Firewall Wizards mailing list archives

Re: Our friend FTP, again


From: "Marcus J. Ranum" <mjr () nfr net>
Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 16:33:07 -0400

Is there any way of seeing the following happen?
1) enhanced servers and clients that multiplex [...]
2) a cryptographic cookie value passed [...]
3) have a passive mode connection always [...]

How about the following:
        1) Deprecate FTP as an Internet protocol; declare it obsolete.
        2) Use HTTP for all file downloads
        3a) Use ssh for all file transfers and build in an anonymous
                "put" capability in the copy utility
        -or-
        3b) Use some kind of upload capability built into browsers
                and server POST methods. This one scares me because
                web servers are as insecure/messy as FTP but at least
                the protocol isn't as ugly. By a narrow margin.

There's all kinds of things that can be done to improve FTP
but the single best would be to shoot it and shovel dirt
over it. :(

mjr.

--
Marcus J. Ranum, CEO, Network Flight Recorder, Inc.
work - http://www.nfr.net
home - http://www.clark.net/pub/mjr



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