1 © SURFnet 2001 Roadmap to European Middleware Is it different? TERENA Networking Conference Antalya, May 2001

2 © SURFnet 2001 Contents (European) middleware? Global trends Directories Public Key Infrastructure Inter-domain authorisation Summary

3 © SURFnet 2001 What is Middleware? the intersection of the stuff that network engineers don’t want to do with the stuff that applications developers don’t want to do -- Ken Klingenstein

4 © SURFnet 2001 What is European Middleware? Stuff that the Europeans don´t want to do? Stuff that only the Europeans want to do? Is there no such thing as European middleware?

5 © SURFnet 2001 The European Environment Legislation Privacy Habits Cultural differences

6 © SURFnet 2001 Global Trends (1) IP over everything & everything over IP –Middleware near the intersection IP applications middleware transmission

7 © SURFnet 2001 Global Trends (1) IP over everything and nothing else in between –economical & technical reasons: simplified network architecture –better use of resources: place b/w where needed, when needed Everything over IP and nothing else –end-to-end & open –promotes novelty, business opportunities –de-facto standard

8 © SURFnet 2001 Global Trends (2) Reduced complexity in layers Dumber cores & smarter edges –AAA functions at the edge: DiffServ authenticate locally, act globally

9 © SURFnet 2001 Roadmap to the Middleware Track Directories Public Key Infrastructures Inter-domain authorisation

10 © SURFnet 2001 Directories History: X.500 /Paradise A single global Directory Information Tree was never realised Exit X.500; enter LDAP v2 -> v3 An European NREN White Pages service –Centralised service by DANTE (the glue) –Index & search experimental service: GIDSGIDS Start moving from WP to DEN

11 © SURFnet 2001 Directories (cont’d) IETF LDAP developments: –Ldapext, co-chaired by Roland Hedberg –Ldup –Ldapbis Does LDAP fit our needs? –David Chadwick Schema issues –X.521 vs. Domain Component –EduPerson by Keith Hazelton

12 © SURFnet 2001 Directories (cont’d) Directories for videoconferencing: –Internet2 vidmid European collaboration & co-ordination –Terena TF-LSD –GRID developments Web2ldap –Michael Ströder

13 © SURFnet 2001 PKI European directives: –Digital Signatures Directive (to be implemented on 1 July 2001) –European Signature Standardization Initiative –Qualified Certificates (not for NREN´s?) National differences wrt crypto legislation EuroPKI –Antonio Lioy

14 © SURFnet 2001 PKI (cont’d) Deployment just started; not all issues well understood Start bottom up –Client cert for SSL (http, imap, ipsec, …) –Integration with directories Bottom line is trust

15 © SURFnet 2001 Inter-domain Authorisation Disclosing credentials beyond your administrative domain: –Publishers –Tele-education –Grids Increased flexibility: –Better than IP address-based authentication Increased security: –Weak u/p replaced by e.g. certificate

16 © SURFnet 2001 Inter-domain Authorisation (cont’d) Various attempts to create a system: –Athens –PAPI –STPA –Gestalt –Shibboleth Longer-term architecture: –IRTF AAAARCH RG

17 © SURFnet 2001 Summary There is no such thing as European middleware –But there is an European environment! Start experimenting to understand the issues Strong drive from the R&E community Interoperability should be reached through –Standards –Collaboration