Get(LEFT_CHILD) || Get(RIGHT_CHILD)) The algorithm for leaf addition is provided the result of H(x) directly.

hash_pospair64 Returns H(pos || a || b), which is the value for the node identified by index pos - 1 Editors note: How this draft accommodates hash alg agility is tbd. Given:

• pos the size of the MMR whose last node index is pos - 1
• a the first value to include in the hash after pos
• b the second value to include in the hash after pos

And the constraints:

• pos < 2^64
• a and b MUST be hashes produced by the appropriate hash alg.

We define hash_pospair64 as

Essential supporting algorithms

index_height index_height(i) returns the zero based height g of the node index i Given:

• i the index of any mmr node.

We define index_height as int: pos = i + 1 while not all_ones(pos): pos = pos - most_sig_bit(pos) + 1 return bit_length(pos) - 1 ]]>

peaks peaks(i) returns the peak indices for MMR(i+1), which is also its accumulator. Assumes MMR(i+1) is complete, implementations can check for this condition by testing the height of i+1 Given:

• i the index of any mmr node.

We define peaks

Security Considerations See the security considerations section of:

IANA Considerations Editors note: Hash agility is desired. We can start with SHA-256. Two of the referenced implementations use BLAKE2b-256, We would like to add support for SHA3-256, SHA3-512, and possibly Keccak and Pedersen.

Additions to Existing Registries Editors note: todo registry requests

New Registries

Normative References Concise Binary Object Representation (CBOR) is a data format designed for small code size and small message size. There is a need to be able to define basic security services for this data format. This document defines a set of algorithms that can be used with the CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE) protocol (RFC 9052). This document, along with RFC 9052, obsoletes RFC 8152. 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.

References

Informative References

• ReyzinYakoubov
• CrosbyWallach
• CrosbyWallachStorage 3.3 Storing the log on secondary storage
• PostOrderTlog
• PeterTodd
• KnuthTBT 2.3.1 Traversing Binary Trees
• BNT

Assumed bit primitives

log2floor Returns the floor of log base 2 x

most_sig_bit Returns the mask for the the most significant bit in pos int: return 1 << (pos.bit_length() - 1) ]]> The following primitives are assumed for working with bits as they commonly have library or hardware support.

bit_length The minimum number of bits to represent pos. b011 would be 2, b010 would be 2, and b001 would be 1.

all_ones Tests if all bits, from the most significant that is set, are 1, b0111 would be true, b0101 would be false. bool: msb = most_sig_bit(pos) mask = (1 << (msb + 1)) - 1 return pos == mask ]]>

ones_count Count of set bits. For example ones_count(b101) is 2

trailing_zeros The count of nodes above and to the left of pos

Implementation Status Note to RFC Editor: Please remove this section as well as references to BCP205 before AUTH48. This section records the status of known implementations of the protocol defined by this specification at the time of posting of this Internet-Draft, and is based on a proposal described in BCP205. The description of implementations in this section is intended to assist the IETF in its decision processes in progressing drafts to RFCs. Please note that the listing of any individual implementation here does not imply endorsement by the IETF. Furthermore, no effort has been spent to verify the information presented here that was supplied by IETF contributors. This is not intended as, and must not be construed to be, a catalog of available implementations or their features. Readers are advised to note that other implementations may exist. According to BCP205, "this will allow reviewers and working groups to assign due consideration to documents that have the benefit of running code, which may serve as evidence of valuable experimentation and feedback that have made the implemented protocols more mature. It is up to the individual working groups to use this information as they see fit".

Implementers

DataTrails An open-source implementation was initiated and is maintained by Data Trails Inc. - DataTrails. Uses SHA-256 as the hash alg

Implementation Name An application demonstrating the concepts is available at https://app.datatrails.ai/.

Implementation URL An open-source implementation is available at:

• https://github.com/datatrails/go-datatrails-merklelog

Maturity Used in production. SEMVER unstable (no backwards compat declared yet)

Robin Bryce (1)

Implementation URL A minimal reference implementation of this draft. Used to generate the test vectors in this draft, is available at:

• https://github.com/robinbryce/merkle-mountain-range-proofs/blob/main/algorithms.py

Maturity Reference only

Robin Bryce (2)

Implementation URL A minimal tiled log implementation

• https://github.com/robinbryce/mmriver-tiles-ts

Maturity Prototype

Mimblewimble Is specifically committing to positions as we describe, but is committing zero based indices, and uses BLAKE2B as the HASH-ALG. Accounting for those differences, their commitment trees would be compatible with this draft.

Implementation URL An implementation is available here:

• https://github.com/mimblewimble/grin/blob/master/doc/mmr.md (Grin is a rust implementation of the mimblewimble protocol)
• https://github.com/BeamMW/beam/blob/master/core/merkle.cpp (Beam is a C++ implementation of the mimblewimble protocol)

 Herodotus

Implementation URL https://github.com/HerodotusDev/rust-accumulators Production, supports keccak, posiedon & pedersen hash algs Editors note: test vectors, based on a SHA256 instantiation, are currently provided in a separate document. (./test-vectors.md)

Acknowledgments