Bruce Schneier on DDOS und die Architektur des Internet

["Axel H Horns" <horns@t-online.de>]

Wenn ich Lawrence Lessig lese, "Code is Law", und dann den (etwas 
dissonanten, aber umso lauteren) Chor der Copyright-Lobby hoere, die 
die Struktur des Internet veraendern moechte, um IP besser 
durchsetzen zu koennen (Stichwort: "RPS"), gehen bei mir diverse 
Alarmlampen an, wenn ich Bruce Schneier davon reden hoere, bezueglich 
anti-DDOS "any long-term solution will involve redesigning the
entire Internet". Sicher kann man Schneier nicht mit Bartloff in 
einen Topf werfen, aber jede Argumentation in diese Richtung weckt 
Begehrlichkeiten aller nur denkbaren Stake- und Shareholder. Es gibt 
keinen rationalen "herrschaftsfreien Dialog" mehr, mit dem ein 
derartiges Vorhaben auf Konsensbasis abwickelbar waere. Jeder auch 
noch so gutgemeinte Versuch, Teile der Internet-Architektur zu 
erneuern, wird in wirtschaftlich und politisch motivierte 
Diadochenkaempfe ausarten, IMHO.

--AHH


------- Forwarded message follows -------
Date sent:      	Tue, 15 Feb 2000 23:33:58 -0600
To:             	crypto-gram@chaparraltree.com
From:           	Bruce Schneier <schneier@counterpane.com>
Subject:        	CRYPTO-GRAM, February 15, 2000

                  CRYPTO-GRAM

               February 15, 2000

               by Bruce Schneier
                Founder and CTO
       Counterpane Internet Security, Inc.
            schneier@counterpane.com
           http://www.counterpane.com



[...]

I believe that any long-term solution will involve redesigning the
entire Internet.  Back in the 1960s, some people figured out that you
could whistle, click, belch, or whatever into a telephone and make the
system do things.  This was the era of phone phreaking: black boxes,
blue boxes, Captain Crunch whistles.  The phone company did their best
to defend against these attacks, but the basic problem was that the
phone system was built with "in-band signaling": the control signal
and the data signal traveled along the same wires.  In the 1980s, the
phone company completely redesigned the phone system.  For example
SS7, or Signaling System 7, was out-of-band.  The voice path and data
path were separated.  Now it doesn't matter how hard you whistle into
the phone system: the switch isn't listening.  The attacks simply
don't work.  (Red boxes still work, against payphones, by mimicking
the in-band tones that count the coins deposited in the phones.)

In the long term, out-of-band signaling is the only way to deal with
many of the vulnerabilities of the Internet, DDS attacks among them. 
Unfortunately, there are no plans to redesign the Internet in this
way, and any such undertaking might be just too complicated to even
consider.

[...]

------- End of forwarded message -------