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Re: PKI operators anyone?

  • From: John Curran
  • Date: Wed Sep 05 10:58:01 2007 
At 10:06 AM -0400 9/5/07, Joe Maimon wrote:
>
>80 years for the root, 4096bit key
>35 years for the policy, 4096bit key
>15 years for the issuing, ?bit key
><=5 years for the issued certificates.
>
>Good idea? Bad Idea? Comments?

Joe -
 
  What's the implications of a single issued certificate being
  cracked, and again for one of the root/policy/issuing set?

  There's quite a bit of speedy hardware out there today
  (particularly if you count things like repurposed video
  processors) and 5 years is a *very* long time in our
  industry.   You can actually hunt down the CPS for
  most public CA's, and I think you'll find that they put
  up with the "loads of fun every 11 months or so..."
 
  However, for them the implications of a compromised
  issued cert is potential customer liability, and for an
  the issuing certificate or above is basically loss of their
  confidence in their entire business of being a CA.  You
  have to assess the implications based on the expected
  certificate use for your CA.

Hope this helps,
/John