True, but my guess is that StartCom doing free revocations / reissues would only make a tiny dent in that situation.
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
(Certificate revocation simply doesn't work regardless, but let's stipulate here that it does).
That assumes that all their clients were paying attention. That is almost certainly not the case. It is arguable where the responsibility lies in a case like this, but there is a case to be made that Start carries at least some of the responsibility for having created an environment where such a critical item was so easy to miss.
I am not saying that Start is in fact the villain it is being made out to be, only that the "you get what you pay for" argument should not be the last word.
I also find the notion that people would have gone elsewhere for their certificates had they only known Start's were irrevocable a bit dubious. More than a bit; "laughable" is perhaps a better word. From out here on the limb I'm standing on, I'll suggest that you probably (and quietly) agree.
> I'll suggest that you probably (and quietly) agree.
I agree with most of the literal text of what you have written, but you still continue to ignore the salient fact that this is an unprecedented situation. The continued existence of large numbers of potentially compromised certificates undermines the entirety of X.509 because you can no longer trust the green padlock. The more un-revoked certificates exist in the wild, the less you can trust the entirety of X.509.
Under normal circumstances this wouldn't matter because the number of certificates that get compromised in the normal course of events is small, so the risk of encountering a compromised but un-revoked certificate is small. But in the current situation that is not the case. Vast numbers of private keys are potentially compromised with no way to know, and until something is done about that, the entirety of x.509 is undermined. Cert revocation is far from an ideal solution, but it's better than nothing. At least it offers the possibility of rejecting potentially compromised certs.
In the face of this unprecedented situation, Start's refusal to make any kind of contribution towards mitigation cannot be defended simply by saying that their users should have read the TOS more carefully because those users are not the ones who are being hurt. Everyone who relies on x.509 is being hurt (hence, externality). Start is in a position to make a major contribution towards the mitigation of this problem and the restoration of trust in x.509, and they are refusing to do so. They are entirely within their rights. But it is also not unreasonable to criticize them for choosing not to contribute to the common good.
The Start deal is obvious: you can have an SSL certificate for free now, but that certificate is inappropriate for (for lack of a better term) "serious business" (actually, any business, as stated in their terms, but I digress). The idea behind the offering is that once you realize you actually get value out of the thing they gave you, you'll convert to a paying customer.
Revocation is, as is clearly stated, one of the points in their customer acquisition process at which window-shopping free SSL cert users convert to paying users.
This isn't a complicated analysis. It is the idea behind the offering. People revoking their certificates are demonstrating that they value them. Like most people who value their certs already did, they should simply pay for the new certificate. Failing that, they can (a) accept the minimal risk that their keys were compromised, or (b) change hostnames, kill the old hostname, and start up with a new certificate.
What's at stake here isn't the fate of the Internet. It's the convenience of "customers" who have a revealed $0 preference for security.
I'm guessing that neither of us like the CA cartel, but we deal with the world as it presents itself to us, not as we wish it to be. Support TACK! It's a step in the direction of less dependences on for-profit central authorities.
Yep.
From a POV of fairness to StartCom, I agree with you, and initially saw it as a ridiculous sense of entitlement on the part of their (non-paying) customers. However as a third party user of the web I am somewhat persuaded by the simple argument that the certs should be distrusted on the basis that they are no longer trustworthy.
Edit: Having thought about it for a minute, a logical consequence of my argument is that all certificates signed by CAs that charge a revocation or reissue fee should be distrusted, which probably makes it not a very reasonable argument. I guess this just leaves us at "Valid SSL certificates are not necessarily trustworthy and we just have to live with that".
Edit2: http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2014/04/11/heartbleed-cert...
It is the same reason we have mandatory recycling provisions. Just because your shit is free doesn't mean we have to sit by and watch you pollute the world.
My own personal blog (not very critical) has a Class 2 certificate, and I decided to switch to a Comodo PositiveSSL ($5/year for 5 years) and not revoke the StartSSL one.
I mean, damn people who use a free thing that then get screwed, through no fault of their own, not wanting to be charged $25 for a part of the service that they would never need to use otherwise.
You're either free, or you're not -- StartSSL is a mish-mash of "free" and opportunistic costs.
EDIT:
Are resellers like them more trustworthy? I understand that big CA often sells out to smaller CA and smaller CA sell out to even smaller CA. But how trustworthy are ssls.com and namecheap?
EDIT
Okay. I see. namecheap has been running since 2001 which means it has been doing business pretty well :) So why are they cheaper? Because namecheap are the one managing all the accounts and Comondo is only doing validation?
To answer your question, suppose I think my key has been compromised. Then I don’t want to continue using that key because non-MITM’ed communication between my server and the client is compromised. So I generate a new key, and I’d like a a new certificate for that new key—the old one won’t work (Apple Secure Transport bug notwithstanding). My users are still vulnerable to a MITM attack, yes.
--edit: assuming that the user’s connection uses a non-PFS cipher suite.
Due to $0 price of certificate I guess many had considered it would be a good idea to have a certificate per service, i.e. a separate one for HTTPS, email, XMPP and so on. I did. The overall thought was that if one service would be compromised, others would likely remain safe - but Heartbleed had completely changed the story.
In my case if I'd revoke all the certificate it would be about $600. Call me names if you want to, but I'm not going to shell out that much. Guess, many others would think the same.
I've updated OpenSSL but if any certs were compromised, they would stay so until they would naturally expire.
StartSSL can make free certificates because the entire system is automated (until you require Level 2 certificates) so the cost of operation is very low.
My guess is that the revocation is not entirely automated. There might also be reasons other than technical why it's not the case. In any case, if they explained the reasons it would put some perspective on their point of view and help people understand.