Messages in this thread |  | | Date | Wed, 7 Aug 1996 12:49:09 +0300 (EET DST) | From | Linus Torvalds <> | Subject | Re: IP security |
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On Tue, 6 Aug 1996, Jauder Ho wrote: > > has anyone looked/implemented this? the url is > > http://www.cisco.com/public/library/isakmp/ipsec.html
I'd just like people to look into ssh before getting all that excited about secure IP. Quite frankly, doing cryptography in the IP layer sucks raw eggs, and anybody who thinks it's a good idea has probably not really thought it through.
Most "secure IP" packages seem to think that having a per-host key is a good idea. In fact the whole idea sucks: you need to be the host maintainer to change the keys etc. That means that the user is at the mercy of the maintainer, who may be overworked, uncaring about the users needs, or simply stupid. You can't really protect against a actively _evil_ root, but ipsec doesn't even protect against a _uncaring_ root..
With "ssh", you get something that works today, is secure and usable, and can be installed easily on the system with minimal need for maintenance, so you don't need to worry overmuch about maintaining it. It ports to just about any UNIX, and because it's connection-oriented you can use it or not use it as you see fit.
Note: if somebody thinks ipsec is useful and implements it cleanly for Linux, I'd be more than happy to add it to the kernel despite the above text. I don't think ipsec is _evil_, I just don't think it's the right way to do security on the internet.
Linus
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