RECENT BLOG NEWS

A while back, we posted that the wolfSSL embedded SSL library would be getting support for Galois/Counter Mode (GCM) encryption in the near future. This is still true! If everything goes as planned, GCM support should be generally available for wolfSSL in June of this year. Specifically, GCM will be used in wolfSSL with AES and as a cipher suite for SSL.  

One of the benefits of GCM is its efficiency and performance in both hardware and software. Galois/Counter Mode (GCM) for block ciphers incorporates both CTR (counter mode) as well as a message authentication code (MAC), providing both integrity and confidentiality. It is designed for block ciphers with a block size of 128 bits and is able to take full advantage of parallel processing and pipelining. Referencing the Wikipedia article on GCM, “the key feature is that the Galois field multiplication used for authentication can be easily computed in parallel thus permitting higher throughput than the authentication algorithms that use chaining modes, like CBC.”

To learn more about the performance and security details of GCM, you can visit the Wikipedia page listed below. We expect to see GCM more widely adopted in the near future.  If you`re interested in testing AES with GCM or have any question or comments please let us know.

GCM (Wikipedia): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galois/Counter_Mode
RFC 5288 (AES Galois Counter Mode (GCM) Cipher Suites for TLS): https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5288

Would you like to see the wolfSSL embedded SSL library integrated into the popular Qt framework? We’ve been throwing around the idea of adding wolfSSL support to Qt and want to hear your feedback. If wolfSSL was integrated into Qt, it would be available as a build option and alternative to using Qt with OpenSSL.

wolfSSL could provide the Qt framework with a much smaller footprint when compared to using Qt with OpenSSL. Looking at typical build sizes of both wolfSSL and OpenSSL, it is typical to see a 20X decrease in footprint size.

What do you think? Please let us know your thoughts, comments, and feedback at info@yassl.com, or by posting in our related thread in our forums.

Qt: https://www1.qt.io/product/
Qt (Wikipedia): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qt_(software)

We would like to recommend an article from EE Times that we recently read which talks about the design and challenges of wireless sensor networks. This article explains some of the challenges faced when implementing a wireless sensor network and the different architectures which can be used, including both clustered sensor architectures and layered architectures.

Sensor networks offer many advantages – they actively provide a robust, reliable, accurate, and fault tolerant network to a wide range of application areas. Applications of wireless sensor networks currently include seismic, thermal, visual, infrared, and other areas within commercial, consumer, government, and academic fields.

One of the challenges that wireless sensor networks face include a necessity for secure, low-power, resource-constrained nodes. The wolfSSL embedded SSL library is ideal for helping secure communication between such nodes because of it’s low resource (ROM/RAM) usage and easy portability to such small devices. To learn more about wolfSSL’s resource usage, you can visit the product page, here.

In the upcoming weeks, yaSSL will be releasing a case study highlighting how one of our customers is using wolfSSL to secure machine-to-machine (M2M) communication, and how wolfSSL has helped overcome some of the challenges outlined in this article. Stay tuned to our blog for updates!

Article: Building wireless M2M & IoT sensor networks: issues and challenges

Team yaSSL has recently been considering the addition of the Camellia block cipher to the wolfSSL embedded SSL library, and we would like to request your feedback on this addition. Do you think it would be a beneficial addition? If it was added to wolfSSL, would you be interested in using it? Because we strive to shape our SSL library around what our users want and need, we greatly value your feedback.

If you are unfamiliar with the Camellia block cipher, you can find a Wikipedia article on the cipher here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camellia_(cipher), or the Camellia cipher’s English homepage, here: http://info.isl.ntt.co.jp/crypt/eng/camellia/index.html.

Please send any feedback to info@yassl.com!

Thanks!
Team yaSSL

Version 2.0.8 of the wolfSSL embedded SSL/TLS library has been released and is now available for download.  This release contains bug fixes, some feature enhancements, and is a recommended update for all users:

– A fix for malicious certificates pointed out by Remi Gacogne (thanks!) resulting in NULL pointer use.
– Respond to renegotiation attempt with no_renegoatation alert
– Add basic path support for load_verify_locations()
– Add set Temp EC-DHE key size
– Extra checks on RSA test when porting into 

To download the open source, GPLv2-licensed version of wolfSSL 2.0.8, please visit our Download Page.  If you have any questions or comments or would like more information on commercial versions of wolfSSL, please contact us at info@yassl.com.

For build instructions, a full feature list, API reference, and more, please see the wolfSSL Manual.

Hi!  We have been asked a number of times about CyaSSL integration with the Nginx web server.  If you are not familiar with Nginx, it is a high performance, high concurrency web server that is becoming extremely popular these days.  You can learn more about Nginx at nginx.com.

Nginx and CyaSSL make a likely pairing because they are both lean, compact, fast, and scale well under high volumes of connections.  The big news today is that CyaSSL is now working with Nginx in the lab, and we expect it to become generally available in the near future.  At this time, we are seeking feedback from those who are particularly interested in using CyaSSL with Nginx and would like to work with us as beta testers.  Let us know what you think at info@yassl.com.

Hi!  The security world has been buzzing this week about two new sets of research into what we will call statistical key cracking.  The hack is one that we would not expect out of your average script kiddie, because it combines sophisticated scanning with mathematical prowess.  The overview story is the first link below.  The second and third links take you to the researchers previews.

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2012/02/crypto-shocker-four-of-every-1000-public-keys-provide-no-security.ars?comments=1#comments-bar

http://eprint.iacr.org/2012/064.pdf

https://freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/nadiah/new-research-theres-no-need-panic-over-factorable-keys-just-mind-your-ps-and-qs

We are particularly interested in the work from Nadia Heninger and her team, given that our user base is skewed towards embedded systems.

Our takeaways from this new research are high entropy seeds are vital to proper key generation.  If a high entropy device is available use it, if not, don`t try to write your own.  Connect securely to a remote server where a high entropy seed can be relayed over the SSL/TLS connection.  And don`t stir the RNG between (p) and (q) generation.  This crack is based on a low entropy seed and the stirring between (p) and (q) generation.  wolfSSL avoids this problem in two ways, by using a high entropy seed from /dev/random and by not stirring between (p) and (q) but before each (p) instead.

wolfSSL is now available as a crypto provider for KoanLogic’s SCS library, LibSCS. SCS, a small cryptographic protocol layered on top of the HTTP cookie facility [RFC6265], allows its users to produce and consume authenticated and encrypted cookies, as opposed to usual cookies, which are un-authenticated and sent in clear text.

From the LibSCS README, “By having a non-tamperable proof of authorship attached, each SCS cookie can always be validated by the originator, making it possible for a server to handle clients` session state without the need to store it locally. In fact, an SCS enabled server could completely delegate the application state storage to the client (e.g. a web browser) and use it, in all respects, as a remote storage device. The result of the cryptographic transformations applied to state data can be used to ensure that its information authenticity and confidentiality attributes are the same as if they were stored privately on server-side.”

You can build LibSCS with wolfSSL by running the following commands. You must have KoanLogic’s makl installed on your development machine (http://koanlogic.com/makl/) to build the package. See the libscs README and INSTALL files for more detailed instructions.

makl-conf –crypto=cyassl
makl

libscs GitHub repository: https://github.com/koanlogic/LibSCS

If you have any questions about wolfSSL with LibSCS, please contact KoanLogic (info@koanlogic) or yaSSL (info@yassl.com).

yaSSL currently secures over 50 million points on the internet.  We don’t talk about who is using CyaSSL, for obvious reasons, but the numbers are big and growing.

We take our work seriously, and hope you feel comfortable with our efforts.  We endeavor to build a business, a community, and do the right thing.  We welcome your feedback.  If you believe that we have failed at some point, then let us know.  We’ll correct it.  We’re open source and open minded about what you have to say.  Contact us at info@yassl.com and let us know how we’re doing!

Did you know that the wolfSSL embedded SSL library supports FreeRTOS and OpenRTOS? FreeRTOS is a real-time operating system for embedded devices which is designed to be both small and simple. With an incredibly large user base, FreeRTOS/OpenRTOS supports 27 architectures and is downloaded from over 77 thousand times every year!

Just like wolfSSL, FreeRTOS is open source, royalty free, and very portable. To build wolfSSL for FreeRTOS, uncomment the #define for FREERTOS in ./cyassl/ctaocrypt/settings.h.

You can find a full list of FreeRTOS features on the FreeRTOS/OpenRTOS website. To learn more about wolfSSL, please visit the wolfSSL product page. If you have any questions about using wolfSSL with FreeRTOS, please contact us at info@yassl.com.

FreeRTOS / OpenRTOS: http://www.freertos.org