diff options
| author | manuel <manuel@mausz.at> | 2013-02-04 00:08:53 +0100 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | manuel <manuel@mausz.at> | 2013-02-04 00:08:53 +0100 |
| commit | 69aec538b456402170dc723af417ba5c05389c32 (patch) | |
| tree | e6f34c543f17c6392447ea337b2e2868212424d1 /forgeries.7 | |
| download | qmail-69aec538b456402170dc723af417ba5c05389c32.tar.gz qmail-69aec538b456402170dc723af417ba5c05389c32.tar.bz2 qmail-69aec538b456402170dc723af417ba5c05389c32.zip | |
qmail 1.03 import
Diffstat (limited to 'forgeries.7')
| -rw-r--r-- | forgeries.7 | 104 |
1 files changed, 104 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/forgeries.7 b/forgeries.7 new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cb99fa7 --- /dev/null +++ b/forgeries.7 | |||
| @@ -0,0 +1,104 @@ | |||
| 1 | .TH forgeries 7 | ||
| 2 | .SH "NAME" | ||
| 3 | forgeries \- how easy it is to forge mail | ||
| 4 | .SH "SUMMARY" | ||
| 5 | An electronic mail message can easily be forged. | ||
| 6 | Almost everything in it, | ||
| 7 | including the return address, | ||
| 8 | is completely under the control of the sender. | ||
| 9 | |||
| 10 | An electronic mail message can be manually traced to its origin | ||
| 11 | if (1) all system administrators of intermediate machines | ||
| 12 | are both cooperative and competent, | ||
| 13 | (2) the sender did not break low-level TCP/IP security, | ||
| 14 | and | ||
| 15 | (3) all intermediate machines are secure. | ||
| 16 | |||
| 17 | Users of | ||
| 18 | .I cryptography | ||
| 19 | can automatically ensure the integrity and secrecy | ||
| 20 | of their mail messages, as long as | ||
| 21 | the sending and receiving machines are secure. | ||
| 22 | .SH "FORGERIES" | ||
| 23 | Like postal mail, | ||
| 24 | electronic mail can be created entirely at the whim of the sender. | ||
| 25 | .BR From , | ||
| 26 | .BR Sender , | ||
| 27 | .BR Return-Path , | ||
| 28 | and | ||
| 29 | .BR Message-ID | ||
| 30 | can all contain whatever information the sender wants. | ||
| 31 | |||
| 32 | For example, if you inject a message through | ||
| 33 | .B sendmail | ||
| 34 | or | ||
| 35 | .B qmail-inject | ||
| 36 | or | ||
| 37 | .BR SMTP , | ||
| 38 | you can simply type in a | ||
| 39 | .B From | ||
| 40 | field. | ||
| 41 | In fact, | ||
| 42 | .B qmail-inject | ||
| 43 | lets you set up | ||
| 44 | .BR MAILUSER , | ||
| 45 | .BR MAILHOST , | ||
| 46 | and | ||
| 47 | .B MAILNAME | ||
| 48 | environment variables | ||
| 49 | to produce your desired | ||
| 50 | .B From | ||
| 51 | field on every message. | ||
| 52 | .SH "TRACING FORGERIES" | ||
| 53 | Like postal mail, | ||
| 54 | electronic mail is postmarked when it is sent. | ||
| 55 | Each machine that receives an electronic mail message | ||
| 56 | adds a | ||
| 57 | .B Received | ||
| 58 | line to the top. | ||
| 59 | |||
| 60 | A modern | ||
| 61 | .B Received | ||
| 62 | line contains quite a bit of information. | ||
| 63 | In conjunction with the machine's logs, | ||
| 64 | it lets a competent system administrator | ||
| 65 | determine where the machine received the message from, | ||
| 66 | as long as the sender did not break low-level TCP/IP security | ||
| 67 | or security on that machine. | ||
| 68 | |||
| 69 | Large multi-user machines often come with inadequate logging software. | ||
| 70 | Fortunately, a system administrator can easily obtain a copy of a | ||
| 71 | 931/1413/Ident/TAP server, such as | ||
| 72 | .BR pidentd . | ||
| 73 | Unfortunately, | ||
| 74 | some system administrators fail to do this, | ||
| 75 | and are thus unable to figure out which local user | ||
| 76 | was responsible for generating a message. | ||
| 77 | |||
| 78 | If all intermediate system administrators are competent, | ||
| 79 | and the sender did not break machine security or low-level TCP/IP security, | ||
| 80 | it is possible to trace a message backwards. | ||
| 81 | Unfortunately, some traces are stymied by intermediate system | ||
| 82 | administrators who are uncooperative or untrustworthy. | ||
| 83 | .SH "CRYPTOGRAPHY" | ||
| 84 | The sender of a mail message may place his message into a | ||
| 85 | .I cryptographic | ||
| 86 | envelope stamped with his seal. | ||
| 87 | Strong cryptography guarantees that any two messages with the same seal | ||
| 88 | were sent by the same cryptographic entity: | ||
| 89 | perhaps a single person, perhaps a group of cooperating people, | ||
| 90 | but in any case somebody who knows a secret originally held | ||
| 91 | only by the creator of the seal. | ||
| 92 | The seal is called a | ||
| 93 | .I public key\fR. | ||
| 94 | |||
| 95 | Unfortunately, the creator of the seal is often an insecure machine, | ||
| 96 | or an untrustworthy central agency, | ||
| 97 | but most of the time seals are kept secure. | ||
| 98 | |||
| 99 | One popular cryptographic program is | ||
| 100 | .BR pgp . | ||
| 101 | .SH "SEE ALSO" | ||
| 102 | pgp(1), | ||
| 103 | identd(8), | ||
| 104 | qmail-header(8) | ||
