488059 - Keygen tag fails for DSA keys whether or not DSA params are supplied

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Core :: Security: PSM, defect)

Description

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

Attachment: html page/form with DSA keygen tag

I ran NSS's makepqg command to generate a base-64 encoded set of PQG 
parameters.  e.g.

    makepqg -a -o /tmp/474958x.txt -g 160

Then I made a tiny html form with a keygen tag that attempts to generate a
DSA key pair using that set of PQG params.  I have attached a copy of that
html form to this bug.

When I visit the form, and click the submit button, 
- it does not prompt me for my "master password"
- it does not generate a DSA key, 
- it immediately submits something (what?) to the form action URL.

It should leave an "orphan" DSA key in my key DB, but it does not.
Note that when I tried it with RSA and EC keys, those worked, but DSA did not.

Comment 1

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

Oh, and it doesn't report any error to me.  I think that, if there is an 
error in the form or the keygen tag, or PSM is unable to do the keygen for
ANY reason, PSM should tell me the reason (and not "for an unknown reason" :)

Comment 2

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

The fault is seen at 
http://bonsai.mozilla.org/cvsblame.cgi?file=mozilla/security/manager/ssl/src/nsCrypto.cpp&rev=1.78&mark=609-612#607

The code intentionally fails when DSA parameters are provided. 
This is utterly brain dead, and utterly useless to any real DSA CA, 
because DSA CAs will nearly always provide DSA parameters.   

DSA parameters speed up the DSA key gen process by orders of magnitude.
They're GOOD things, and PSM ought not to treat them as undesirable!

Comment 3

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

Turns out that this page fails whether PQG params are supplied or not.
I will attach a couple of improved test pages to show this.

Comment 4

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

Attachment: Improved DSA Keygen test page, this one WITH PQG params

Comment 5

[Nelson Bolyard (seldom reads bugmail)]

Attachment: Improved DSA Keygen test page, this one WITHOUT PQG params

These two newly added test pages actually display the data in the form post.

Comment 6

[:Cykesiopka]

Bug 1215779 has removed the broken DSA code entirely. See Bug 1215779 comment 0 for why the code isn't really worth fixing.