Internet-Draft | RATS CMW | February 2025 |
Birkholz, et al. | Expires 25 August 2025 | [Page] |
This document defines a conceptual message wrapper (CMW) format - an encapsulation method applicable to any RATS conceptual message, such as Evidence, Attestation Results, Endorsements, and Reference Values. It also describes a collection type that aggregates one or more CMWs into a single message.¶
In addition, this document specifies a corresponding CBOR tag, JSON Web Tokens (JWT) and CBOR Web Tokens (CWT) claims, and an X.509 extension. These mechanisms enable the embedding of enveloped conceptual messages into CBOR-based protocols, web APIs, and PKIX protocols. Moreover, a Media Type and a CoAP Content-Format are defined for transporting CMWs over HTTP, MIME, CoAP, and other Internet protocols.¶
This note is to be removed before publishing as an RFC.¶
Discussion of this document takes place on the Remote ATtestation ProcedureS Working Group mailing list (rats@ietf.org), which is archived at https://mailarchive.ietf.org/arch/browse/rats/.¶
Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at https://github.com/thomas-fossati/draft-ftbs-rats-msg-wrap.¶
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.¶
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-Drafts is at https://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.¶
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."¶
This Internet-Draft will expire on 25 August 2025.¶
Copyright (c) 2025 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved.¶
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (https://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Revised BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as described in the Revised BSD License.¶
The IETF Remote ATtestation procedureS (RATS) architecture defines a handful of conceptual messages (see Section 8 of [RFC9334]), such as Evidence and Attestation Results. Each conceptual message can have multiple claims encoding and serialization formats (Section 9 of [RFC9334]). Throughout their lifetime, RATS conceptual messages are typically transported over different protocols. For example,¶
In a "background check" topology, Evidence (e.g., EAT [I-D.ietf-rats-eat]) first flows from the Attester to the Relying Party and then from the Relying Party to the Verifier, each leg following a separate protocol path.¶
In a "passport" topology, an attestation result payload (e.g., Attestation Results for Secure Interactions (AR4SI) [I-D.ietf-rats-ar4si]) is initially sent from the Verifier to the Attester, and later, via a different channel, from the Attester to the Relying Party.¶
By using the CMW format outlined in this document, protocol designers can avoid the need to update protocol specifications to accommodate different conceptual messages and serialization formats used by various attestation technologies. This approach streamlines the implementation process for developers, enabling easier support for diverse attestation technologies. For instance, a Relying Party application implementer does not need to parse attestation-related messages, such as Evidence from Attesters on IoT devices with Trusted Platform Modules (TPM) or servers using confidential computing hardware like Intel Trust Domain Extensions (TDX). Instead, they can leverage the CMW format, remaining agnostic to the specific attestation technology.¶
A further design goal is extensibility. This means that adding support for new conceptual messages and new attestation technologies should not change the core of the processor, and that a CMW stack can be designed to offer a plug-in interface for both encoding and decoding. To achieve this, the format must provide consistent message encapsulation and explicit typing. These features allow for selecting the appropriate message handler based on its type identifier. An opaque message can then be passed between the core and the handler.¶
This document defines two encapsulation formats for RATS conceptual messages that aim to achieve the goals stated above.¶
These encapsulation formats have been specifically designed to possess the following characteristics:¶
They are self-describing, which means that they can convey precise typing information without relying on the framing provided by the embedding protocol or the storage system.¶
They are based on media types [RFC6838], which allows the cost of their registration to be spread across numerous usage scenarios.¶
A protocol designer could use these formats, for example, to convey Evidence, Endorsements and Reference Values in certificates and CRLs extensions ([DICE-arch]), to embed Attestation Results or Evidence as first-class authentication credentials in TLS handshake messages [I-D.fossati-tls-attestation], to transport attestation-related payloads in RESTful APIs, or for stable storage of Attestation Results in the form of file system objects.¶
This document also defines corresponding CBOR tag, JSON Web Tokens (JWT) and CBOR Web Tokens (CWT) claims, as well as an X.509 extension. These allow embedding the wrapped conceptual messages into CBOR-based protocols, web APIs, and PKIX protocols. In addition, a Media Type and a CoAP Content-Format are defined for transporting CMWs in HTTP, MIME, CoAP and other Internet protocols.¶
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown here.¶
In this document, CDDL [RFC8610] [RFC9165] is used to describe the data formats.¶
The reader is assumed to be familiar with the vocabulary and concepts defined in [RFC9334].¶
This document reuses the terms defined in Section 2 of [RFC9193] (e.g., "Content-Type").¶
A RATS Conceptual Message Wrapper (CMW) has a tree structure. Leaf nodes are of type "Record" (Section 3.1), or "Tag" (Section 3.2). Intermediate nodes are of type "Collection" (Section 3.3); they hold together multiple CMW items.¶
The following snippet outlines the productions associated with the top-level types.¶
start = cmw cmw = json-cmw / cbor-cmw json-cmw = json-record / json-collection cbor-cmw = cbor-record / cbor-collection / $cbor-tag¶
The complete CDDL can be found in Section 6.¶
Section 4.3 and Section 4.4 describe the transport of CMWs using CBOR and JSON Web Tokens and PKIX messages, respectively.¶
This document only defines an encapsulation, not a security format. It is the responsibility of the Attester to ensure that the CMW contents have the necessary security protection. Security considerations are discussed in Section 8.¶
The format of the Record CMW is shown in Figure 1.
The JSON [STD90] and CBOR [STD94] representations are provided separately.
Both the json-record
and cbor-record
have the same fields except for slight differences in the types discussed below.¶
json-record = [ type: media-type value: base64url-string ? ind: uint .bits cm-type ] cbor-record = [ type: coap-content-format-type / media-type value: bytes ? ind: uint .bits cm-type ]
Each contains two or three members:¶
type
:Either a text string representing a Content-Type (e.g., an EAT media type [I-D.ietf-rats-eat-media-type]) or an unsigned integer corresponding to a CoAP Content-Format ID (Section 12.3 of [RFC7252]). The latter MUST NOT be used in the JSON serialization.¶
value
:The RATS conceptual message serialized according to the value defined in the type member. When using JSON, the value field MUST be encoded as Base64 using the URL and filename safe alphabet (Section 5 of [RFC4648]) without padding. This always applies, even if the conceptual message format is already textual (e.g., a JWT EAT). When using CBOR, the value field MUST be encoded as a CBOR byte string.¶
ind
:An optional bitmap that indicates which conceptual message types are
carried in the value
field. Any combination (i.e., any value between
1 and 15, included) is allowed. This is useful only if the type
is
potentially ambiguous and there is no further context available to the
CMW consumer to decide. For example, this might be the case if the base
media type is not profiled (e.g., application/eat+cwt
), if the value
field contains multiple conceptual messages with different types (e.g.,
both Reference Values and Endorsements within the same application/signed-corim+cbor
), or if the same profile identifier is
shared by different conceptual messages.
Future specifications may add new values to the ind
field; see Section 9.5.¶
Tag CMWs derive their tag numbers from a corresponding CoAP Content-Format ID using the TN()
transform defined in Appendix B of [RFC9277].
Such CBOR tag numbers are in range [1668546817, 1668612095].¶
The RATS conceptual message is first serialized according to the Content-Format ID and then encoded as a CBOR byte string, to which the TN-derived tag number is prepended.¶
The Tag CMW is defined in Figure 2 using two different macros.
One for CBOR-encoded types, the other for all other types.
Both macros take the CBOR tag number tn
as a parameter.
The tag-cm-cbor
macro takes the CDDL definition of the associated conceptual message fmt
as a second parameter.¶
tag-cm-cbor<tn, fmt> = #6.<tn>(bytes .cbor fmt) tag-cm-data<tn> = #6.<tn>(bytes)
To add a new CMW, the $cbor-tag
type socket is extended with a new instance of the Tag CMW macro.
For example, to associate conceptual messages of type my-evidence
with CBOR tag 1668576819
, one would extend $cbor-tag
as follows:¶
$cbor-tag /= tag-cm-cbor<1668576819, my-evidence> my-evidence = { &(eat_nonce: 10) => bstr .size (8..64) }¶
Layered Attesters and composite devices (Sections 3.2 and 3.3 of [RFC9334]) generate Evidence that consists of multiple parts. For example, in data center servers, it is not uncommon for separate attesting environments (AE) to serve a subsection of the entire machine. One AE might measure and attest to what was booted on the main CPU, while another AE might measure and attest to what was booted on a SmartNIC plugged into a PCIe slot, and a third AE might measure and attest to what was booted on the machine's GPU. To allow aggregation of multiple, potentially non-homogeneous evidence formats collected from different AEs, this document defines a Collection CMW as a container that holds several CMW items, each with a label that is unique within the scope of the Collection.¶
Although originally designed to support layered Attester and composite device use cases, the Collection CMW can be adapted for other scenarios that require the aggregation of RATS conceptual messages. For instance, Collections may be used to group Endorsements, Reference Values, Attestation Results, and more. A single Collection CMW can contain a mix of different message types, and it can also be used to carry messages related to multiple devices simultaneously.¶
The Collection CMW (Figure 3) is defined as a CBOR map or JSON object containing CMW values.
The position of a cmw
entry in the cmw-collection
is not significant.
Labels can be strings (or integers in the CBOR serialization) that serve as a mnemonic for different conceptual messages in the Collection.¶
A Collection MUST have at least one CMW entry.¶
The "__cmwc_t"
key is reserved for associating an optional type to the overall Collection and MUST NOT be used for a label.
The value of the "__cmwc_t"
key is either a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) or an object identifier (OID).
The OID is always absolute and never relative.
The URI is always in the absolute form (Section 4.3 of [RFC3986]).¶
Since the Collection CMW is recursive (a Collection CMW is itself a CMW), implementations may limit the allowed depth of nesting.¶
json-collection = { ? "__cmwc_t": ~uri / oid + &(label: text) => json-cmw } cbor-collection = { ? "__cmwc_t": ~uri / oid + &(label: (int / text)) => cbor-cmw }
A Collection CMW's tree structure is not required to be a spanning tree of the system's composite Attester topology. If the labels carry semantic content for a Verifier (e.g. to improve Verifier performance or aid human comprehension), the Collection SHOULD be integrity protected. For example, the Collection can be integrity protected by including it in a signed token such as a CWT or JWT.¶
Once any external framing is removed (for example, if the CMW is carried in a certificate extension), the CMW decoder performs a 1-byte lookahead to determine how to decode the remaining byte buffer. The following pseudo-code illustrates this process:¶
func CMWTypeDemux(b []byte) (CMW, error) { if len(b) == 0 { return Unknown } if b[0] == 0x82 || b[0] == 0x83 { return CBORRecord } else if b[0] == 0xda { return CBORTag } else if b[0] == 0x5b { return JSONRecord } else if b[0] == 0x7b { return JSONCollection } else if (b[0] >= 0xa0 && b[0] <= 0xbb) || b[0] == 0xbf { return CBORCollection } return Unknown }¶
This section highlights a number of mechanisms to add cryptographic protection to CMWs.¶
A CBOR CMW can be signed using COSE [STD96].
A signed-cbor-cmw
is a COSE_Sign1
with the following layout:¶
signed-cbor-cmw = [ protected: bytes .cbor signed-cbor-cmw-protected-hdr unprotected: signed-cbor-cmw-unprotected-hdr payload: bytes .cbor cbor-cmw signature: bytes ]¶
The payload MUST be the CBOR-encoded Tag, Record or Collection CMW.¶
signed-cbor-cmw-protected-hdr = { 1 => int ; alg 2 => "application/cmw+cbor" ; cty * cose.label => cose.values } signed-cbor-cmw-unprotected-hdr = { * cose.label => cose.values } cose.label = int / text cose.values = any¶
The protected header MUST include the signature algorithm identifier.
The protected header MUST include the content type application/cmw+cbor
.
Other header parameters MAY be added to the header buckets, for example a kid
that identifies the signing key.¶
A JSON CMW can be signed using JSON Web Signature (JWS) [RFC7515].
A signed-json-cmw
is a JWS object with the following layout:¶
signed-json-cmw = { "protected": text .b64u (text .json signed-json-cmw-protected-hdr) ? "header": text .b64u (text .json signed-json-cmw-unprotected-hdr) "payload": text .b64u (text .json json-cmw) "signature": text .b64u bytes }¶
The payload MUST be the JSON-encoded Record or Collection CMW.¶
signed-json-cmw-protected-hdr = { "alg": text "cty": "application/cmw+json" * text => text } signed-json-cmw-unprotected-hdr = { * text => text }¶
The protected header MUST include the signature algorithm identifier.
The protected header MUST include the content type application/cmw+json
.
Other header parameters MAY be added to the header buckets, for example a kid
that identifies the signing key.¶
For clarity, the above uses the Flattened JSON Serialization (Section 7.2.2 of [RFC7515]). However, the Compact Serialization (Section 3.1 of [RFC7515]) can also be used.¶
To facilitate the embedding of CMWs in CBOR-based protocols and web APIs, this document defines two "cmw"
claims for use with JSON Web Tokens (JWT) and CBOR Web Tokens (CWT).¶
The definitions for these claims can be found in Section 9.2 and Section 9.1, respectively.¶
A Collection CMW carried in a "cmw"
JWT claim MUST be a json-collection
.
A Collection CMW carried in a "cmw"
CWT claim MUST be a cbor-collection
.¶
A Record CMW carried in a "cmw"
JWT claim MUST be a json-record
.
A Record CMW carried in a "cmw"
CWT claim MUST be a cbor-record
.¶
CMW may need to be transported in PKIX messages, such as Certificate Signing Requests (CSRs) or in X.509 Certificates and Certificate Revocation Lists (CRLs).¶
The use of CMW in CSRs is documented in [I-D.ietf-lamps-csr-attestation], while its application in X.509 Certificates and CRLs is detailed in Section 6.1 of [DICE-arch].¶
This section outlines the CMW extension designed to carry CMW objects.¶
The CMW extension MAY be included in X.509 Certificates, CRLs [RFC5280], and CSRs.¶
The CMW extension MUST be identified by the following object identifier:¶
id-pe-cmw OBJECT IDENTIFIER ::= { iso(1) identified-organization(3) dod(6) internet(1) security(5) mechanisms(5) pkix(7) id-pe(1) TBD }¶
This extension SHOULD NOT be marked critical. It MAY be marked critical in cases where the attestation-related information is essential for granting resource access, and there is a risk that legacy relying parties would bypass such controls.¶
The CMW extension MUST have the following syntax:¶
CMW ::= CHOICE { json UTF8String, cbor OCTET STRING }¶
The CMW MUST include the serialized CMW object in either JSON or CBOR format, utilizing the appropriate CHOICE entry.¶
The DER-encoded CMW is the value of the OCTET STRING for the extnValue field of the extension.¶
This section provides an ASN.1 module [X.680] for the CMW extension, following the conventions established in [RFC5912] and [RFC6268].¶
CMWExtn { iso(1) identified-organization(3) dod(6) internet(1) security(5) mechanisms(5) pkix(7) id-mod(0) id-mod-cmw-collection-extn(TBD) } DEFINITIONS IMPLICIT TAGS ::= BEGIN IMPORTS EXTENSION FROM PKIX-CommonTypes-2009 -- RFC 5912 { iso(1) identified-organization(3) dod(6) internet(1) security(5) mechanisms(5) pkix(7) id-mod(0) id-mod-pkixCommon-02(57) } ; -- CMW Extension ext-CMW EXTENSION ::= { SYNTAX CMW IDENTIFIED BY id-pe-cmw } -- CMW Extension OID id-pe-cmw OBJECT IDENTIFIER ::= { iso(1) identified-organization(3) dod(6) internet(1) security(5) mechanisms(5) pkix(7) id-pe(1) TBD } -- CMW Extension Syntax CMW ::= CHOICE { json UTF8String, cbor OCTET STRING } END¶
ConceptualMessageWrapper
Section 6.1.8 of [DICE-arch] specifies the ConceptualMessageWrapper (CMW) format and its corresponding object identifier. The CMW format outlined in [DICE-arch] permits only a subset of the CMW grammar defined in this document. In particular, the Collection format cannot be encoded using DICE CMWs.¶
The (equivalent) examples in Section 5.1, Section 5.2, and Section 5.3 assume that
the Media-Type-Name application/vnd.example.rats-conceptual-msg
has been
registered alongside a corresponding CoAP Content-Format ID 30001
. The
CBOR tag 1668576935
is derived applying the TN()
transform as described in
Section 3.2.¶
All the examples focus on the wrapping aspects. The wrapped messages are not instances of real Conceptual Messages.¶
[ "application/vnd.example.rats-conceptual-msg", "I0faVQ" ]¶
[ 30001, h'2347da55' ]¶
with the following wire representation:¶
82 # array(2) 19 7531 # unsigned(30001) 44 # bytes(4) 2347da55 # "#G\xDAU"¶
Note that a Media-Type-Name can also be used with the CBOR-encoded Record form, for example if it is known that the receiver cannot handle CoAP Content-Formats, or (unlike the case in point) if a CoAP Content-Format ID has not been registrered.¶
[ "application/vnd.example.rats-conceptual-msg", h'2347da55' ]¶
1668576935(h'2347da55')¶
with the following wire representation:¶
da 637476a7 # tag(1668576935) 44 # bytes(4) 2347da55 # "#G\xDAU"¶
This is an example of a signed CoRIM (Concise Reference Integrity Manifest) [I-D.ietf-rats-corim] with an explicit ind
value of 0b0000_0011
(3), indicating that the wrapped message contains both Reference Values and Endorsements.¶
[ "application/signed-corim+cbor", h'd901f6d28440a044d901f5a040', 3 ]¶
with the following wire representation:¶
83 # array(3) 78 1d # text(29) 6170706c69636174696f6e2f7369676e65642d636f72696d2b63626f72 # "app lication/signed-corim+cbor" 4d # bytes(13) d901f6d28440a044d901f5a040 # "\xD9\u0001\xF6҄@\xA0D\xD9\u00 01\xF5\xA0@" 03 # unsigned(3)¶
The following example is a CBOR-encoded Collection CMW that assembles conceptual messages from three attesters: Evidence for attesters A and B and Attestation Results for attester C.
It is given an explicit "__cmwc_t"
using the URI form.¶
{ "__cmwc_t": "tag:example.com,2024:composite-attester", / attester A / 0: [ 30001, h'2347da55', 4 ], / attester B / 1: 1668576935(h'2347da55'), / attester C / 2: [ "application/eat+jwt", h'2e2e2e', 8 ] }¶
The following example is a JSON-encoded Collection CMW that assembles Evidence from two attesters.¶
{ "__cmwc_t": "tag:example.com,2024:another-composite-attester", "attester A": [ "application/eat-ucs+json", "e30K", 4 ], "attester B": [ "application/eat-ucs+cbor", "oA", 4 ] }¶
The following example shows the use of the "cmw"
JWT claim to transport a Collection CMW in a JWT Claims Set [RFC7519]:¶
{ "cmw": { "__cmwc_t": "tag:example.com,2024:another-composite-attester", "attester A": [ "application/eat-ucs+json", "e30K", 4 ], "attester B": [ "application/eat-ucs+cbor", "oA", 4 ] }, "iss": "evidence collection daemon", "exp": 1300819380 }¶
start = cmw cmw = json-cmw / cbor-cmw json-cmw = json-record / json-collection cbor-cmw = cbor-record / cbor-collection / $cbor-tag json-record = [ type: media-type value: base64url-string ? ind: uint .bits cm-type ] cbor-record = [ type: coap-content-format-type / media-type value: bytes ? ind: uint .bits cm-type ] tag-cm-cbor<tn, fmt> = #6.<tn>(bytes .cbor fmt) tag-cm-data<tn> = #6.<tn>(bytes) json-collection = { ? "__cmwc_t": ~uri / oid + &(label: text) => json-cmw } cbor-collection = { ? "__cmwc_t": ~uri / oid + &(label: (int / text)) => cbor-cmw } media-type = text .abnf ("Content-Type" .cat Content-Type-ABNF) base64url-string = text .regexp "[A-Za-z0-9_-]+" cm-type = &( reference-values: 0 endorsements: 1 evidence: 2 attestation-results: 3 ) coap-content-format-type = uint .size 2 oid = text .regexp "([0-2])((\\.0)|(\\.[1-9][0-9]*))*" Content-Type-ABNF = ' Content-Type = Media-Type-Name *( *SP ";" *SP parameter ) parameter = token "=" ( token / quoted-string ) token = 1*tchar tchar = "!" / "#" / "$" / "%" / "&" / "\'" / "*" / "+" / "-" / "." / "^" / "_" / "`" / "|" / "~" / DIGIT / ALPHA quoted-string = %x22 *( qdtext / quoted-pair ) %x22 qdtext = SP / %x21 / %x23-5B / %x5D-7E quoted-pair = "\\" ( SP / VCHAR ) Media-Type-Name = type-name "/" subtype-name type-name = restricted-name subtype-name = restricted-name restricted-name = restricted-name-first *126restricted-name-chars restricted-name-first = ALPHA / DIGIT restricted-name-chars = ALPHA / DIGIT / "!" / "#" / "$" / "&" / "-" / "^" / "_" restricted-name-chars =/ "." ; Characters before first dot always ; specify a facet name restricted-name-chars =/ "+" ; Characters after last plus always ; specify a structured syntax suffix DIGIT = %x30-39 ; 0 - 9 POS-DIGIT = %x31-39 ; 1 - 9 ALPHA = %x41-5A / %x61-7A ; A - Z / a - z SP = %x20 VCHAR = %x21-7E ; printable ASCII (no SP) ' signed-cbor-cmw = [ protected: bytes .cbor signed-cbor-cmw-protected-hdr unprotected: signed-cbor-cmw-unprotected-hdr payload: bytes .cbor cbor-cmw signature: bytes ] signed-cbor-cmw-protected-hdr = { 1 => int ; alg 2 => "application/cmw+cbor" ; cty * cose.label => cose.values } signed-cbor-cmw-unprotected-hdr = { * cose.label => cose.values } cose.label = int / text cose.values = any signed-json-cmw = { "protected": text .b64u (text .json signed-json-cmw-protected-hdr) ? "header": text .b64u (text .json signed-json-cmw-unprotected-hdr) "payload": text .b64u (text .json json-cmw) "signature": text .b64u bytes } signed-json-cmw-protected-hdr = { "alg": text "cty": "application/cmw+json" * text => text } signed-json-cmw-unprotected-hdr = { * text => text }¶
This section records the status of known implementations of the protocol defined by this specification at the time of posting of this Internet-Draft, and is based on a proposal described in [RFC7942]. The description of implementations in this section is intended to assist the IETF in its decision processes in progressing drafts to RFCs. Please note that the listing of any individual implementation here does not imply endorsement by the IETF. Furthermore, no effort has been spent to verify the information presented here that was supplied by IETF contributors. This is not intended as, and must not be construed to be, a catalog of available implementations or their features. Readers are advised to note that other implementations may exist.¶
According to [RFC7942], "this will allow reviewers and working groups to assign due consideration to documents that have the benefit of running code, which may serve as evidence of valuable experimentation and feedback that have made the implemented protocols more mature. It is up to the individual working groups to use this information as they see fit".¶
The organization responsible for this implementation is Project Veraison, a Linux Foundation project hosted at the Confidential Computing Consortium.¶
The software, hosted at https://github.com/veraison/cmw, provides a Golang package that allows encoding and decoding of CMW payloads. The implementation covers all the features presented in this draft. The maturity level is alpha. The license is Apache 2.0. The developers can be contacted on the Zulip channel: https://veraison.zulipchat.com/#narrow/stream/383526-CMW/.¶
CMW itself does not provide any mechanisms for authenticity, integrity protection, or confidentiality. It is the responsibility of the designer for each use case to determine the necessary security properties and implement them accordingly. In some scenarios, a secure channel (e.g., via TLS) or object-level security (e.g., using JWT) may be sufficient, but this is not always the case.¶
When a CMW is used to carry Evidence for composite or layered attestation of a single device, all components within the CMW must be cryptographically bound to prevent an attacker from replacing Evidence from a compromised device with that from a non-compromised device. Authenticity and integrity protection MUST be provided by the attestation technology. For additional security considerations related to Collections, refer to Section 8.2.¶
RATS conceptual messages are typically secured using cryptography.
If the messages are already protected, no additional security requirements are imposed by this encapsulation.
If an adversary attempts to modify the payload encapsulation, it will result in incorrect processing of the encapsulated message, leading to an error.
If the messages are not protected, additional security must be added at a different layer.
For example, a cbor-record
containing an Unprotected CWT Claims Set (UCCS) [I-D.ietf-rats-uccs] can be signed as described in Section 4.1.¶
Section 4 describes a number of methods that can be used to add cryptographic protection to CMW.¶
If the Collection CMW is not protected from tampering by external security measures (such as object security primitives) or internal mechanisms (such as intra-item binding), an attacker could easily manipulate the Collection's contents. It is the responsibility of the Attester who creates the Collection CMW to ensure that the contents of the Collection are integrity-protected. The designer of the attestation technology is typically in charge of ensuring that the security properties are met, not the user of the conceptual message wrapper. In particular, when a CMW is used to carry multiple Evidence messages for a composite device or layered attestation, there should be strong binding between the Evidence messages within the Collection. This binding is needed to prevent attacks where Evidence from a subverted part of the device is replaced by Evidence from a separate non-subverted device. The binding of Evidence messages should be some form of attestation. For example, key material used to sign/bind an entire Collection CMW should be an attestation key, handled as described in Section 12.1 of [RFC9334]. The binding does not necessarily have to be a signature over the Collection CMW, it might also be achieved through identifiers, cross-linking, signing or hashing between the members of the Collection. Client-authenticated TLS may be used to bind a Collection CMW of Evidence messages. However, the client key used with TLS should not be that of the end-user or owner of the device. Instead, it should be attestation-oriented key material from the device or the attester manufacturer.¶
RFC Editor: Please replace "RFCthis" with the RFC number assigned to this document.¶
RFC Editor: This document uses the CPA (code point allocation) convention described in [I-D.bormann-cbor-draft-numbers]. For each usage of the term "CPA", please remove the prefix "CPA" from the indicated value and replace the residue with the value assigned by IANA; perform an analogous substitution for all other occurrences of the prefix "CPA" in the document. Finally, please remove this note.¶
cmw
Claim Registration
IANA is requested to add a new cmw
claim to the "CBOR Web Token (CWT) Claims" registry [IANA.cwt] as follows:¶
Claim Name: cmw¶
Claim Description: A RATS Conceptual Message Wrapper¶
JWT Claim Name: cmw¶
Claim Key: CPA299¶
Claim Value Type(s): CBOR map, CBOR array, or CBOR tag¶
Change Controller: IETF¶
Specification Document(s): Section 3.1, Section 3.3 and Section 3.2 of RFCthis¶
cmw
Claim Registration
IANA is requested to add a new cmw
claim to the "JSON Web Token Claims" registry of the "JSON Web Token (JWT)" registry group [IANA.jwt] as follows:¶
Claim Name: cmw¶
Claim Description: A RATS Conceptual Message Wrapper¶
Change Controller: IETF¶
Specification Document(s): Section 3.1 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis¶
+jws
Structured Syntax Suffix
IANA is requested to register the +jws
structured syntax suffix in the "Structured Syntax Suffixes" registry [IANA.media-type-structured-suffix] in the manner described in [RFC6838], which can be used to indicate that the media type is encoded as JSON Web Signature (JWS) [RFC7515].¶
JSON Web Signature (JWS)¶
+jws¶
8bit; values are represented as a JSON Object or as a series of base64url-encoded values each separated from the next by a single period ('.') character.¶
n/a¶
n/a¶
See Section 10 of [RFC7515]¶
RATS WG mailing list (rats@ietf.org), or IETF Security Area (saag@ietf.org)¶
Remote ATtestation ProcedureS (RATS) Working Group. The IETF has change control over this registration.¶
IANA is requested to add the following tag to the "CBOR Tags" [IANA.cbor-tags] registry.¶
CBOR Tag | Data Item | Semantics | Reference |
---|---|---|---|
CPA765 | CBOR map, CBOR array, CBOR tag | RATS Conceptual Message Wrapper | Section 3.1, Section 3.2 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis |
This specification defines a new "RATS Conceptual Message Wrapper (CMW) Indicators" registry, with the policy "Expert Review" (Section 4.5 of [BCP26]).¶
The objective is to have CMW Indicators values registered for all RATS Conceptual Messages (Section 8 of [RFC9334]).¶
This registry is to be added to the Remote Attestation Procedures (RATS) registry group at [IANA.rats].¶
The expert is instructed to add the values incrementally.¶
Acceptable values are those corresponding to RATS Conceptual Messages defined by the RATS architecture [RFC9334] and any of its updates.¶
Each entry in the registry must include:¶
A number corresponding to the bit position in the ind
bitmap (Section 3.1).¶
A text string describing the RATS conceptual message this indicator corresponds to.¶
A reference to a document, if available, or the registrant.¶
The initial registrations for the registry are detailed in Table 2.¶
Indicator value | Conceptual Message name | Reference |
---|---|---|
0 | Reference Values | RFCthis |
1 | Endorsements | RFCthis |
2 | Evidence | RFCthis |
3 | Attestation Results | RFCthis |
4-31 | Unassigned | RFCthis |
Before the creation of the registry by IANA, new codepoints can be added to the provisional CMW Indicators registry by following the documented procedure.¶
Table 2 will be regularly updated to match the contents of the provisional registry.¶
The provisional registry will be discontinued once IANA establishes the permanent registry, which is expected to coincide with the publication of the current document.¶
IANA is requested to add the following media types to the "Media Types" registry [IANA.media-types].¶
Name | Template | Reference |
---|---|---|
cmw+cbor
|
application/cmw+cbor
|
Section 3.1, Section 3.2 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis |
cmw+json
|
application/cmw+json
|
Section 3.1 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis |
cmw+cose
|
application/cmw+cose
|
Section 4.1 of RFCthis |
cmw+jws
|
application/cmw+jws
|
Section 4.2 of RFCthis |
application/cmw+cbor
application¶
cmw+cbor¶
n/a¶
cmwc_t
(Collection CMW type in string format. OIDs must use the
dotted-decimal notation. The parameter value is case-insensitive. It must not be used for CMW that are not Collections.)¶
binary (CBOR)¶
n/a¶
RFCthis¶
Attesters, Verifiers, Endorsers and Reference-Value providers, Relying Parties that need to transfer CMW payloads over HTTP(S), CoAP(S), and other transports.¶
The syntax and semantics of fragment identifiers are as specified for "application/cbor". (No fragment identification syntax is currently defined for "application/cbor".)¶
RATS WG mailing list (rats@ietf.org)¶
COMMON¶
none¶
IETF¶
no¶
application/cmw+json
application¶
cmw+json¶
n/a¶
cmwc_t
(Collection CMW type in string format. OIDs must use the
dotted-decimal notation. The parameter value is case-insensitive. It must not be used for CMW that are not Collections.)¶
binary (JSON is UTF-8-encoded text)¶
n/a¶
RFCthis¶
Attesters, Verifiers, Endorsers and Reference-Value providers, Relying Parties that need to transfer CMW payloads over HTTP(S), CoAP(S), and other transports.¶
The syntax and semantics of fragment identifiers are as specified for "application/json". (No fragment identification syntax is currently defined for "application/json".)¶
RATS WG mailing list (rats@ietf.org)¶
COMMON¶
none¶
IETF¶
no¶
application/cmw+cose
application¶
cmw+cose¶
n/a¶
cmwc_t
(Collection CMW type in string format. OIDs must use the
dotted-decimal notation. The parameter value is case-insensitive. It must not be used for CMW that are not Collections.) Note that the cose-type
parameter is explicitly not supported, as it is understood to be "cose-sign1"
.¶
binary (CBOR)¶
n/a¶
RFCthis¶
Attesters, Verifiers, Endorsers and Reference-Value providers, Relying Parties that need to transfer CMW payloads over HTTP(S), CoAP(S), and other transports.¶
n/a¶
RATS WG mailing list (rats@ietf.org)¶
COMMON¶
none¶
IETF¶
no¶
application/cmw+jws
application¶
cmw+jws¶
n/a¶
cmwc_t
(Collection CMW type in string format. OIDs must use the
dotted-decimal notation. The parameter value is case-insensitive. It must not be used for CMW that are not Collections.)¶
8bit; values are represented as a JSON Object or as a series of base64url-encoded values each separated from the next by a single period ('.') character.¶
n/a¶
RFCthis¶
Attesters, Verifiers, Endorsers and Reference-Value providers, Relying Parties that need to transfer CMW payloads over HTTP(S), CoAP(S), and other transports.¶
n/a¶
RATS WG mailing list (rats@ietf.org)¶
COMMON¶
none¶
IETF¶
no¶
IANA is requested to register the following Content-Format IDs in the "CoAP Content-Formats" registry, within the "Constrained RESTful Environments (CoRE) Parameters" registry group [IANA.core-parameters]:¶
Content-Type | Content Coding | ID | Reference |
---|---|---|---|
application/cmw+cbor | - | TBD1 | Section 3.1, Section 3.2 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis |
application/cmw+json | - | TBD2 | Section 3.1 and Section 3.3 of RFCthis |
application/cmw+cose | - | TBD3 | Section 4.1 of RFCthis |
application/cmw+jws | - | TBD4 | Section 4.2 of RFCthis |
If possible, TBD1 and TBD2 should be assigned in the 256..9999 range.¶
New CoAP Content-Formats can be created based on parameterized instances of the application/cmw+json
, application/cmw+cbor
, application/cmw+cose
and application/cmw+jws
media types.¶
When assigning a new CoAP Content-Format ID for a CMW media type that utilizes the cmwc_t
parameter, the registrar must check (directly or through the Designated Expert) that:¶
The corresponding CMW is a Collection (Section 3.3), and¶
The cmwc_t
value is either a (non-relative) OID or an absolute URI.¶
IANA is requested to assign an object identifier (OID) for the CMW extension defined in Section 4.4 in the "SMI Security for PKIX Certificate Extension" registry of the "SMI Numbers" [IANA.smi-numbers] registry group:¶
Decimal | Description | References |
---|---|---|
TBD | id-pe-cmw | Section 4.4 of RFCthis |
IANA is requested to assign an object identifier (OID) for the ASN.1 Module defined in Section 4.4.1 in the "SMI Security for PKIX Module Identifier" registry of the "SMI Numbers" [IANA.smi-numbers] registry group:¶
Decimal | Description | References |
---|---|---|
TBD | id-mod-cmw-collection-extn | Section 4.4.1 of RFCthis |
Figure 4 describes the registration preconditions for using CMWs in either Record CMW or Tag CMW forms. When using Collection CMW, the preconditions apply for each entry in the Collection.¶
The list of currently open issues for this documents can be found at https://github.com/thomas-fossati/draft-ftbs-rats-msg-wrap/issues.¶
RFC Editor: please remove before publication.¶
The authors would like to thank Brian Campbell, Carl Wallace, Carsten Bormann, Ionuț Mihalcea, Michael B. Jones, Mohit Sethi, Russ Housley, and Tom Jones for their reviews and suggestions.¶
The definition of a Collection CMW has been modelled on a proposal originally made by Simon Frost for an EAT-based Evidence collection type. The Collection CMW intentionally attains binary compatibility with Simon's design and aims at superseding it by also generalizing on the allowed Evidence formats.¶
Laurence made significant contributions to enhancing the security requirements and considerations for Collection CMWs.¶