BSAFE

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
BSAFE
LicenseProprietary
Websitewww.dell.com

Dell BSAFE, formerly known as RSA BSAFE, is a

kleptographic backdoor from the American National Security Agency (NSA), as part of its secret Bullrun program.[3] In 2013 Reuters revealed that RSA had received a payment of $10 million to set the compromised algorithm as the default option.[3]
The RNG standard was subsequently withdrawn in 2014, and the RNG removed from BSAFE beginning in 2015.

Cryptography backdoors

Dual_EC_DRBG random number generator

From 2004 to 2013, the default

Snowden leaks in 2013, and it was insinuated that NSA had paid RSA Security US$10 million to use Dual_EC_DRBG by default in 2004,[3] though RSA Security denied that they knew about the backdoor in 2004. The Reuters article which revealed the secret $10 million contract to use Dual_EC_DRBG described the deal as "handled by business leaders rather than pure technologists".[3] RSA Security has largely declined to explain their choice to continue using Dual_EC_DRBG even after the defects and potential backdoor were discovered in 2006 and 2007, and has denied knowingly inserting the backdoor.[6]

So why would RSA pick Dual_EC as the default? You got me. Not only is Dual_EC hilariously slow – which has real performance implications – it was shown to be a just plain bad random number generator all the way back in 2006. By 2007, when Shumow and Ferguson raised the possibility of a backdoor in the specification, no sensible cryptographer would go near the thing. And the killer is that RSA employs a number of highly distinguished cryptographers! It's unlikely that they'd all miss the news about Dual_EC.

— Matthew Green, cryptographer and research professor at Johns Hopkins University, A Few Thoughts on Cryptographic Engineering[4] (From after the backdoor was confirmed, but before the $10 million secret deal was revealed by Reuters.)

As a cryptographically secure random number generator is often the basis of cryptography, much data encrypted with BSAFE was not secure against NSA. Specifically it has been shown that the backdoor makes SSL/

elliptic curve problem[5]
(breaking an instance of elliptic curve cryptography is considered unlikely with current computers and algorithms, but a breakthrough may occur).

In June 2013, Edward Snowden began leaking NSA documents. In November 2013, RSA switched the default to HMAC DRBG with SHA-256 as the default option. The following month, Reuters published the report based on the Snowden leaks stating that RSA had received a payment of $10 million to set Dual_EC_DRBG as the default.[3]

With subsequent releases of Crypto-C Micro Edition 4.1.2 (April 2016), Micro Edition Suite 4.1.5 (April 2016) and Crypto-J 6.2 (March 2015), Dual_EC_DRBG was removed entirely.

Extended Random TLS extension

"Extended Random" was a proposed extension for the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol, submitted for standardization to IETF by an NSA employee,[7] although it never became a standard. The extension would otherwise be harmless, but together with the Dual_EC_DRBG, it would make it easier to take advantage of the backdoor.[8][9]

The extension was previously not known to be enabled in any implementations, but in December 2017, it was found enabled on some Canon printer models, which use the RSA BSAFE library, because the extension number conflicted a part of TLS version 1.3.[9]

Varieties

Product suite support status

On November 25, 2015, RSA announced End of Life (EOL) dates for BSAFE.[17] The End of Primary Support (EOPS) was to be reached on January 31, 2017, and the End of Extended Support (EOXS) was originally set to be January 31, 2019. That date was later further extended by RSA for some versions until January 31, 2022.[18] During Extended Support, even though the support policy stated that only the most severe problems would be patched, new versions were released containing bugfixes, security fixes and new algorithms.[19]

On December 12, 2020, Dell announced the reversal of RSA's past decision, allowing BSAFE product support beyond January 2022 as well as the possibility to soon acquire new licenses. Dell also announced it was rebranding the toolkits to Dell BSAFE.[20]

References

  1. ^ "BSAFE support and billing update | Dell US". www.dell.com. Archived from the original on 2021-07-26. Retrieved 2021-07-26.
  2. ^ RSA (September 1, 2020). "RSA Emerges as Independent Company Following Completion of Acquisition by Symphony Technology Group". RSA. Archived from the original on September 4, 2020. Retrieved June 7, 2023.
  3. ^ a b c d e Menn, Joseph (December 20, 2013). "Exclusive: Secret contract tied NSA and security industry pioneer". San Francisco. Reuters. Archived from the original on September 24, 2015. Retrieved May 11, 2021.
  4. ^ a b Matthew Green (September 20, 2013). "RSA warns developers not to use RSA products". A Few Thoughts on Cryptographic Engineering. Archived from the original on October 10, 2013. Retrieved December 28, 2013.
  5. ^ a b c d Bruce Schneier. "The Strange Story of Dual_EC_DRBG". Archived from the original on 2019-04-23. Retrieved 2013-12-28.
  6. ^ "We don't enable backdoors in our crypto products, RSA tells customers". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 2014-10-12. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
  7. ^ Rescorla, Eric; Salter, Margaret (2 March 2009). "Extended Random Values for TLS". IETF draft standard. I-D draft-rescorla-tls-extended-random-02. Archived from the original on 19 December 2017. Retrieved 2023-09-28.
  8. ^ Menn, Joseph (31 March 2014). "Exclusive: NSA infiltrated RSA security more deeply than thought - stu". Reuters. Archived from the original on 29 December 2017. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  9. ^ a b Green, Matthew (19 December 2017). "The strange story of "Extended Random"". Cryptographic Engineering blog. Archived from the original on 29 December 2017. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  10. ^ "RSA licenses Baltimore Technologies J/CRYPTO".
  11. ^ "RSA's BSafe toolkit spawns new Java version".
  12. ^ "Making Java Development JSafe" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 2021-09-28. Retrieved 2020-04-27.
  13. ^ "RSA unveils three new products at its show". IT World. February 20, 2002.
  14. .
  15. .
  16. ^ "Securing IT Resources with Digital Certificates and LDAP". Archived from the original on 2020-07-31. Retrieved 2020-04-27.
  17. ^ RSA (November 25, 2015). "RSA announces End of Life (EOL) dates for RSA BSAFE". RSA. Archived from the original on October 3, 2018. Retrieved October 3, 2018.
  18. ^ RSA (June 20, 2018). "RSA announces support extension for some of the BSAFE® product suite". RSA. Archived from the original on October 3, 2018. Retrieved October 3, 2018.
  19. ^ RSA (September 11, 2019). "RSA announces the release of RSA BSAFE® Micro Edition Suite 4.4". RSA. Archived from the original on September 23, 2019. Retrieved September 11, 2019.
  20. ^ Dell (December 12, 2020). "Dell BSAFE products remain supported beyond January 2022, reversing RSA's past decision to end-of-life BSAFE toolkits". Dell.

External links

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