Everything John says is true.  We/they have all be sloppy and gone for cheap choices.

But the title of his article promises too much.  It implies that merely being more diligent would lead to a “secure” Internet.  This underestimates the diligence and success rate of bad actors. 

Outside of the Internet, has anyone found a place that has a complete absence of crime?  Even fully totalitarian regimes have a serious undercurrent of crime.  The Internet will never be different from this norm.  It can be (and perhaps is) worse, but it can’t be better.

So, we can make the Internet more tolerable and more safe, but really folks, let’s be careful about managing our expectations, along with managing our better security efforts.

/d

Great article. Security (sadly) is almost never a feature and those who name it as one are seen as a responsible party in one lens or one dispensing FUD in another.

You are correct that as connectivity has become less exclusive and the newly connected are “less responsible.”  However, that same force has allowed a whole slew of innovation and and I don’t mean retail on the Internet.  I mean the innovation based on stretching or breaking acceptable practice.

Manipulating DNS responses was originally unfathomable. A couple companies really broke ground to provide a net benefit to Internet users by directing those end-users to content servers faster (Akamai/UltraDNS).  When those services first launched, there were some (and still today) who think that they violate the protocol.  Those two companies demonstrated that the net effect was positive and it’s now generally accepted.  Today, the practice known as manipulating DNS responses ranges changing answers for geographical/network optimization of content (think Akamai/Neustar UltraDNS/Dynect), what OpenDNS does as a recursive DNS ASP, or what Comcast does as an ISP.  Time seems to make convenience outweigh protocol correctness.

Like all modern systems, the features and convenience we enjoy come with contain methods to abuse them.  I’m not sure that a system which is fully-featured and user-desirable whether it a network operator or a home blogger would prefer the deny first, allow last Internet.

What I am optimistic about is that the Internet has reached a level of maturity where “security” of the whole is now considered.  You can ask a software maintainer to tightening something up and ISPs are more cooperative about reaction.

There is clearly benefit to make sure that default pieces of software are secure by default but if you force a user to choose between security and a feature, we have lost.  Has to be secure by default.

People certainly prefer to be more free, but they also prefer not to be hit over the head and robbed whenever they walk down the street. We’re finding that the current Internet has become unpleasantly close to a mugger’s paradise.

Your DNS example isn’t a very good one, since I don’t know anyone other than a few religious extremists who ever objected to split-horizon DNS. Open mail relays are a better example, which were a convenience when everyone was well behaved, but turned into a serious nuisance when bad guys appeared.

Your parallels to society are interesting and accurate.  It’s a constant struggle between things like “freedom” and “openness” and “privacy” with “security” and “law / law enforcement”, with the ever-present “cost” factor figuring in.  We always try to achieve a balance but the lines tend to move depending on a lot of conditions.  Many were more tolerant - albeit somewhat briefly - of a loss of liberties immediately after 9/11, based primarily on fear rather than reality and logic.  But most of the time, laws seem to only describe what can be done following the commision of what it terms a crime, rather than actually preventing crime.  Security is unfortunately more reactive than proactive.  The threat of consequences only goes so far, and not very far in the online Internet world that spans legal boundaries and jurisdictions and where it is easy to be invisible.  Furthermore, regarding the cost factor, security is lost sometimes not just because it is complicated but simple because (a.) it creates inconveniences for users (as you suggested earlier) and (b.) it costs alot to get there sometimes.  We’ve become incredibly spoiled these days, especially with the Internet providing so much and often for “free”, that we expect prices to continually drop while features and services get better.  For example, we get in a tizzy when our broadband bill is $40/month when it should be $39 or $10 or free, depending on your perspective.  Yet we get in a similar tizzy when the service isn’t secure, or the customer service is slow or outsourced or just plain bad, or the technology or services offered are just mediocre.  We constantly want better while simultaneously wanting cheap (or free.)

It’s not reality.  The money is real and has to come from somewhere. There are jobs to be created or similarly lost.  There are P&L;targets and share prices to consider.  Those that complain most about the price for services or goods are usually the same ones that complain about unemployment rates, or the recessed economy, or declines in their stock portfolio, or a company’s quarterly results being below what they think they should be, or not getting a raise or bonus this year.  Something has to give.  And this applies not only to security in our online services but also for customer service, management features, technical features, etc.  Personally, I’d be willing to pay a premium for many things, including increased security.  Hell, I’d pay an extra monthly fee if a service provider guaranteed that my occasional support call was routed to a human being immediately rather than an auto-attendent IVR from hell.  The same could be said for a more secure service offering.  But I’m probably alone on that.  It costs something to get there, and too many of our expectations are warped to think these things like security are cheap or free, or that you can acquire them without giving up something, perhaps privacy, service quality, features, speed, support, etc.

There’s cheap, fast and good.  You can have 2 of the 3 but not all 3.  Take your pick.

Those interested in the topic might find Alan Turing’s work on cryptanalysis and machines interesting. He is considered the father of modern computers.

The Titanic was thought to be unsinkable. WWII was to end all wars.

The practical implication is that downside risk/failure must be managed.

I happen to have a single rotor Enigma here that I bought at Bletchley Park. Assuming you also have one, I’ll send along a suitable response.  Note that he designed the electromechanical Bombe, not the electronic Colossus.

Also. WW I was supposed to be the war to end all wars.  WW II was indeed the war to end all (large) wars, but now we’re really off the topic.