openssh bugs - Oct 2014 - [Bug 2303] New: ssh (and perhaps even sshd) should allow to specify the minimum DH group sizes for DH GEX

https://bugzilla.mindrot.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2303

            Bug ID: 2303
           Summary: ssh (and perhaps even sshd) should allow to specify
                    the minimum DH group sizes for DH GEX
           Product: Portable OpenSSH
           Version: 6.7p1
          Hardware: All
                OS: All
            Status: NEW
          Severity: security
          Priority: P5
         Component: ssh
          Assignee: unassigned-bugs at mindrot.org
          Reporter: calestyo at scientia.net

Hi.

I think it would be a nice feature if ssh/libssh allow to specify the
minimum and maximum accepted group size for DH GEX.

Currently the limits are hardcoded between 1024 - 8912, but this may
not be enough for the security margins expected by client users or
server operators.

A server operator can apparently easy protect against too small groups,
by simply disabling the respective algos (diffie-hellman-group1-sha1
and diffie-hellman-group14-sha1) respectively removing all those
entries from /etc/ssh/moduli, which are considered to be too small.
Well not exactly since there is bug #2302.

But a client has currently no way to restrict the servers choice
(unless by recomiling with new hardcoded defaults).
Of course on cannot protect this way against evil servers, but it's a
good way against those which are just weakly configured without
malicious intent.


I think it's also worth to allow changing the maximum size,... cause
the RFC seems to only suggest a maximum of 8192, but doesn't forbid any
higher.

But people should probably not be allowed to manually set something
smaller than the current 1024.

If the server doesn't accept the client's choice or cannot serve it,
the connection should be aborted and no fallback be made as in #2302.


Cheers,
Chris.

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https://bugzilla.mindrot.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2303

--- Comment #1 from Christoph Anton Mitterer <calestyo at scientia.net>
---
Oh and regarding sshd... well not sure if it makes sense to allow
setting the minimum value for the server side... it may make it easier
to disable smaller DH groups without the need to edit the moduli file.

But it probably does make sense to allow chaning the max... at least to
the value that is supported by sshd.

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