SSL Encryption and HTML

[paul at pauldotcom.com (Paul Asadoorian)]

My thoughts on SSL:

1) Spoofing the Certificate - This is successful more often than not,
and since SSL is based on trust, well bad things can happen.  Remember
the security conference where they spoofed bogus certs and most people,
security people at that, accepted the invalid cert?  This is a major
weakness in the concept of SSL (not necessarily the encryption
implementation, which is good, just don't get caught using weak ciphers).

2) Certificate Authorities - If you can own the cert authority, you
could make a big profit :)  Seriously, ever look at the CA's that are
trusted in your browser?  There are some shady places in there, and you
don't necessarily just trust them, you trust however has possession of
their keys...

3) Extended Verification Certs - Firefox just recently included this by
default in version 3, and I think its a good thing, and adds a layer
(albeit a small one) to the security of SSL.  I like to see the green
when I go to a web site (especially if its my bank ;)

Cheers,
Paul

Cody Ray wrote:
> Do you guys agree with the below statement?
>
> Although the login does not occur on a secure HTML page, the login is,
> in fact, secure. We have all been well trained on how to check for
> security. We all look down at our status bar at the bottom of the
> browser to make sure there is a little lock or key that assures us that
> everything is secure before we send anything. Well now there's a new
> rule to learn: data can be sent securely even if you don't see these
> icons of security. When you fill out an information form, or
> application, or login, etc. you are filling out information on one page
> and the information is being sent to a second page. We see the security
> icons when the page that collects the information is secure. The
> information can be sent securely if the collection page is not secure,
> but the page where the information is sent to is secure. This is the
> method we use on home page logins. If you want to assure yourself that
> the information you are sending is secure and you don't see a security
> icon, you can view the HTML source code. This may be intimidating for
> some, but all you have to do is search to find the word "action=." This
> will show you the location of the page that the information will be sent
> to. If you see "action='_https://?',_"; you know that it is being sent
> securely. If you see "action='_http://',_"; you know it is not secure.
>
>
>     Information Encryption
>
> Your account information never travels the Internet without encryption
> protection. When you click on "login", we encrypt your Online Banking ID
> and password using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) technology, the highest
> level of Internet security available. A secure connection is established
> before your ID and password are transmitted and maintained for the
> duration of your Online Banking session. 
>
>
>
>
>
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>
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-- 
Paul Asadoorian
PaulDotCom Enterprises
Web: http://pauldotcom.com
Phone: 401.829.9552

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