RFC 5877

The application/pkix-attr-cert Media Type for Attribute Certificates 🎀

Okay bestie, RFC 5877 is giving classic IETF energy 🦋 It was written by Russell "Russ" Housley from Vigil Security, and it's dated May 2010. It's an Informational doc, so it's not a Standards Track spec, just published for info 💅 The ISSN is 2070-1721. The header doesn't list anything it obsoletes or updates, so it's a standalone moment ✨

Abstract

This document specifies a MIME media type used to carry a single attribute certificate as defined in RFC 5755. 🌸

Status of This Memo

Real talk, this one isn't an Internet Standards Track spec. It's published for informational purposes 📖

It's a product of the IETF, and it reflects IETF community consensus. It got public review and the IESG approved it for publication. Not every IESG-approved doc is a candidate for any level of Internet Standard, so check Section 2 of RFC 5741 if you're curious 🧐

For the current status, errata, and how to send feedback, head to http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5877 🔗

Copyright Notice

Copyright (c) 2010 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. 💜

This doc is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) as they stand on the publication date. Please read these carefully, because they spell out your rights and restrictions for this doc 🫶 Code Components pulled from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions, and they come without warranty as described in the Simplified BSD License ⚖️

1. Introduction ✨

Okay so, RFC 2585 [RFC2585] already defines MIME media types for public key certificates and certificate revocation lists (CRLs). This document adds one for attribute certificates, as defined in RFC 5755 [RFC5755] 🎀

Attribute certificates are ASN.1 encoded [X.680]. RFC 5755 [RFC5755] says which parts of the attribute certificate must use the distinguished encoding rules (DER) [X.690], and which parts are allowed to use the basic encoding rules (BER) [X.690]. DER is a proper subset of BER, so BER decoding all parts of a properly constructed attribute certificate will work 🙌

2. IANA Considerations 💅

This doc registers the "application/pkix-attr-cert" Internet Media Type with IANA, for use with an attribute certificate as defined in [RFC5755]. The registration follows the procedures in BCP 13 [RFC4288] 🦋

Here's the registration template, verbatim:

   Type name: application

   Subtype name: pkix-attr-cert

   Required parameters: None

   Optional parameters: None

   Encoding considerations: binary

   Security considerations:
     An attribute certificate provides authorization information.  An
     attribute certificate is most often used in conjunction with a
     public key certificate [RFC5280], and the two certificates
     should use the same encoding of the distinguished name as
     described in the Security Considerations of this document.

   Interoperability considerations:
     The media type will be used with HTTP to fetch attribute
     certificates.  Other uses may emerge in the future.

   Published specification: RFC 5755
   Applications that use this media type:
     The media type is used with a MIME-compliant transport to
     transfer an attribute certificate.  Attribute certificates
     convey authorization information, and they are most often used
     in conjunction with public key certificates as defined in
     [RFC5280].

   Additional information:
     Magic number(s): None
     File extension(s): .ac
     Macintosh File Type Code(s): none

   Person & email address to contact for further information:
     Russ Housley
     housley@vigilsec.com

   Intended usage: COMMON

   Restrictions on usage: none

   Author:
     Russ Housley <housley@vigilsec.com>

   Intended usage: COMMON

   Change controller:
     The IESG <iesg@ietf.org>

3. Security Considerations 🔥

Serious moment, bestie 🚨 Attribute certificate issuers must encode the holder entity name in exactly the same way as the public key certificate distinguished name. If the two are encoded differently, implementations may fail to recognize that the attribute certificate and the public key certificate belong to the same entity 💀

4. References 📚

4.1. Normative References

[RFC5755]   Farrell, S., Housley, R., and S. Turner, "An Internet
            Attribute Certificate Profile for Authorization",
            RFC 5755, January 2010.

4.2. Informative References

[RFC2585]   Housley, R. and P. Hoffman, "Internet X.509 Public Key
            Infrastructure Operational Protocols: FTP and HTTP",
            RFC 2585, May 1999.

[RFC4288]   Freed, N. and J. Klensin, "Media Type Specifications and
            Registration Procedures", BCP 13, RFC 4288,
            December 2005.

[RFC5280]   Cooper, D., Santesson, S., Farrell, S., Boeyen, S.,
            Housley, R., and W. Polk, "Internet X.509 Public Key
            Infrastructure Certificate and Certificate Revocation
            List (CRL) Profile", RFC 5280, May 2008.

[X.680]     ITU-T Recommendation X.680 (2002) | ISO/IEC 8824-1:2002,
            Information technology - Abstract Syntax Notation One
            (ASN.1):  Specification of basic notation.

[X.690]     ITU-T Recommendation X.690 (2002) | ISO/IEC 8825-1:2002,
            Information technology - ASN.1 encoding rules:
            Specification of Basic Encoding Rules (BER), Canonical
            Encoding Rules (CER) and Distinguished Encoding
            Rules (DER).

Author's Address 🧚

Russell Housley
Vigil Security, LLC
918 Spring Knoll Drive
Herndon, VA 20170
USA
EMail: housley@vigilsec.com

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That's the whole RFC, bestie 🌈💖 Go wrap that attribute cert in application/pkix-attr-cert and be iconic about it 👑