[Python-Dev] Enable Hostname and Certificate Chain Validation

M.-A. Lemburg mal at egenix.com
Wed Jan 22 14:16:18 CET 2014


On 22.01.2014 13:43, Jesse Noller wrote:
>> Well, it's not really a security issue, since the security features
>> are present in Python 3.4. It's just that the user has to enable them.
> 
> I have to concur with Donald here - in the case of security, especially language security which directly impacts the implicit security of downstream applications, I should not have to opt in to the most secure defaults.
> 
> Yes; this potentially breaks applications relying on insecure / loose defaults. However it changes the model to "you are by default, explicitly secure" then relying on the domain knowledge of an application developer to harden their application.
> 
> When, if this changes, an application breaks, it will be in a plainly obvious way which can quickly be resolved.

The "can quickly be resolved" is the issue...

> Donald is perfectly right: today, it's trivial to MITM an application that relies off of the current behavior; this is bad news bears for users and developers as it means they need domain knowledge to secure their applications by default they may not have.

I don't think you need much domain knowledge to insert
a single line of code into applications to enable the checks.

Using an environment switch the extra checks could even be enabled
without any code changes.

-- 
Marc-Andre Lemburg
eGenix.com

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