GENWiki

Premier IT Outsourcing and Support Services within the UK

User Tools

Site Tools


rfc:rfc5792

Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) P. Sangster Request for Comments: 5792 Symantec Corporation Category: Standards Track K. Narayan ISSN: 2070-1721 Cisco Systems

                                                            March 2010
        PA-TNC: A Posture Attribute (PA) Protocol Compatible
                 with Trusted Network Connect (TNC)

Abstract

 This document specifies PA-TNC, a Posture Attribute protocol
 identical to the Trusted Computing Group's IF-M 1.0 protocol.  The
 document then evaluates PA-TNC against the requirements defined in
 the NEA Requirements specification.

Status of This Memo

 This is an Internet Standards Track document.
 This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
 (IETF).  It represents the consensus of the IETF community.  It has
 received public review and has been approved for publication by the
 Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG).  Further information on
 Internet Standards is available in Section 2 of RFC 5741.
 Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
 and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
 http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5792.

Copyright Notice

 Copyright (c) 2010 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
 document authors.  All rights reserved.
 This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
 Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
 (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
 publication of this document.  Please review these documents
 carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
 to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
 include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
 the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
 described in the Simplified BSD License.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 1] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 This document may contain material from IETF Documents or IETF
 Contributions published or made publicly available before November
 10, 2008.  The person(s) controlling the copyright in some of this
 material may not have granted the IETF Trust the right to allow
 modifications of such material outside the IETF Standards Process.
 Without obtaining an adequate license from the person(s) controlling
 the copyright in such materials, this document may not be modified
 outside the IETF Standards Process, and derivative works of it may
 not be created outside the IETF Standards Process, except to format
 it for publication as an RFC or to translate it into languages other
 than English.

Table of Contents

 1. Introduction ....................................................4
    1.1. Prerequisites ..............................................4
    1.2. Message Diagram Conventions ................................4
    1.3. Conventions Used in This Document ..........................4
 2. Design Considerations ...........................................4
    2.1. Standard Attribute Namespace for Interoperability ..........4
    2.2. Vendor-Defined Namespace for Differentiation and Agility ...5
    2.3. Use of TLV-Based Encoding for Efficiency ...................6
 3. PA-TNC Message Protocol .........................................7
    3.1. PA-TNC Messaging Model .....................................7
    3.2. PA-TNC Relationship to PB-TNC ..............................8
    3.3. PB-PA Posture Collector and Posture Validator
         Identifiers ...............................................10
    3.4. PA-TNC Messages in PB-TNC .................................10
    3.5. IETF Standard PA Subtypes .................................11
    3.6. PA-TNC Message Header Format ..............................12
 4. PA-TNC Attributes ..............................................13
    4.1.  PA-TNC Attribute Header ..................................13
    4.2.  IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types .....................17
         4.2.1. Attribute Request ..................................18
         4.2.2. Product Information ................................20
         4.2.3. Numeric Version ....................................22
         4.2.4. String Version .....................................24
         4.2.5. Operational Status .................................26
         4.2.6. Port Filter ........................................29
         4.2.7. Installed Packages .................................31
         4.2.8. PA-TNC Error .......................................34
         4.2.9. Assessment Result ..................................41
         4.2.10. Remediation Instructions ..........................42
         4.2.11. Forwarding Enabled ................................45
         4.2.12. Factory Default Password Enabled ..................47
    4.3.  Vendor-Defined Attributes ................................48
 5. Security Considerations ........................................48
    5.1. Trust Relationships .......................................48

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 2] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

         5.1.1. Posture Collector ..................................49
         5.1.2. Posture Validator ..................................49
         5.1.3. Posture Broker Client, Posture Broker Server .......49
    5.2. Security Threats ..........................................50
         5.2.1. Attribute Theft ....................................50
         5.2.2. Message Fabrication ................................51
         5.2.3. Attribute Modification .............................51
         5.2.4. Attribute Replay ...................................52
         5.2.5. Attribute Insertion ................................52
         5.2.6. Denial of Service ..................................53
 6. Privacy Considerations .........................................53
 7. IANA Considerations ............................................54
    7.1. Designated Expert Guidelines ..............................55
    7.2. PA Subtypes ...............................................56
    7.3. Registry for PA-TNC Attribute Types .......................56
    7.4. Registry for PA-TNC Error Codes ...........................57
    7.5. Registry for PA-TNC Remediation Parameters Types ..........58
 8. Acknowledgments ................................................58
 9. References .....................................................59
    9.1. Normative References ......................................59
    9.2. Informative References ....................................59
 Appendix A. Use Cases .............................................60
    A.1. Initial Client-Triggered Assessment .......................60
    A.2. Server-Initiated Assessment with Remediation ..............64
    A.3. Client-Triggered Reassessment .............................71
 Appendix B. Evaluation against NEA Requirements ...................77
    B.1. Evaluation against Requirements C-1 .......................77
    B.2. Evaluation against Requirements C-2 .......................77
    B.3. Evaluation against Requirements C-3 .......................77
    B.4. Evaluation against Requirements C-4 .......................78
    B.5. Evaluation against Requirements C-5 .......................78
    B.6. Evaluation against Requirements C-6 .......................78
    B.7. Evaluation against Requirements C-7 .......................79
    B.8. Evaluation against Requirements C-8 .......................79
    B.9. Evaluation against Requirements C-9 .......................79
    B.10. Evaluation against Requirements C-10 .....................80
    B.11. Evaluation against Requirements C-11 .....................80
    B.12. Evaluation against Requirements PA-1 .....................81
    B.13. Evaluation against Requirements PA-2 .....................81
    B.14. Evaluation against Requirements PA-3 .....................81
    B.15. Evaluation against Requirements PA-4 .....................82
    B.16. Evaluation against Requirements PA-5 .....................82
    B.17. Evaluation against Requirements PA-6 .....................83

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 3] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

1. Introduction

 This document specifies PA-TNC, a Posture Attribute (PA) Protocol
 identical to the Trusted Computing Group's IF-M 1.0 protocol [8].
 The document then evaluates PA-TNC against the requirements defined
 in the Network Endpoint Assessment (NEA) Requirements specification
 [9].

1.1. Prerequisites

 This document does not define an architecture or reference model.
 Instead, it defines a protocol that works within the reference model
 described in the NEA Overview and Requirements specification.  The
 reader is assumed to be thoroughly familiar with that document.  No
 familiarity with TCG specifications is assumed.

1.2. Message Diagram Conventions

 This specification defines the syntax of PA-TNC messages using
 diagrams.  Each diagram depicts the format and size of each field in
 bits.  Implementations MUST send the bits in each diagram as they are
 shown, traversing the diagram from top to bottom and then from left
 to right within each line (which represents a 32-bit quantity).
 Multi-byte fields representing numeric values must be sent in network
 (big endian) byte order.
 Descriptions of bit field (e.g., flag) values are described referring
 to the position of the bit within the field.  These bit positions are
 numbered from the most significant bit through the least significant
 bit, so a 1-octet field with only bit 0 set has the value 0x80.

1.3. Conventions Used in This Document

 The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
 "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
 document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119 [1].

2. Design Considerations

 This section discusses some of the key design considerations for the
 PA protocol.

2.1. Standard Attribute Namespace for Interoperability

 The PA protocol requires the use of two categories of namespaces:
 component types (AKA PA subtypes) and attributes.  Each of these
 namespace categories needs to contain well-known, interoperable names
 with defined syntax and semantics co-existing with names for vendor-

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 4] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 defined private extensions.  Similarly, each namespace category needs
 to be readily extensible without repeated coordination yet avoids
 naming conflicts.
 The PA-TNC and PB-TNC protocols provide for multiple orthogonal
 namespaces for each category that exist without overlap by including
 a Structure of Management Information (SMI) Private Enterprise Number
 (PEN) field to identify the definer of namespace of the associated
 field.  This allows the IETF NEA WG to define a set of standard
 component types and attribute types while allowing vendors to each
 create additional names outside of the IETF standard namespace.  Over
 time, vendor-defined names might be proposed for standardization and
 thus migration into the IETF namespace.
 The PB-TNC protocol defines an IETF standard namespace (using
 vendor-id=0) that allows for definition of standard component types
 (e.g., Operating System, Firewall, Anti-Virus) using the PA Subtype
 field (see section 3.2).  Similarly, PA-TNC defines a set of standard
 attributes in section 4.2 that represent the most common capabilities
 (attributes) of these types of components across a variety of vendor
 implementations.  The standard namespace allows NEA deployments with
 both open source and vendor-provided NEA implementations to support a
 consistent set of policies across their environment based on these
 standard attributes.  The standard attributes can be used with a
 variety of endpoints (hosts, printers, mobile devices) that are
 running applications and operating systems (defined by the PA
 subtypes) from a variety of vendors.

2.2. Vendor-Defined Namespace for Differentiation and Agility

 The endpoint is a very dynamic environment in terms of rate of new
 features being deployed and attacks that are crafted against existing
 and new applications such as viruses, worms, malware, and spyware.
 It is difficult to imagine the standard namespaces being able to keep
 pace with this rapidly changing environment.  Vendors typically
 differentiate themselves by moving rapidly to provide unique
 mechanisms to address such threats and their ability to deal with
 changes in an agile manner.  The PA-TNC and PB-TNC protocols allow
 for creation of vendor-defined namespace(s) where each namespace
 allows use of vendor-defined PA subtypes to identify non-standard
 applications or operating system variants and vendor-defined
 attributes describing new aspects of each type of component.  The
 vendor namespaces will allow NEA deployments to craft compliance
 policies using a mixture of attributes from both the IETF standard
 namespace and vendor-defined namespaces that may include multiple
 vendors representing the various hardware and software components
 present on the endpoints.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 5] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The PA-TNC protocol's use of vendor-id to identify the namespace of
 each attribute allows Posture Collectors to support some or all of
 the IETF standard attributes plus optionally a set of vendor-defined
 attributes (potentially from more than one vendor-id namespace).  For
 instance, an open source anti-virus Posture Collector might be
 written that supports all of the IETF standard attributes used to
 describe a local anti-virus component and a subset of multiple anti-
 virus manufacturers' vendor-defined attributes.  This Posture
 Collector might therefore be able to interoperate with Posture
 Validators from multiple vendors.  Conversely, a simple Posture
 Collector might be written to ignore any vendor-defined attributes
 requested and only return standard attributes that it supports.  If
 the vendor-provided Posture Validator's policy allows for this subset
 to be considered compliant, then these simple Posture Collectors can
 be used to perform a successful assessment.

2.3. Use of TLV-Based Encoding for Efficiency

 The PA-TNC protocol has chosen to employ a binary encoding using a
 type-length-value (TLV) structure.  TLV encoding was preferred over
 the use of a textual encoding format such as XML to provide a more
 efficient utilization of the potentially constrained bandwidth
 available between the NEA Client and NEA Server (see NEA Overview and
 Architecture [9]).  Efficiency was a primary criterion for this
 choice with consideration given to both:
    1. Optimization of the bits-on-the-wire to accommodate NEA
       requirements for assessment over low bandwidth or high latency
       links (C-8) and allow for the Posture Transport (PT) protocol
       to run over existing network access protocols (PT-4, C-11) that
       are constrained by packet size.
    2. Optimization of CPU utilization on the endpoint to accommodate
       for low power endpoints such as mobile devices.
 The choice of TLV encoding does not preclude the use of XML-based
 attribute values within the vendor namespaces or future standard
 attributes.  It is conceivable that certain vendors may utilize XML
 encoding for extensibility within their namespace when the above
 considerations are less applicable to their technologies.  Attributes
 encoded within the vendor-defined namespace using alternate encoding
 such as XML will be opaque to NEA software only supporting standard
 attributes and will be processed primarily by the vendor-defined
 components (collector/validator).

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 6] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

3. PA-TNC Message Protocol

 This section discusses the use of the PA-TNC message and its
 attributes, and specifies the syntax and semantics for the PA-TNC
 message header.  The details of each attribute included within the
 PA-TNC payload are specified in section 4.2.

3.1. PA-TNC Messaging Model

 PA-TNC messages are carried by the PB-TNC protocol [5], which
 provides a multi-roundtrip reliable transport and end-to-end message
 delivery to subscribed (interested) parties using a variety of
 underlying network protocols.  PA-TNC is unaware of these underlying
 PT protocols being used below PB-TNC.
 The interested parties consist of Posture Collectors on the NEA
 Client and Posture Validators associated with the NEA Server that
 have registered to receive messages about particular types of
 components (e.g., anti-virus) during an assessment.  The PA-TNC
 messaging protocol operates synchronously within an assessment
 session, with Posture Collectors and Posture Validators taking turns
 sending one or more messages to each other.  Each PA-TNC message may
 contain one or more attributes associated with the functional
 component identified in the component type (PA Subtype) of the
 Posture Broker (PB) protocol.
 Posture Collectors may only send PA-TNC messages to Posture
 Validators and vice versa.  No Posture Collector-to-Posture Collector
 or Posture Validator-to-Posture Validator messaging is allowed to
 occur.  Each Posture Collector or Posture Validator may send several
 PA-TNC messages in succession before indicating that it has completed
 its batch of messages to the Posture Broker Client or Posture Broker
 Server respectively.  As necessary, the Posture Broker Client and
 Posture Broker Server will batch these messages prior to sending them
 over the network.
 PB-TNC provides a publish/subscribe model of message exchange.  This
 means that, at any given point in time, zero or more subscribers for
 a particular type of message may be present on a Posture Broker
 Client or Posture Broker Server.  This is beneficial, since it allows
 one Posture Collector or Posture Validator to combine multiple
 functions (like anti-virus and personal firewall) by subscribing to
 both TNC standard component types.  It also allows multiple Posture
 Collectors or Posture Validators to support the same components, such
 as two anti-virus Posture Validators that are each used to manage
 their own respective anti-virus client software.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 7] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 However, this publish/subscribe model has some possible negative side
 effects.  When a Posture Collector or Posture Validator initially
 sends a PA-TNC message, it does not know whether it will receive
 many, one, or no PA-TNC messages from the other side.  For many types
 of assessments, this is acceptable, but in some cases a more direct
 channel binding between a particular Posture Collector and Posture
 Validator pair is necessary.  For example, a Posture Validator may
 wish to provide remediation instructions to a particular Posture
 Collector that it knows is capable of remediating a non-compliant
 component.  This can be accomplished using the exclusive delivery PB-
 TNC capability to limit distribution of a message to a single Posture
 Collector by including the target Posture Collector Identifier in the
 PB-PA header.  For more information on the PB-PA header, see section
 4.5 of the PB-TNC specification.

3.2. PA-TNC Relationship to PB-TNC

 This section summarizes the major elements of a PA-TNC message as
 they might appear inside of a PB-TNC message.  The double line (===)
 in the diagram below indicates the separation between the PB-TNC and
 PA-TNC protocols.  The PA-TNC portion of the message is delivered to
 each Posture Collector or Posture Validator registered to receive
 messages containing a particular message type.  Note that PB-TNC is
 capable of carrying multiple PB-TNC and PA-TNC messages in a single
 PB-TNC batch.  See the PB-TNC specification [5] for more information
 on its capabilities.
 One important linkage between the PA-TNC and PB-TNC protocols is the
 PA message type (PA Message Vendor ID and PA Subtype) that is used by
 the Posture Broker Client and Posture Broker Server to route messages
 to interested Posture Collectors and Posture Validators.  The message
 type indicates the software component (component type) that is
 associated with the attributes included inside the PA-TNC message.
 Therefore, Posture Collectors and Posture Validators written to
 support an assessment of a particular component can register to
 receive messages about the component and thus participate in its
 assessment.  Each Posture Collector and Posture Validator MUST only
 send PA-TNC messages containing attributes that pertain to the
 software component defined in the message type of the message.  This
 ensures that only the appropriate Posture Collectors and Posture
 Validators that support a particular type of component will receive
 attributes related to that component.  If a PA-TNC message contained
 a mix of attributes about different components and a message type of
 only one of those components, the message would only be delivered to
 parties interested in the component type included in the message
 type, so other interested recipients wouldn't see those attributes.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 8] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The message type is composed of two fields: a PA Message Vendor ID
 and a PA Subtype.  The PA Message Vendor ID identifies the vendor or
 other organization that defined this message type.  The PA Subtype
 identifies the message type more specifically within the set of
 message types defined by that vendor.  This specification defines
 several IETF Standard PA Subtypes to be used with a PA Message Vendor
 ID of zero (0).  Within this specification, the PA Subtype field is
 used to indicate the type of component (e.g., firewall) involved with
 the message's attributes.  Therefore, for clarity, the PA subtype
 will be referred to as the "component type" in this specification.
 Vendor-defined namespaces may use other semantics for the PA Subtype
 field as this is outside the scope of this specification.
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                         PB-TNC Header                       |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                PB-TNC Message of type PB-PA-Message         |
 |(includes PA Message Vendor ID, PA Subtype, and other fields |
 | used by Posture Broker Client and Posture Broker Server for |
 | routing)                                                    |
 ===============================================================
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     PA-TNC Message Header                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                         PA-TNC Attribute                    |
 |                  (e.g., Product Information)                |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                         PA-TNC Attribute                    |
 |                  (e.g., Operational Status)                 |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Figure 1.  Overview of a PB-TNC batch that contains a PA-TNC message
 For example, if a Posture Broker Client sent a PB-TNC batch that
 contained a PA-TNC message with a message type indicating firewall
 component, this message would be routed by the Posture Broker Server
 to Posture Validators registered to assess firewalls.  Each
 registered Posture Validator would receive a copy of the PA-TNC
 message including the PA-TNC header and set of attributes.  It is
 important that each of the attributes included in the PA-TNC message
 be associated with the firewall component because only the Posture
 Collector and Posture Validator interested in firewalls will receive
 such messages.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 9] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 If the above message contained both firewall and operating system
 attributes inside a PA-TNC message with a component type of firewall,
 then any Posture Collector and Posture Validator registered to
 receive operating system messages would not receive those attributes,
 as the messages would only be delivered to those registered for
 firewall messages.

3.3. PB-PA Posture Collector and Posture Validator Identifiers

 The PB-PA header contains several fields important to the processing
 of a received PA message.  The PA Vendor ID and Subtype are described
 in the PB-TNC specification and above in section 3.2.  Also present
 in the PB-PA header is a pair of fields that identify the Posture
 Collector and/or Posture Validator involved in the exchange.  These
 fields are used for performing exclusive delivery of messages as
 described in section 3.1 and as an indicator for correlation of
 received attributes.
 Correlation of attributes is necessary when the sending Posture
 Collector provides posture for multiple implementations of a single
 type of component during an assessment, so the recipient Posture
 Validators need to know which attributes are describing the same
 implementation.
 For example, a single Posture Collector might report attributes on
 two installed VPN implementations on the endpoint.  Because the
 individual attributes do not include an indication of which VPN
 product they are describing, the recipient needs something to perform
 this correlation.  Therefore, for this example, the VPN Posture
 Collector would need to obtain two Posture Collector Identifiers from
 the Posture Broker Client and consistently use one with each of the
 implementations during an assessment.  The VPN Posture Collector
 would group all the attributes associated with a particular VPN
 implementation into a single PB-PA message and send the message using
 the Posture Collector Identifier it designates as going with the
 particular implementation.  This approach allows the recipient to
 recognize when attributes in future assessment messages also describe
 the same component implementation.

3.4. PA-TNC Messages in PB-TNC

 As depicted in section 3.2, a PA-TNC message consists of a PA-TNC
 header followed by a sequence of one or more attributes.  The PA-TNC
 message header (described in section 3.6) and the header for each of
 the PA-TNC attributes (specified in section 4.1) have a fixed type-
 length-value (TLV) format.  Each PA-TNC message MAY contain a mixture
 of standards-based and vendor-defined attributes identifiable using
 the type portion of the attribute header.  All Posture Collectors and

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 10] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Posture Validators compliant with this specification MUST be capable
 of processing multiple attributes in a received PA-TNC message.  A
 Posture Collector or Posture Validator that receives a PA-TNC message
 can use the attribute header's length field to skip any attributes
 that it does not understand, unless the attribute is marked as
 mandatory to process.

3.5. IETF Standard PA Subtypes

 This section defines several IETF Standard PA Subtypes.  Each PA
 subtype defined here identifies a specific component relevant to the
 endpoint's posture.  This allows a small set of generic PA-TNC
 attributes (e.g., Product Information) to be used to describe a large
 number of different components (e.g., operating system, anti-virus,
 etc.).  It also allows Posture Collectors and Posture Validators to
 specialize in a particular component and only receive PA-TNC messages
 relevant to that component.
 Value    Integer           Definition
 -----    -------           ----------
 0        Testing           Reserved for use in specification
                            examples, experimentation and
                            testing.
 1        Operating System  Operating system running on the
                            endpoint
 2        Anti-Virus        Host-based anti-virus software
 3        Anti-Spyware      Host-based anti-spyware software
 4        Anti-Malware      Host-based anti-malware (e.g., anti-
                            bot) software not included within
                            anti-virus or anti-spyware components
 5        Firewall          Host-based firewall
 6        IDPS              Host-based Intrusion Detection and/or
                            Prevention Software (IDPS)
 7        VPN               Host-based Virtual Private Network
                            (VPN) software
 8        NEA Client        NEA client software
 These PA subtypes must be used in a PB-PA message with a PA Message
 Vendor ID of zero (0) indicating an IETF standard type of component
 (as described in the PB-TNC specification [5]).  If these PA subtype

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 11] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 values are used with a different PA Message Vendor ID, they have a
 completely different meaning that is not defined in this
 specification.  Posture Collectors and Posture Validators MUST NOT
 require support for particular vendor-specific PA subtypes and MUST
 interoperate with other parties despite any differences in the set of
 vendor-specific PA subtypes supported (although they MAY permit
 administrators to configure them to require support for specific PA
 subtypes).

3.6. PA-TNC Message Header Format

 This section describes the format and semantics of the PA-TNC header.
 Every PA-TNC message MUST start with a PA-TNC header.  The PA-TNC
 header provides a common context applying to all of the attributes
 contained within the PA-TNC payload.  The payload consists of a
 sequence of assessment attributes described in section 4.2.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Version    |                    Reserved                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                       Message Identifier                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Version
    This field indicates the version of the format for the PA-TNC
    message.  This version is intended to allow for evolution of the
    PA-TNC message header and payload in a manner that can easily be
    detected by message recipients.
    PA-TNC message senders MUST set this field to 0x01 for all PA-TNC
    messages that comply with this specification.  Implementations
    responding to a PA-TNC message containing a supported version MUST
    use the same version number to minimize the risk of version
    incompatibility.  Message recipients MUST respond to a PA-TNC
    message containing an unsupported version by sending a Version Not
    Supported error in a PA-TNC Error attribute that is the only PA-
    TNC attribute in a PA-TNC message with version number 1.
    PA-TNC message initiators supporting multiple PA-TNC protocol
    versions SHOULD be able to alter which version of PA-TNC message
    they send based on prior message exchanges with a particular peer
    Posture Collector or Posture Validator.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 12] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Reserved
    Reserved for future use.  This field MUST be set to 0 on
    transmission and ignored upon reception.
 Message Identifier
    This field contains a value that uniquely identifies this message,
    differentiating it from others sent by a particular PA-TNC message
    sender within this assessment.  This value can be included in the
    payload of a response message to indicate which message was
    received and caused the response.  This value is included in the
    payload of PA-TNC error messages so the party who receives the
    error message can determine which of the messages they had sent
    caused the error.
    PA-TNC message senders MUST NOT send the same message identifier
    more than once during an assessment.  Message identifiers may be
    randomly generated or sequenced as long as values are not repeated
    during an assessment message exchange.  PA-TNC message recipients
    are not required to check for duplicate message identifiers.

4. PA-TNC Attributes

 This section defines the PA-TNC attributes that can be carried within
 a PA-TNC message.  The initial section defines the standard attribute
 header that appears at the start of each attribute in a PA-TNC
 message.  The second section defines each of the IETF Standard PA-TNC
 Attributes and the final section discusses how vendor-defined PA-TNC
 attributes can be used within a PA-TNC message.  Vendor-defined PA-
 TNC attributes use the vendor's SMI Private Enterprise Number in the
 Attribute Type field.
 A PA-TNC message MUST contain a PA-TNC header (defined in section
 3.6.  followed by a sequence of zero or more PA-TNC attributes.  All
 PA-TNC attributes MUST begin with a standard PA-TNC attribute header,
 as defined in section 4.1.  The contents of PA-TNC attributes vary
 widely, depending on their attribute type.  Section 4.2 defines the
 IETF Standard PA-TNC Attributes.  Section 4.3 discusses how vendor-
 specific PA-TNC attributes can be defined.

4.1. PA-TNC Attribute Header

 Following the PA-TNC message header is a sequence of zero or more
 attributes.  All PA-TNC attributes MUST begin with the standard PA-
 TNC attribute header defined in this subsection.  Each attribute
 described in this specification is represented by a TLV tuple.  The
 TLV tuple includes an attribute identifier comprised of the Vendor ID

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 13] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 and Attribute Type (type), the TLV tuple's overall length, and
 finally the attribute's value.  The use of TLV representation was
 chosen due to its flexibility and extensibility and use in other
 standards.  Recipients of an attribute can use the attribute type
 fields to determine the precise syntax and semantics of the attribute
 value field and the length to skip over an unrecognized attribute.
 The length field is also beneficial when a variable-length attribute
 value is provided.
 The TLV format does not contain an explicit TLV format version
 number, so every attribute included in a particular PA-TNC message
 MUST use the same TLV format.  Using the PA-TNC message version
 number to indicate the format of all TLV attributes within a PA-TNC
 message allows for future versioning of the TLV format in a manner
 detectable by PA-TNC message recipients.  Similarly, requiring all
 TLV attribute formats to be the same within a PA-TNC message also
 ensures that recipients compliant with a particular PA-TNC message
 version can at least parse every attribute header and use the length
 to skip over unrecognized attributes.  Finally, all attribute TLVs
 within a PA-TNC message MUST pertain to the same implementation of
 the component.  This restriction is relevant when a single Posture
 Collector is reporting on multiple implementations of a component, so
 must send multiple PA-TNC messages each including only the attributes
 describing a single implementation.  For more information on how
 Posture Collectors should handle multiple implementations, see
 section 3.3.
 Every PA-TNC-compliant TLV attribute MUST use the following TLV
 format:
                     1                   2                   3
 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |     Flags     |          PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     PA-TNC Attribute Type                     |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                    PA-TNC Attribute Length                    |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                 Attribute Value (Variable Length)             |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Flags
    This field defines flags impacting the processing of the
    associated attribute.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 14] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    Bit 0 (0x80) is the NOSKIP flag.  Any Posture Collector or Posture
    Validator that receives an attribute with this flag set to 1 but
    does not support this attribute MUST NOT process any part of the
    PA-TNC message and SHOULD respond with an Attribute Type Not
    Supported error in a PA-TNC error message.
    In order to avoid taking action on a subset of the attributes only
    to later find an unsupported attribute with the NOSKIP flag set,
    recipients of a multi-attribute PA-TNC message might need to scan
    all of the attributes prior to acting upon any attribute.
    When the NOSKIP flag is set to 0, recipients SHOULD skip any
    unsupported attributes and continue processing the next attribute.
    Bit 1-7 are reserved for future use.  These bits MUST be set to 0
    on transmission and ignored upon reception.
 PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID
    This field indicates the owner of the namespace associated with
    the PA-TNC Attribute Type.  This is accomplished by specifying the
    24-bit SMI Private Enterprise Number Vendor ID of the party who
    owns the Attribute Type namespace.  IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute
    Types MUST use zero (0) in this field.
    The PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID 0xffffff is reserved.  Posture
    Collectors and Posture Validators MUST NOT send PA-TNC messages in
    which the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID has this reserved value
    (0xffffff).  If a Posture Collector or Posture Validator receives
    a message in which the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID has this
    reserved value (0xffffff), it SHOULD respond with an Invalid
    Parameter error code in a PA-TNC Error attribute.
 PA-TNC Attribute Type
    This field defines the type of the attribute included in the
    Attribute Value field.  This field is qualified by the PA-TNC
    Attribute Vendor ID field so that a particular PA-TNC Attribute
    Type value (e.g., 327) has a completely different meaning
    depending on the value in the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field.
    Posture Collectors and Posture Validators MUST NOT require support
    for particular vendor-specific PA-TNC Attribute Types and MUST
    interoperate with other parties despite any differences in the set
    of vendor-specific PA-TNC Attribute Types supported (although they
    MAY permit administrators to configure them to require support for
    specific PA-TNC attribute types).

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 15] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    If the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field has the value zero (0),
    then the PA-TNC Attribute Type field contains an IETF Standard PA-
    TNC Attribute Type, as listed in the IANA registry.  IANA
    maintains a registry of PA-TNC Attribute Types.  Entries in this
    registry are added by Expert Review with Specification Required,
    following the guidelines in section 7.  Section 4.2 of this
    specification defines the initial set of IETF Standard PA-TNC
    Attribute Types.
    The PA-TNC Attribute Type 0xffffffff is reserved.  Posture
    Collectors and Posture Validators MUST NOT send PA-TNC messages in
    which the PA-TNC Attribute Type has this reserved value
    (0xffffffff).  If a Posture Collector or Posture Validator
    receives a message in which the PA-TNC Attribute Type has this
    reserved value (0xffffffff), it SHOULD respond with an Invalid
    Parameter error code in a PA-TNC Error attribute.
 PA-TNC Attribute Length
    This field contains the length in octets of the entire PA-TNC
    attribute including the PA-TNC Attribute Header (the fields Flags,
    PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID, PA-TNC Attribute Type, and PA-TNC
    Attribute Length).  Therefore, this value MUST always be at least
    12.  Any Posture Collector or Posture Validator that receives a
    message with a PA-TNC Attribute Length field whose value is less
    than 12 SHOULD respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error
    code.  Similarly, if a Posture Collector or Posture Validator
    receives a PA-TNC message for an Attribute Type that has a well-
    known Attribute Value length (e.g., fixed-length attribute value)
    and the Attribute Length indicates a different value (greater or
    less than the expected value), the recipient SHOULD respond with
    an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.
    Implementations that do not support the specified PA-TNC Attribute
    Type can use this length to skip over this attribute to the next
    attribute.  Note that while this field is 4 octets the maximum
    usable attribute length is less than 2^32-1 due to limitations of
    the underlying protocol stack.  Specifically, PB-TNC TLV header's
    Batch Length field is also 32 bits in length.  Therefore, the
    maximum batch that PB-TNC can carry is 2^32-1, so the largest PA-
    TNC message carried by PB-TNC must be less than 2^32-1 - size of
    the PB-TNC header (see section 4.1 of PB-TNC for more details).
 Attribute Value
    This field varies depending on the particular type of attribute
    being expressed.  The contents of this field for each of the IETF
    Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types are defined in section 4.2.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 16] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

4.2. IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types

 This section defines an initial set of IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute
 Types.  These Attribute Types MUST always be used with a PA-TNC
 Vendor ID of zero (0).  If these PA-TNC Attribute Type values are
 used with a different PA-TNC Vendor ID, they have a completely
 different meaning that is not defined in this specification.
 The following table briefly describes each attribute and defines the
 numeric value to be used in the PA-TNC Attribute Type field of the
 PA-TNC Attribute Header.  Later subsections provide detailed
 specifications for each PA-TNC Attribute Value.
 Number  Integer                  Description
 ------  -------                  -----------
 0       Testing                  Reserved for use in
                                  specification examples,
                                  experimentation, and testing.
 1       Attribute Request        Contains a list of attribute
                                  type values defining the
                                  attributes desired from the
                                  Posture Collectors.
 2       Product Information      Manufacturer and product
                                  information for the component.
 3       Numeric Version          Numeric version of the
                                  component.
 4       String Version           String version of the
                                  component.
 5       Operational Status       Describes whether the component
                                  is running on the endpoint.
 6       Port Filter              Lists the set of ports (e.g.,
                                  TCP port 80 for HTTP) that are
                                  allowed or blocked on the
                                  endpoint.
 7       Installed Packages       List of software packages
                                  installed on endpoint that
                                  provide the requested
                                  component.
 8       PA-TNC Error             PA-TNC message or attribute
                                  processing error.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 17] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 9       Assessment Result        Result of the assessment
                                  performed by a Posture
                                  Validator.
 10      Remediation Instructions Instructions for remediation
                                  generated by a Posture
                                  Validator.
 11      Forwarding Enabled       Indicates whether packet
                                  forwarding has been enabled
                                  between different interfaces on
                                  the endpoint.
 12      Factory Default Password Indicates whether the endpoint
         Enabled                  has a factory default password
                                  enabled.
 The following subsections discuss the usage, format, and semantics of
 the Attribute Value field for each IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute
 Type.

4.2.1. Attribute Request

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type allows a Posture Validator to request
 certain attributes from the registered set of Posture Collectors.
 All Posture Collectors that implement any of the IETF Standard PA
 Subtypes defined in this specification SHOULD support receiving and
 processing this attribute type for at least those PA subtypes.  This
 requirement is only a "should" because there are deployment scenarios
 (e.g., see section A.1) where the Posture Collectors proactively send
 a set of attributes at the start of an assessment (e.g., based upon
 local policy), so does not need to support Posture Validator
 requested attributes.  Posture Collectors that receive but do not
 support the Attribute Request attribute MUST respond with an
 Attribute Type Not Supported PA-TNC error code.  Posture Collectors
 that receive and process this attribute MAY choose to send all, a
 subset, or none of the requested attributes but MUST NOT send
 attributes that were not requested (except Error attributes).  All
 Posture Validators that implement any of the IETF Standard PA
 Subtypes defined in this specification SHOULD support sending this
 attribute type for at least those PA subtypes.
 Posture Validators MUST NOT include this attribute type in an
 Attribute Request attribute.  It does not make sense for a Posture
 Validator to request that a Posture Collector send an Attribute
 Request attribute.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 18] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 1.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
 Note that this diagram shows two attribute types.  The actual number
 of attribute types included in an Attribute Request attribute can
 vary from one to a large number (limited only by the maximum message
 and length supported by the underlying PT protocol).  However, each
 Attribute Request MUST contain at least one attribute type.  Because
 the length of a PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID paired with a PA-TNC
 Attribute Type and a 1-octet Reserved field is always 8 octets, the
 number of requested attributes can be easily computed using the PA-
 TNC Attribute Length field by subtracting the number of octets in the
 PA-TNC Attribute Header and dividing by 8.  If the PA-TNC Attribute
 Length field is invalid, Posture Collectors SHOULD respond with an
 Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |   Reserved    |           PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID          |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                      PA-TNC Attribute Type                    |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |   Reserved    |           PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID          |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                      PA-TNC Attribute Type                    |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Reserved
    Reserved for future use.  This field MUST be set to 0 on
    transmission and ignored upon reception.
 PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID
    This field contains the SMI Private Enterprise Number of the
    organization that controls the namespace for the following PA-TNC
    Attribute Type.  This field enables IETF Standard PA-TNC
    Attributes and vendor-defined PA-TNC attributes to be used without
    potential collisions.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 19] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    Any IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types defined in section 4.2
    MUST use zero (0) in this field.  Vendor-defined attributes MUST
    use the SMI Private Enterprise Number of the organization that
    defined the attribute.
 PA-TNC Attribute Type
    The PA-TNC Attribute Type field (together with the PA-TNC Vendor
    ID field) indicates the specific attribute requested.  Some IETF
    Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types MUST NOT be requested using this
    field (e.g., requesting a PA-TNC Error attribute).  This is
    explicitly indicated in the description of those PA-TNC Attribute
    Types.  Any Posture Collector or Posture Validator that receives
    an Attribute Request containing one of the prohibited Attribute
    Types SHOULD respond with an Invalid Parameter error in a PA-TNC
    error message.

4.2.2. Product Information

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type contains identifying information about a
 product that implements the component specified in the PA Subtype
 field, as described in section 3.5.  For example, if the PA Subtype
 is Anti-Virus, this attribute would contain information identifying
 an anti-virus product installed on the endpoint.
 All Posture Collectors that implement any of the IETF Standard PA
 Subtypes defined in this specification MUST support sending this
 attribute type, at least for those PA subtypes.  Whether a particular
 Posture Collector actually sends this attribute type SHOULD still be
 governed by local privacy and security policies.  All Posture
 Validators that implement any of the IETF Standard PA Subtypes
 defined in this specification MUST support receiving this attribute
 type, at least for those PA subtypes.  Posture Validators MUST NOT
 send this attribute type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 2.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field will vary, depending
 on the length of the Product Name field.  However, the value in the
 PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be at least 17 because this is the
 length of the fixed-length fields in the PA-TNC Attribute Header and
 the fixed-length fields in this attribute type.  If the PA-TNC
 Attribute Length field is less than the size of these fixed-length
 fields, implementations SHOULD respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-
 TNC error code.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 20] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 This attribute type includes both numeric and textual identifiers for
 the organization that created the product (the "product creator") and
 for the product itself.  For automated processing, numeric
 identifiers are superior because they are less ambiguous and more
 efficient.  However, numeric identifiers are only available if the
 product creator has assigned them.  Therefore, a textual identifier
 is also included.  This textual identifier has the additional benefit
 that it may be easier for humans to read (although this benefit is
 minimal since the primary purpose of this attribute is automated
 assessment).
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |               Product Vendor ID               |  Product ID   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |  Product ID   |         Product Name (Variable Length)        |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Product Vendor ID
    This field contains the SMI Private Enterprise Number for the
    product creator.  If the SMI PEN for the product creator is
    unknown or if the product creator does not have an SMI PEN, the
    Product Vendor ID field MUST be set to 0 and the identity of the
    product creator SHOULD be included in the Product Name along with
    the name of the product.
 Product ID
    This field identifies the product using a numeric identifier
    assigned by the product creator.  If this Product ID value is
    unknown or if the product creator has not assigned such a value,
    this field MUST be set to 0.  If the Product Vendor ID is 0, this
    field MUST be set to 0.  In any case, the name of the product
    SHOULD be included in the Product Name field.
    Note that a particular Product ID value (e.g., 635) will have
    completely different meanings depending on the Product Vendor ID.
    Each Product Vendor ID defines a different space of Product ID
    values.  Product creators are encouraged to publish lists of
    Product ID values for their products.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 21] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Product Name
    This variable-length field contains a UTF-8 [2] string identifying
    the product (e.g., "Symantec Norton AntiVirus(TM) 2008") in enough
    detail to unambiguously distinguish it from other products from
    the product creator.  Products whose creator is known, but does
    not have a registered SMI Private Enterprise Number, SHOULD be
    represented using a combination of the creator name and full
    product name (e.g., "Ubuntu(R) IPtables" for the IPtables firewall
    in the Ubuntu distribution of Linux).  If the product creator's
    SMI Private Enterprise Number is included in the Product Vendor ID
    field, the product creator's name may be omitted from this field.
    The length of this field can be determined by starting with the
    value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field in the PA-TNC Attribute
    Header and subtracting the size of the fixed-length fields in that
    header (12) and the size of the fixed-length fields in this
    attribute (5).  If the PA-TNC Attribute Length field is less than
    the size of these fixed-length fields, implementations SHOULD
    respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.

4.2.3. Numeric Version

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type contains numeric version information for a
 product on the endpoint that implements the component specified in
 the PA Subtype field, as described in section 3.5.  For example, if
 the PA Subtype is Operating System, this attribute would contain
 numeric version information for the operating system installed on the
 endpoint.  The version information in this attribute is associated
 with a particular product, so Posture Validators are expected to also
 possess the corresponding Product Information attribute when
 interpreting this attribute.
 All Posture Collectors that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype
 for Operating System SHOULD support sending this attribute type, at
 least for the Operating System PA subtype.  Other Posture Collectors
 MAY support sending this attribute type.  Whether a particular
 Posture Collector actually sends this attribute type SHOULD still be
 governed by local privacy and security policies.  All Posture
 Validators that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for Operating
 System SHOULD support receiving this attribute type, at least for the
 Operating System PA subtype.  Other Posture Validators MAY support
 receiving this attribute type.  A Posture Validator that does not
 support receiving this attribute type SHOULD simply ignore attributes
 with this type.  Posture Validators MUST NOT send this attribute
 type.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 22] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 3.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be 28.  If the
 PA-TNC Attribute Length field is less than the size of these fixed-
 length fields, implementations SHOULD respond with an Invalid
 Parameter PA-TNC error code.
 This attribute type includes numeric values for the product version
 information, enabling Posture Validators to do comparative operations
 on the version.  Some Posture Collectors may not be able to determine
 some or all of this information for a product.  However, this
 attribute can be especially useful for describing the version of the
 operating system, where numeric version numbers are generally
 available.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                        Major Version Number                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                        Minor Version Number                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                            Build Number                       |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |      Service Pack Major       |      Service Pack Minor       |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Major Version Number
    This field contains the major version number for the product, if
    applicable.  If unused or unknown, this field SHOULD be set to 0.
 Minor Version Number
    This field contains the minor version number for the product, if
    applicable.  If unused or unknown, this field SHOULD be set to 0.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 23] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Build Number
    This field contains the build number for the product, if
    applicable.  This may provide more granularity than the minor
    version number, as many builds may occur leading up to an official
    release, and all these builds may share a single major and minor
    version number.  If unused or unknown, this field SHOULD be set to
    0.
 Service Pack Major
    This field contains the major version number of the service pack
    for the product, if applicable.  If unused or unknown, this field
    SHOULD be set to 0.
 Service Pack Minor
    This field contains the minor version number of the service pack
    for the product, if applicable.  If unused or unknown, this field
    SHOULD be set to 0.

4.2.4. String Version

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type contains string version information for a
 product on the endpoint that implements the component specified in
 the PA Subtype field, as described in section 3.5.  For example, if
 the PA Subtype is Firewall, this attribute would contain string
 version information for a host-based firewall product installed on
 the endpoint (if any).  The version information in this attribute is
 associated with a particular product, so Posture Validators are
 expected to also possess the corresponding Product Information
 attribute when interpreting this attribute.
 All Posture Collectors that implement any of the IETF Standard PA
 Subtypes defined in this document MUST support sending this attribute
 type, at least for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture Collectors MAY
 support sending this attribute type.  Whether a particular Posture
 Collector actually sends this attribute type SHOULD still be governed
 by local privacy and security policies.  All Posture Validators that
 implement any of the IETF Standard PA Subtypes defined in this
 document MUST support receiving this attribute type, at least for
 those PA subtypes.  Other Posture Validators MAY support receiving
 this attribute type.  Posture Validators MUST NOT send this attribute
 type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 4.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field will vary, depending

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 24] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 on the length of the Component Version Number, Internal Build Number,
 and Configuration Version Number fields.  However, the value in the
 PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be at least 15 because this is the
 length of the fixed-length fields in the PA-TNC Attribute Header and
 the fixed-length fields in this attribute type.  If the PA-TNC
 Attribute Length field is less than the size of these fixed-length
 fields or does not match the length indicated by the sum of the
 fixed-length and variable-length fields, implementations SHOULD
 respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |  Version Len  |   Product Version Number (Variable Length)    |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 | Build Num Len |   Internal Build Number (Variable Length)     |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |  Config. Len  | Configuration Version Number (Variable Length)|
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Version Len
    This field defines the number of octets in the Product Version
    Number field.  If the product version number is unavailable or
    unknown, this field MUST be set to 0 and the Product Version
    Number field will be zero length (effectively not present).
 Product Version Number
    This field contains a UTF-8 string identifying the version of the
    component (e.g., "1.12.23.114").  This field MUST be sized to fit
    the version string and MUST NOT include extra octets for padding
    or NUL character termination.
    Various products use a wide range of different formats and
    semantics for version strings.  Some use alphabetic characters,
    white space, and punctuation.  Some consider version "1.21" to be
    later than version "1.3" and some earlier.  Therefore, the syntax
    and semantics of this string are not defined.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 25] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Build Num Len
    This field defines the number of octets in the Internal Build
    Number field.  For products where the internal build number is
    unavailable or unknown, this field MUST be set to 0 and the
    Internal Build Number field will be zero length (effectively not
    present).
 Internal Build Number
    This field contains a UTF-8 string identifying the engineering
    build number of the product.  This field MUST be sized to fit the
    build number string and MUST NOT include extra octets for padding
    or NUL character termination.  The syntax and semantics of this
    string are not defined.
 Config. Len
    This field defines the number of octets in the Configuration
    Version Number field.  If the configuration version number is
    unavailable or unknown, this field MUST be set to 0 and the
    Configuration Version Number field will be zero length
    (effectively not present).
 Configuration Version Number
    This field contains a UTF-8 string identifying the version of the
    configuration used by the component.  This version SHOULD
    represent the overall configuration version even if several
    configuration policy files or settings are used.  Posture
    Collectors MAY include multiple version numbers in this single
    string if a single version is not practical.  This field MUST be
    sized to fit the version string and MUST NOT include extra octets
    for padding or NUL character termination.
    Various products use a wide range of different formats for version
    strings.  Some use alphabetic characters, white space, and
    punctuation.  Some consider version "1.21" to be later than
    version "1.3" and some earlier.  In addition, some Posture
    Collectors may place multiple configuration version numbers in
    this single string.  Therefore, the syntax and semantics of this
    string are not defined.

4.2.5. Operational Status

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type describes the operational status of a
 product that can implement the component specified in the PA Subtype
 field, as described in section 3.5. For example, if the PA Subtype is

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 26] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Anti-Spyware, this attribute would contain information about the
 operational status of a host-based anti-spyware product that may or
 may not be installed on the endpoint.
 Posture Collectors that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for
 Operating System or VPN MAY support sending this attribute type for
 those PA subtypes.  Posture Collectors that implement other IETF
 Standard PA Subtypes defined in this specification SHOULD support
 sending this attribute type for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture
 Collectors MAY support sending this attribute type.  Whether a
 particular Posture Collector actually sends this attribute type
 SHOULD still be governed by local privacy and security policies.
 Posture Validators that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for
 Operating System or VPN MAY support receiving this attribute type, at
 least for those PA subtypes.  Posture Validators that implement other
 IETF Standard PA Subtypes defined in this specification SHOULD
 support receiving this attribute type, at least for those PA
 subtypes.  Other Posture Validators MAY support receiving this
 attribute type.  A Posture Validator that does not support receiving
 this attribute type SHOULD simply ignore attributes with this type.
 Posture Validators MUST NOT send this attribute type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 5.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be 36.  If the
 PA-TNC Attribute Length field does not have this value,
 implementations SHOULD respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error
 code.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Status     |     Result    |         Reserved              |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                          Last Use                             |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     Last Use (continued)                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     Last Use (continued)                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     Last Use (continued)                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     Last Use (continued)                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 27] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Status
    This field gives the operational status of the product.  The
    following table lists the values currently defined for this field.
    Value   Description
    -----   -----------
    0       Unknown or other
    1       Not installed
    2       Installed but not operational
    3       Operational
    If a Posture Validator receives a value for this field that it
    does not recognize, it SHOULD treat this value as equivalent to
    the value 0.
 Result
    This field contains the result of the last use of the product.
    The following table lists the values currently defined for this
    field.
    Value   Description
    -----   -----------
    0       Unknown or other
    1       Successful use with no errors detected
    2       Successful use with one or more errors detected
    3       Unsuccessful use (e.g., aborted)
    Posture Collectors SHOULD set this field to 0 if the Status field
    contains a value of 1 (Not installed) or 2 (Installed but not
    operational).  If a Posture Validator receives a value for this
    field that it does not recognize, it SHOULD treat this value as
    equivalent to the value 0.
 Reserved
    This field is reserved for future use.  The field MUST be set to 0
    on transmission and ignored upon reception.
 Last Use
    This field contains the date and time of the last use of the
    component.  The Last Use date and time MUST be represented as an
    RFC 3339 [4] compliant ASCII string in Coordinated Universal Time
    (UTC) time with the additional restrictions that the 't' delimiter
    and the 'z' suffix MUST be capitalized and fractional seconds
    (time-secfrac) MUST NOT be included.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 28] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    This field conforms to the date-time ABNF production from section
    5.6 of RFC 3339 with the above restrictions.  Leap seconds are
    permitted and Posture Validators MUST support them.
    The last use string MUST NOT be NUL terminated or padded in any
    way.  If the last use time is not known, not applicable, or cannot
    be represented in this format, the Posture Collector MUST set this
    field to the value "0000-00-00T00:00:00Z" (allowing this field to
    be fixed length).  Note that this particular reserved value is NOT
    a valid RFC 3339 date and time and MUST NOT be used for any other
    purpose in this field.
    This encoding produces a string that is easy to read, parse, and
    interpret.  The format (more precisely defined in RFC 3339) is
    YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SSZ, resulting in one and only one representation
    for each second in UTC time from year 0000 to year 9999.  For
    example, 9:05:00AM EST (GMT-0500) on January 19, 1995 can be
    represented as "1995-01-19T14:05:00Z".  The length of this field
    is always 20 octets.

4.2.6. Port Filter

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type provides the list of port numbers and
 associated protocols (e.g., TCP and UDP) that are currently blocked
 or allowed by a host-based firewall on the endpoint.
 Posture Collectors that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for
 Firewall or VPN SHOULD support sending this attribute type for those
 PA subtypes.  Posture Collectors that implement other IETF Standard
 PA Subtypes defined in this specification MUST NOT support sending
 this attribute type for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture Collectors
 MAY support sending this attribute type, if it is appropriate to
 their PA subtype.  Whether a particular Posture Collector actually
 sends this attribute type SHOULD still be governed by local privacy
 and security policies.  Posture Validators that implement the IETF
 Standard PA Subtype for Firewall or VPN SHOULD support receiving this
 attribute type, at least for those PA subtypes.  Posture Validators
 that implement other IETF Standard PA Subtypes defined in this
 specification MUST NOT support receiving this attribute type for
 those PA subtypes.  Other Posture Validators MAY support receiving
 this attribute type.  A Posture Validator that does not support
 receiving this attribute type SHOULD simply ignore attributes with
 this type.  Posture Validators MUST NOT send this attribute type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 6.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 29] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
 Note that this diagram shows two Protocol/Port Number pairs.  The
 actual number of Protocol/Port Number pairs included in a Port Filter
 attribute can vary from one to a large number (limited only by the
 maximum message and length supported by the underlying PT protocol).
 However, each Port Filter attribute MUST contain at least one
 Protocol/Port Number pair.  Because the length of a Protocol/Port
 Number pair with the Reserved field and B flag is always 4 octets,
 the number of Protocol/Port Number pairs can be easily computed using
 the PA-TNC Attribute Length field by subtracting the number of octets
 in the PA-TNC Attribute Header and dividing by 4.  If the PA-TNC
 Attribute Length field is invalid, Posture Validators SHOULD respond
 with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |   Reserved  |B|    Protocol   |         Port Number           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |   Reserved  |B|    Protocol   |         Port Number           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Reserved
    This field is reserved for future use.  It MUST be set to 0 on
    transmission and ignored upon reception.
 B Flag (Blocked or Allowed Port)
    This single-bit field indicates whether the following port is
    blocked or allowed.  This bit MUST be set to 1 if the protocol and
    port combination is blocked.  Otherwise, this field MUST be set to
    0.  This field was provided to allow for more abbreviated
    reporting of the port filtering policy (e.g., when all ports are
    blocked except a few, the Posture Collector can just list the few
    that are allowed).
    Posture Collectors MUST NOT provide a mixed list of blocked and
    non-blocked ports for a particular protocol.  To be more precise,
    a Posture Collector MUST NOT include two Protocol/Port Number
    pairs in a single Port Filter attribute where the protocol number
    is the same but the B flag is different.  Also, Posture Collectors
    MUST NOT list the same Protocol and Port Number combination twice
    in a Port List attribute.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 30] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    Posture Collectors MAY list all blocked ports for one protocol and
    all allowed ports for a different protocol in a single Port List
    attribute, using the B flag to indicate whether each entry is
    blocked.  For example, a Posture Collector might list all the
    blocked TCP ports but only list the allowed UDP ports.  However,
    it MUST NOT list some blocked TCP ports and some other allowed TCP
    ports.
 Protocol
    This field contains the transport protocol number (e.g., tcp is 6)
    being blocked or allowed.  The values used in this field are the
    same ones used in the IPv4 Protocol and IPv6 Next Header fields.
    The IANA already maintains the Assigned Internet Protocol Numbers
    registry of these values for use in this field.
 Port Number
    This field contains the transport protocol (e.g., tcp) port number
    being blocked or allowed.  The values used in this field are
    specific to the protocol identified by the Protocol field.  The
    IANA maintains registries for well-known and user-requested TCP
    and UDP port numbers for use in this field.

4.2.7. Installed Packages

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type contains a list of the installed packages
 that comprise a product on the endpoint that implements the component
 specified in the PA Subtype field, as described in section 3.5.  This
 allows a Posture Validator to check which packages are installed for
 a particular product and which versions of those packages are
 installed.
 Posture Collectors that implement any of the IETF Standard PA
 Subtypes defined in this document SHOULD support sending this
 attribute type for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture Collectors MAY
 support sending this attribute type, if it is appropriate to their PA
 subtype.  Whether a particular Posture Collector actually sends this
 attribute type SHOULD still be governed by local privacy and security
 policies.  Posture Validators that implement any of the IETF Standard
 PA Subtypes defined in this document SHOULD support receiving this
 attribute type, at least for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture
 Validators MAY support receiving this attribute type.  A Posture
 Validator that does not support receiving this attribute type SHOULD
 simply ignore attributes with this type.  Posture Validators MUST NOT
 send this attribute type.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 31] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 This attribute type can be quite long, especially for the Operating
 System PA subtype.  This can cause problems, especially with 802.1X
 and other limited transport protocols.  Therefore, Posture Collectors
 SHOULD NOT send this attribute unless specifically requested to do so
 using the Attribute Request attribute or otherwise configured to do
 so.  Also, Posture Validators SHOULD NOT request this attribute
 unless the transport protocol in use can support the large amount of
 data that may be sent in response.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 7.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field will vary, depending
 on the number of packages and the length of the Package Name and
 Package Version Number fields for those packages.  However, the value
 in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be at least 16 because this
 is the length of the fixed-length fields in the PA-TNC Attribute
 Header and the fixed-length fields in this attribute type.  If the
 PA-TNC Attribute Length field is less than the size of these fixed-
 length fields or does not match the length indicated by the sum of
 the fixed-length and variable-length fields, implementations SHOULD
 respond with an Invalid Parameter PA-TNC error code.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
 Note that this diagram shows an attribute containing information on
 one package.  The actual number of package descriptions included in
 an Installed Packages attribute is indicated by the Package Count
 field.  This value may vary from zero to a large number (up to 65535,
 if the underlying PT protocol can support that many).  If this number
 is not sufficient, specialized patch management software should be
 employed that can simply report compliance with a pre-established
 patch policy.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |          Reserved             |         Package Count         |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 | Pkg Name Len  |        Package Name (Variable Length)         |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |  Version Len  |    Package Version Number (Variable Length)   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 32] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Reserved
    This field is reserved for future use.  The field MUST be set to 0
    on transmission and ignored upon reception.
 Package Count
    This field is an unsigned 16-bit integer that indicates the number
    of packages listed in this attribute.  For each package so
    indicated, a Pkg Name Len, Package Name, Version Len, and Package
    Version Number field is included in the attribute.
 Pkg Name Len
    This field is an unsigned 8-bit integer that indicates the length
    of the Package Name field in octets.  This field may be zero if a
    Package Name is not available.
 Package Name
    This field contains the name of the package associated with the
    product.  This field is a UTF-8 encoded character string whose
    octet length is given by the Pkg Name Len field.  This field MUST
    NOT include extra octets for padding or NUL character termination.
    The syntax and semantics of this name are not specified in this
    document, since they may vary across products and/or operating
    systems.  Posture Collectors MAY list two packages with the same
    name in a single Installed Packages attribute.  The meaning of
    doing so is not defined here.
 Version Len
    This field is an unsigned 8-bit integer that indicates the length
    of the Package Version Number field in octets.  This field may be
    zero if a Package Version Number is not available.
 Package Version Number
    This field contains the version string for the package named in
    the previous Package Name field.  This field is a UTF-8 encoded
    character string whose octet length is given by the Version Len
    field.  This field MUST NOT include extra octets for padding or
    NUL character termination.  The syntax and semantics of this
    version string are not specified in this document, since they may
    vary across products and/or operating systems.  Posture Collectors

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 33] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    MAY list two packages with the same Package Version Number (and
    even the same Package Name and Package Version Number) in a single
    Installed Packages attribute.  The meaning of doing so is not
    defined here.

4.2.8. PA-TNC Error

 This PA-TNC Attribute Type contains an error code and supplemental
 information regarding an error pertaining to PA-TNC.
 All Posture Collectors and Posture Validators that implement any of
 the IETF Standard PA Subtypes defined in this specification MUST
 support sending and receiving this attribute type, at least for those
 PA subtypes.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 8.
 The value in the PA-TNC Attribute Length field will vary, depending
 on the length of the Error Information field.  However, the value in
 the PA-TNC Attribute Length field MUST be at least 20 because this is
 the length of the fixed-length fields in the PA-TNC Attribute Header
 and the fixed-length fields in this attribute type.
 A PA-TNC error code SHOULD be sent with the same PA Message Vendor ID
 and PA Subtype used by the PA-TNC message that caused the error so
 that the error code is sent to the party who sent the offending PA-
 TNC message.  Other measures (such as setting PB-TNC's EXCL flag and
 Posture Collector Identifier or Posture Validator Identifier fields)
 SHOULD also be taken to attempt to ensure that only the party who
 sent the offending message receives the error.
 When a PA-TNC error code is received, the recipient MUST NOT respond
 with a PA-TNC error code because this could result in an infinite
 loop of errors.  Instead, the recipient MAY log the error, modify its
 behavior to attempt to avoid the error (attempting to avoid loops or
 long strings of errors), ignore the error, terminate the assessment,
 or take other action as appropriate (as long as it is consistent with
 the requirements of this specification).
 Posture Validators MUST NOT include this attribute type in an
 Attribute Request attribute.  It does not make sense for a Posture
 Validator to request that a Posture Collector send a PA-TNC Error
 attribute.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 34] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Reserved   |            PA-TNC Error Code Vendor ID        |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                        PA-TNC Error Code                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                 Error Information (Variable Length)           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Reserved
    This field is reserved for future use.  This field MUST be set to
    0 on transmission and ignored upon reception.
 PA-TNC Error Code Vendor ID
    This field contains the SMI Private Enterprise Number for the
    organization that defined the PA-TNC Error Code that is being used
    in the attribute.  For IETF Standard PA-TNC Error Code values this
    field MUST be set to zero (0).
 PA-TNC Error Code
    This field contains the PA-TNC Error Code being reported in this
    attribute.  Note that a particular PA-TNC Error Code value will
    have completely different meanings depending on the PA-TNC Error
    Code Vendor ID.  Each PA-TNC Error Code Vendor ID defines a
    different space of PA-TNC Error Code values.  Posture Collectors
    and Posture Validators MUST NOT require support for particular
    vendor-specific PA-TNC Error Codes and MUST interoperate with
    other parties despite any differences in the set of vendor-
    specific PA-TNC Error Codes supported (although they MAY permit
    administrators to configure them to require support for specific
    PA-TNC Error Codes).
    When the PA-TNC Error Code Vendor ID is set to zero (0), the PA-
    TNC Error Code is an IETF Standard PA-TNC Error Code.  IANA
    maintains a registry of PA-TNC Error Codes.  Entries in this
    registry are added by Expert Review with Specification Required,
    following the guidelines in section 7.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 35] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    The following table lists the IETF Standard PA-TNC Error Codes
    defined in this specification:
    Integer   Description
    -------   -----------
    0         Reserved
    1         Invalid Parameter
    2         Version Not Supported
    3         Attribute Type Not Supported
    The next few subsections of this document provide detailed
    definitions of these error codes.
 Error Information
    This field provides additional context for the error.  The
    contents of this field vary based on the PA-TNC Error Code Vendor
    ID and PA-TNC Error Code.  Therefore, whenever a PA-TNC Error Code
    is defined, the format of this field for that error code must also
    be defined.  The definitions of IETF Standard PA-TNC Error Codes
    on the next few pages provide good examples of such definitions.
    The length of this field can be determined by the recipient using
    the PA-TNC Attribute Length field by subtracting the length of the
    fixed-length fields in the PA-TNC Attribute Header and the fixed-
    length fields in this attribute.

4.2.8.1. Invalid Parameter Error Code

 The Invalid Parameter error code is an IETF Standard PA-TNC Error
 Code (value 1) that indicates that the sender of this error code has
 detected an invalid value in a PA-TNC message sent by the recipient
 of this error code in the current assessment.
 For this error code, the Error Information field contains the first 8
 octets of the PA-TNC message that contained the invalid parameter and
 an offset indicating the position within that message of the invalid
 parameter.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 36] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Error Information field for this error code.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Version    |            Copy of Reserved                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                       Message Identifier                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                             Offset                            |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Version
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Version field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.
 Copy of Reserved
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Reserved field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.
 Message Identifier
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Message Identifier
    field in the PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that
    caused this error.
 Offset
    This field MUST contain an octet offset from the start of the PA-
    TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this error to
    the start of the value that caused this error.  For instance, if
    the first PA-TNC attribute in the message had an invalid PA-TNC
    Attribute Length (e.g., 0), this value would be 16.

4.2.8.2. Version Not Supported Error Code

 The Version Not Supported error code is an IETF Standard PA-TNC Error
 Code (value 2) that indicates that the sender of this error code does
 not support the PA-TNC version number included in the PA-TNC Message
 Header of a PA-TNC message sent by the recipient of this error code
 in the current assessment.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 37] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 For this error code, the Error Information field contains the first 8
 octets of the PA-TNC message that contained the unsupported version
 as well as Max Version and Min Version fields that indicate which PA-
 TNC version numbers are supported by the sender of the error code.
 The sender MUST support all PA-TNC versions between the Min Version
 and the Max Version, inclusive (i.e., including the Min Version and
 the Max Version).  When possible, recipients of this error code
 SHOULD send future messages to the Posture Collector or Posture
 Validator that originated this error message with a PA-TNC version
 number within the stated range.
 Any party that is sending the Version Not Supported error code MUST
 include that error code as the only PA-TNC attribute in a PA-TNC
 message with version number 1.  All parties that send PA-TNC messages
 MUST be able to properly process a message that meets this
 description, even if they cannot process any other aspect of PA-TNC
 version 1.  This ensures that a PA-TNC version exchange can proceed
 properly, no matter what versions of PA-TNC the parties implement.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Error Information field for this error code.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Version    |                Copy of Reserved               |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                       Message Identifier                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |  Max Version  |  Min Version  |            Reserved           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Version
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Version field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.
 Copy of Reserved
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Reserved field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 38] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Message Identifier
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Message Identifier
    field in the PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that
    caused this error.
 Max Version
    This field MUST contain the maximum PA-TNC version supported by
    the sender of this error code.
 Min Version
    This field MUST contain the minimum PA-TNC version supported by
    the sender of this error code.
 Reserved
    Reserved for future use.  This field MUST be set to 0 on
    transmission and ignored upon reception.

4.2.8.3. Attribute Type Not Supported Error Code

 The Attribute Type Not Supported error code is an IETF Standard PA-
 TNC Error Code (value 3) that indicates that the sender of this error
 code does not support the PA-TNC Attribute Type included in the Error
 Information field.  This PA-TNC Attribute Type was included in a PA-
 TNC message sent by the recipient of this error code in the current
 assessment.
 For this error code, the Error Information field contains the first 8
 octets of the PA-TNC message that contained the unsupported attribute
 type as well as a copy of the attribute type that caused the problem.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 39] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Error Information field for this error code.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Version    |            Copy of Reserved                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                       Message Identifier                      |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |     Flags     |          PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                     PA-TNC Attribute Type                     |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Version
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Version field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.
 Copy of Reserved
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Reserved field in the
    PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that caused this
    error.
 Message Identifier
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Message Identifier
    field in the PA-TNC Message Header of the PA-TNC message that
    caused this error.
 Flags
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the Flags field in the
    PA-TNC Attribute Header of the PA-TNC attribute that caused this
    error.
 PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the PA-TNC Attribute
    Vendor ID field in the PA-TNC Attribute Header of the PA-TNC
    attribute that caused this error.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 40] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 PA-TNC Attribute Type
    This field MUST contain an exact copy of the PA-TNC Attribute Type
    field in the PA-TNC Attribute Header of the PA-TNC attribute that
    caused this error.

4.2.9. Assessment Result

 This PA-TNC attribute contains the final assessment result from a
 particular Posture Validator.  This attribute might be returned to a
 Posture Collector for information purposes such as when an endpoint
 is compliant.  Similarly, the Assessment Result attribute could be
 sent to indicate a non-compliant result where specific actions are
 needed to bring an endpoint into compliance with the network's
 policies.  These actions could be defined in other PA-TNC attributes
 such as Remediation Instructions sent to the Posture Collector.
 All Posture Collectors that support an IETF Standard PA Subtype
 defined in this specification SHOULD support receiving and processing
 the Assessment Result attribute.  All Posture Validators that
 implement an IETF Standard PA Subtype defined in this specification
 SHOULD support sending the Assessment Result attribute.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to 9.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                       Assessment Result                       |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Assessment Result
    This 32-bit field MUST contain one of the following values;
     Value   Description
     -----   -----------
     0      Posture Validator assessed the endpoint component to
            be compliant with policy.
     1      Posture Validator assessed the endpoint component to
            be non-compliant with policy but the difference from
            compliant was minor.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 41] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

     2      Posture Validator assessed the endpoint component to
            be non-compliant with policy and the assessed
            difference was very significant.
     3      Posture Validator was unable to determine policy
            compliance of an endpoint component due to an error.
     4      Posture Validator was unable to determine whether the
            assessed endpoint component was compliant with policy
            based on the attributes provided by the Posture
            Collector.

4.2.10. Remediation Instructions

 This PA-TNC attribute sent by the Posture Validator to the Posture
 Collector contains remediation instructions for updating a particular
 component to make the endpoint compliant with the assessment
 policies.  A Posture Validator might choose to send more than one
 Remediation Instructions attribute in some circumstances (e.g., both
 a URI and a human-readable message are necessary) to remediate one or
 more components.  This attribute supports the inclusion of either an
 IETF standard or vendor-specific remediation instruction.
 All Posture Collectors that implement an IETF Standard PA Subtype
 defined in this specification SHOULD support receiving and processing
 the Remediation Instructions attribute.  All Posture Validators that
 implement an IETF Standard PA Subtype defined in this specification
 SHOULD support sending this attribute type.  Posture Collectors and
 Posture Validators supporting other non-IETF standard components MAY
 support this attribute.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to
 10.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |    Reserved   |       Remediation Parameters Vendor ID        |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                  Remediation Parameters Type                  |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |            Remediation Parameters (Variable Length)           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 42] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Reserved (8 bits)
    The Reserved bits MUST be set to 0 on transmission and ignored on
    reception.
 Remediation Parameters Vendor ID (24 bits)
    The Remediation Parameters Vendor ID field identifies a vendor by
    using the SMI Private Enterprise Number (PEN).  Any organization
    can receive its own unique PEN from IANA, the Internet Assigned
    Numbers Authority.  The Remediation Parameters Vendor ID qualifies
    the Remediation Parameters Type field so that each vendor has 2^32
    separate Remediation Parameters Types available for its use.
    Remediation Parameters Types standardized by the IETF are always
    used with the value zero (0) in this field.
 Remediation Parameters Type (32 bits)
    The Remediation Parameters Type field identifies the different
    types of remediation instructions that can be contained in the
    Remediation Parameters field.  IANA maintains a registry of PA-TNC
    Remediation Parameters Types.  Entries in this registry are added
    by Expert Review with Specification Required, following the
    guidelines in section 7.  A list of IETF Standard PA-TNC
    Remediation Parameters Types defined in this specification appears
    later in this section.
    New vendor-specific remediation instructions can be created by
    adding new Remediation Parameters Types (those used with a non-
    zero Remediation Parameters vendor ID) without IETF or IANA
    involvement.  Posture Collectors and Posture Validators MUST NOT
    require support for particular vendor-specific PA-TNC Remediation
    Parameters Types and MUST interoperate with other parties despite
    any differences in the set of vendor-specific PA-TNC Remediation
    Parameters Types supported (although they MAY permit
    administrators to configure them to require support for specific
    PA-TNC remediation parameter types).
    The following table lists the IETF Standard PA-TNC Remediation
    Parameters Type values defined in this specification:
    Integer   Description
    -------   -----------
    0         Reserved
    1         Remediation URI
    2         Remediation String

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 43] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    The next few subsections of this document provide detailed
    definitions of the contents of the Remediation Parameters field
    used with each Remediation Parameter Type.
 Remediation Parameters (variable length)
    The Remediation Parameters field contains the actual remediation
    instructions for the Posture Collector.

4.2.10.1. Remediation URI Parameters Type

 The Remediation URI Parameters Type is an IETF Standard Remediation
 Parameters Type (value 1) that indicates that the sending Posture
 Validator is providing a URI to instructions on how to remediate the
 endpoint.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Remediation Parameters field when carrying a Remediation URI
 parameter.  The text after this diagram describes the fields shown
 here.
                     1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                 Remediation URI (Variable Length)             |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Remediation URI
    The Remediation URI field MUST contain a URI, as described in RFC
    3986 [7].  This URI SHOULD contain instructions to update a
    particular component so that it might result in the component
    being compliant with the policies in future assessments.  Posture
    Collectors should validate that the URI and instructions come from
    a trustworthy source to avoid being tricked into performing
    damaging actions (see security considerations).

4.2.10.2. Remediation String Parameters Type

 The Remediation String Parameters Type is an IETF Standard
 Remediation Parameters Type (value 2) that indicates that the sending
 Posture Validator is providing a human-readable string containing
 instructions on how to remediate the endpoint.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Remediation Parameters field when the carrying a Remediation String
 parameter.  The text after this diagram describes the fields shown
 here.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 44] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

                     1                   2                   3
 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                   Remediation String Length                   |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                Remediation String (Variable Length)           |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 | Lang Code Len |  Remediation String Lang Code (Variable Len)  |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Remediation String Length
    The Remediation String Length contains the length of the
    Remediation String field in octets.
 Remediation String
    The Remediation String field MUST contain a UTF-8 encoded string.
    This string contains human-readable instructions for remediation
    that MAY be displayed to the user by the Posture Collector.  NUL
    termination MUST NOT be included.  If a Posture Collector receives
    a Remediation String that does contain a NUL termination, it
    SHOULD send an Invalid Parameter error code.
 Lang Code Len (Remediation String Language Code Length)
    The Lang Code Len field contains the length of the Remediation
    String Language Code field in octets.
 Remediation String Lang Code
    The Remediation String Lang(uage) Code field contains a US-ASCII
    string composed of a well-formed RFC 4646 [6] language tag that
    indicates the language(s) used in the Remediation String in the
    Remediation Parameters field.  A zero-length string MAY be sent
    for this field (essentially omitting this field) to indicate that
    the language code for the remediation string is not known.

4.2.11. Forwarding Enabled

 This PA-TNC attribute indicates whether the endpoint is forwarding
 traffic between interfaces.  Endpoints that forward traffic between
 networks connected to multiple network interfaces may be considered
 non-compliant (and a security risk) in some enterprise network
 deployments.  For example, an endpoint with multiple connected
 network interfaces might allow traffic from an interface connected to
 a public network to be forwarded through another interface carrying a
 VPN session to a protected enterprise network.  This attribute is

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 45] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 currently envisioned to be specific to reporting posture for the
 operating system component; however, could be useful for other future
 types of components.
 Posture Collectors that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for
 Operating System SHOULD support sending the Forwarding Enabled
 attribute.  Posture Collectors that do not implement the Operating
 System PA Subtype defined in this specification SHOULD NOT send the
 Forwarding Enabled attribute unless it is appropriate to their PA
 Subtype.  Whether a particular Posture Collector actually sends this
 attribute type SHOULD still be governed by local privacy and security
 policies.  Posture Validators that implement the IETF Standard PA
 Subtype for Operating System SHOULD support receiving the Forwarding
 Enabled attribute type.  Posture Validators supporting components
 other than Operating System MAY support receiving this attribute type
 if it is appropriate to their PA Subtype.  A Posture Validator that
 does not support receiving this attribute type SHOULD simply ignore
 attributes with this type.  Posture Validators MUST NOT send this
 attribute type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to
 11.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |                        Forwarding Enabled                     |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Forwarding Enabled
    This 32-bit field MUST contain one of the following values;
    Value   Description
    -----   -----------
      0       Disabled - Endpoint is not forwarding traffic.
      1       Enabled -  Endpoint is forwarding traffic.
      2       Unknown -  Unable to determine whether endpoint is
                         forwarding traffic

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 46] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

4.2.12. Factory Default Password Enabled

 This PA-TNC attribute indicates whether the endpoint has a factory
 default password enabled for use.  Some types of endpoints include a
 default static password for used to gain privileged access to the
 endpoint.  If this password is not changed or disabled before the
 endpoint is accessible on the network, it's often easy to compromise
 the endpoint.
 Posture Collectors that implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for
 Operating System SHOULD support sending the Factory Default Password
 Enabled attribute.  Posture Collectors that implement other IETF
 Standard PA Subtypes defined in this specification SHOULD NOT support
 sending this attribute type for those PA subtypes.  Other Posture
 Collectors MAY support sending this attribute type, if it is
 appropriate to their PA subtype.  Whether a particular Posture
 Collector actually sends this attribute type SHOULD still be governed
 by local privacy and security policies.  Posture Validators that
 implement the IETF Standard PA Subtype for Operating System SHOULD
 support receiving the Factory Default Password Enabled attribute.
 Other Posture Validators MAY support receiving this attribute type.
 A Posture Validator that does not support receiving this attribute
 type SHOULD simply ignore attributes with this type.  Posture
 Validators MUST NOT send this attribute type.
 For this attribute type, the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID field MUST be
 set to zero (0) and the PA-TNC Attribute Type field MUST be set to
 12.
 The following diagram illustrates the format and contents of the
 Attribute Value field for this attribute type.  The text after this
 diagram describes the fields shown here.
                      1                   2                   3
  0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 |              Factory Default Password Enabled                 |
 +-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
 Factory Default Password Enabled
    This 32-bit field MUST contain one of the following values;
    Value   Description
    -----   -----------
    0       Endpoint does not have factory default password enabled.
    1       Endpoint has a factory default password enabled.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 47] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

4.3. Vendor-Defined Attributes

 This section discusses the use of vendor-defined attributes within
 PA-TNC.  The PA-TNC protocol was designed to allow for vendor-defined
 attributes to be used as a replacement where a standard attribute
 could be used.  In some cases, even the standard attributes allow for
 vendor-defined information to be included.  It is envisioned that
 over time as particular vendor-defined attributes become popular, an
 equivalent standard attribute could be added allowing for broader
 interoperability.
 This specification does not define vendor-defined attributes, but
 rather highlights how such attributes can be used with PA-TNC without
 the potential for namespace collisions or misinterpretations.  In
 order to avoid collisions, PA-TNC uses the well-established SMI
 Private Enterprise Numbers as vendor IDs to define separate
 namespaces for important fields within a PA-TNC message.  For
 example, to ensure the uniqueness of attribute types while providing
 for vendor extensions, vendor-defined attribute types include the
 vendor's unique vendor ID, to indicate the intended namespace for the
 attribute type, followed by the attribute type.  IETF Standard PA-TNC
 Attribute Types use a vendor ID of zero (0).
 SMI Private Enterprise Numbers are used to provide a separate
 identifier space for each vendor.  The IANA provides a registry for
 SMI Private Enterprise Numbers.  Any organization (including non-
 profit organizations, governmental bodies, etc.) can obtain one of
 these numbers at no charge, and thousands of organizations have done
 so.  Within this document, SMI Private Enterprise Numbers are known
 as "vendor IDs".

5. Security Considerations

 This section discusses the major potential types of security threats
 relevant to the PA-TNC message protocol.  It is envisioned that
 additional attribute types could be defined in the future to
 facilitate the exchange of security capabilities, keys, and security
 protected attributes if future use cases are adopted that require
 such protections.

5.1. Trust Relationships

 In order to understand where security countermeasures are necessary,
 this section starts with a discussion of where the TNC architecture
 envisions some trust relationships between the processing elements of
 the PA-TNC protocol.  The following subsections discuss the trust
 properties associated with each portion of the NEA reference model
 directly involved with the processing of the PA-TNC protocol.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 48] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

5.1.1. Posture Collector

 The Posture Collectors are trusted by Posture Validators to:
 o  Collect valid information about the component type associated with
    the Posture Collector
 o  Report upon collected information consistent with local security
    and privacy policies
 o  Accurately report information associated with the type of
    component for the PA-TNC message
 o  Not act maliciously to the Posture Broker Server and Posture
    Validators, including attacks such as denial of service

5.1.2. Posture Validator

 The Posture Validators are trusted by Posture Collectors to:
 o  Only request information necessary to assess the security state of
    the endpoint
 o  Make assessment decisions based on deployer-defined policies
 o  Discard collected information consistent with data retention and
    privacy policies
 o  Not act maliciously to the Posture Broker Server and Posture
    Collectors, including attacks such as denial of service
 o  Not send malicious remediation instructions that do not fix or
    that cause damage to the endpoint

5.1.3. Posture Broker Client, Posture Broker Server

 The Posture Broker Client and Posture Broker Server are trusted by
 the Posture Collector and Posture Validator to:
 o  Provide a reliable transport for PA-TNC messages
 o  Deliver messages for a particular PA Subtype only to those Posture
    Collectors and Posture Validators that have registered for them
 o  Not disclose any provided attributes to unauthorized parties

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 49] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 o  Not act maliciously to drop messages, duplicate messages, or flood
    Posture Collectors and Posture Validators with unnecessary
    messages
 o  Not observe, fabricate, or alter the contents of a PA-TNC message
 o  Properly place Posture Collector and Posture Validator identifiers
    into the PB-TNC protocol, deliver those identifiers to Posture
    Collectors and Posture Validators as needed, and manage exclusive
    delivery to a particular Posture Collector or Posture Validator
    when requested
 o  Properly expose authentication information from PT security so
    that Posture Collectors and Posture Validators can use the peer's
    identity information to safely make policy decisions

5.2. Security Threats

 Beyond the trusted relationships assumed in section 5.1, the PA-TNC
 protocol faces a number of potential security attacks that could
 require security countermeasures.
 Generally, the PA-TNC protocol relies upon the underlying PT
 protocol's security to protect the messages from attack when
 traveling over the network.  Once the message resides on the Posture
 Broker Client or Posture Broker Server, the posture brokers are
 trusted to properly and safely deliver the messages to the
 appropriate Posture Collectors and Posture Validators.

5.2.1. Attribute Theft

 When PA-TNC messages are sent over unprotected network links or
 spanning local software stacks that are not trusted, the contents of
 the PA-TNC messages may be subject to information theft by an
 intermediary party.  This theft could result in information being
 recorded for future use or analysis by the adversary.  Attributes
 observed by eavesdroppers could contain information that exposes
 potential weaknesses in the security of the endpoint, or system
 fingerprinting information easing the ability of the attacker to
 employ attacks more likely to be successful against the endpoint.
 The eavesdropper might also learn information about the endpoint or
 network policies that either singularly or collectively is considered
 sensitive information (e.g., certain endpoints are lacking patches,
 or particular sub-networks have more lenient policies).
 PA-TNC attributes are not intended to carry privacy-sensitive
 information, but should some exist in a message, the adversary could
 come into possession of the information, which could be used for

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 50] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 financial gain.  Therefore, it is important that PT provide strong
 confidentiality protection to protect the message from eavesdroppers
 when being sent between the Posture Transport Client and Posture
 Transport Server.

5.2.2. Message Fabrication

 Attackers on the network or present within the NEA system could
 introduce fabricated PA-TNC messages intending to trick or create a
 denial of service against aspects of an assessment.  For example, an
 adversary could attempt to send a falsified set of remediation
 instructions using the Remediation URI support in hopes of the
 Posture Collector automatically following the instructions.  Posture
 Collectors need to ensure that any requests to take actions on the
 endpoint (such as remediation instructions) received from Posture
 Validators are authentic and trustworthy using strong authentication
 and integrity protections offered by PT.  Posture Collectors should
 not blindly follow remediation instructions received from a trusted
 NEA Server.  At least for patches and other potentially dangerous
 actions, Posture Collectors should validate these actions (e.g., via
 user confirmation) before proceeding.
 Such an attack could occur if an active attacker launches a man-in-
 the-middle (MitM) attack by proxying the PA-TNC messages and was able
 to replace undesired messages with ones easing future attack upon the
 endpoint.  Consider a scenario where PT security protection is not
 used and the Posture Broker Server proxies all assessment traffic to
 a remote Posture Broker Server.  The proxy could eavesdrop and
 replace assessment results attributes, tricking the endpoint into
 thinking it has passed an assessment, when in fact it has not and
 requires remediation.  Because the Posture Collector has no way to
 verify that attributes were actually created by an authentic Posture
 Validator, it is unable to detect the falsified attribute or message.
 Therefore, it is important that PT provides strong authentication and
 integrity protection.

5.2.3. Attribute Modification

 This attack could allow an active attacker capable of intercepting a
 message to modify a PA-TNC message attribute to a desired value to
 ease the compromise of an endpoint.  Without the ability for message
 recipients to detect whether a received message contains the same
 content as what was originally sent, active attackers can stealthily
 modify the attribute exchange.
 For example, an attacker might wish to change the contents of the
 firewall component's version string attribute to disguise the fact
 that the firewall is running an old, vulnerable version.  The

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 51] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 attacker would change the version string sent by the firewall Posture
 Collector to the current version number, so the Posture Validator's
 assessment passes while leaving the endpoint vulnerable to attack.
 Similarly, an attacker could achieve widespread denial of service by
 altering large numbers of assessments' version string attributes to
 an old value so they repeatedly fail assessments even after a
 successful remediation.  Upon receiving the lower value, the Posture
 Validator would continue to believe that the endpoint is running old,
 potentially vulnerable versions of the firewall that does not meet
 network compliance policy, so therefore the endpoint would not be
 allowed to join the network.  Use of a PT protocol providing strong
 integrity protection and authentication is essential as
 countermeasures to these attacks.

5.2.4. Attribute Replay

 Another potential attack against an unprotected PA-TNC message
 attribute exchange is to exploit the lack of a strong binding between
 the attributes sent during an assessment to the specific endpoint.
 Without a strong binding of the endpoint to the posture information,
 an attacker could record the attributes sent during an assessment of
 a compliant endpoint and later replay those attributes so that a non-
 compliant endpoint can now gain access to the network or protected
 resource.  This attack could be employed by a network MitM that is
 able to eavesdrop and proxy message exchanges, or by using local
 rogue agents on the endpoints.  Assessments lacking some form of
 freshness exchange could be subject to replay of prior assessment
 data, even if it no longer reflects the current state of the
 endpoint.  Use of a PT protocol providing strong integrity protection
 and authentication including a freshness exchange is necessary
 countermeasure to these attacks.

5.2.5. Attribute Insertion

 Similar to the attribute modification attacks, an adversary wishing
 to include one or more attributes or PA-TNC messages inside a valid
 assessment may be able to insert the attributes or messages without
 detection by the recipient.  For example, an attacker could add
 attributes to the front of a PA-TNC message to cause an assessment to
 succeed even for a non-compliant endpoint, particularly if it knew
 that the recipient ignored repeated attributes within a message.
 Similarly, if a Posture Collector or Posture Validator always
 generated an error if it saw unexpected attributes, the attacker
 could cause failures and denial of service by adding attributes or
 messages to an exchange.  Use of a PT protocol providing strong
 authentication and integrity protection could prevent the adversary
 from inserting attributes into the assessment.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 52] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

5.2.6. Denial of Service

 A variety of types of denial-of-service attacks are possible against
 the PA-TNC message exchange if left unprotected from untrusted
 parties along the communication path between the Posture Collector
 and Posture Validator.  Normally, the PT exchange is bidirectionally
 authenticated, which helps to prevent a MitM on the network from
 becoming an active proxy, but transparent message routing gateways
 may still exist on the communication path and can modify the
 integrity of the message exchange unless adequate integrity
 protection is provided.  If the MitM or other entities on the network
 can send messages to the Posture Broker Client or Posture Broker
 Server that appear to be part of an assessment, these messages could
 confuse the Posture Collector and Posture Validator or cause them to
 perform unnecessary work or take incorrect action.  Several example
 denial-of-service situations are described in sections 5.2.3 and
 5.2.5.  Many potential denial-of-service examples exist, including
 flooding messages to the Posture Collector or Posture Validator,
 sending very large messages containing many attributes, and
 repeatedly asking for resource-intensive operations.

6. Privacy Considerations

 The PA-TNC protocol is designed to allow for controlled disclosure of
 security-relevant information about an endpoint, specifically for the
 purpose of enabling an assessment of the endpoint's compliance with
 network policy.  The purpose of this protocol is to provide
 visibility into the state of the protective mechanisms on the
 endpoint, in order for the Posture Validators and Posture Broker
 Server to determine whether the endpoint is up to date and thus has
 the best chance of being resilient in the face of malware threats.
 One risk associated with providing visibility into the contents of an
 endpoint is the increased chance for exposure of privacy-sensitive
 information without the consent of the user.
 While this protocol does provide the Posture Validator the ability to
 request specific information about the endpoint, the protocol is not
 open ended, bounding the Posture Validator to only query specific
 information (attributes) about specific security features (component
 types) of the endpoint.  Each PA-TNC message is explicitly about a
 single component from the list of components in section 3.5.  These
 components include a list of security-related aspects of the endpoint
 that affect the ability of the endpoint to resist attacks and thus
 are of interest during an assessment.  Discretionary components used
 by the user to create or view content are not on the list, as they
 are more likely to have access to privacy-sensitive information.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 53] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Similarly, PA-TNC messages contain a set of attributes that describe
 the particular component.  Each attribute contains generic
 information (e.g., product information or versions) about the
 component, so it is unlikely to include any user-specific or
 identifying information.  This combination of a limited set of
 security-related components with non-user-specific attributes greatly
 reduces the risk of exposure of privacy-sensitive information.
 Vendors that choose to define additional component types and/or
 attributes within their namespace are encouraged to provide similar
 constraints.
 Even with the bounding of standard attribute information to specific
 components, it is possible that individuals might wish to share less
 information with different networks they wish to access.  For
 example, a user may wish to share more information when connecting to
 or being reassessed by the user's employer network than what would be
 made available to the local coffee shop wireless network.  While
 these situations do not impact the protocol itself, they do suggest
 that Posture Collector implementations should consider supporting a
 privacy filter allowing the user and/or system owner to restrict
 access to certain attributes based upon the target network.
 The underlying PT protocol authenticates the network's Posture Broker
 Server at the start of an assessment, so identity can be made
 available to the Posture Collector and per-network privacy filtering
 is possible.  Network owners should make available a list of the
 attributes they require to perform an assessment and any privacy
 policy they enforce when handling the data.  Users wishing to use a
 more restricted privacy filter on the endpoint may risk not being
 able to pass an assessment and thus not gain access to the requested
 network or resource.

7. IANA Considerations

 This section defines the contents of three new IANA registries: PA-
 TNC Attribute Types, PA-TNC Error Codes, and PA-TNC Remediation
 Parameters Types.  This section explains how these registries work.
 Also, this specification defines several new PA Subtypes for use with
 PA-TNC.
 All of the registries defined in this document support IETF standard
 values and vendor-defined values.  To explain this phenomenon, we
 will use the PA-TNC Attribute Type as an example, but the other three
 registries work the same way.  Whenever a PA-TNC Attribute Type
 appears on a network, it is always accompanied by an SMI Private
 Enterprise Number (PEN), also known as a vendor ID.  If this vendor
 ID is zero, the accompanying PA-TNC Attribute Type is an IETF
 standard value listed in the IANA registry for PA-TNC Attribute

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 54] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Types, and its meaning is defined in the specification listed for
 that PA-TNC Attribute Type in that registry.  If the vendor ID is not
 zero, the meaning of the PA-TNC Attribute Type is defined by the
 vendor identified by the vendor ID (as listed in the IANA registry
 for SMI PENs).  The identified vendor is encouraged but not required
 to register with IANA some or all of the PA-TNC Attribute Types used
 with their vendor ID and publish a specification for each of these
 values.
 This delegation of namespace is analogous to the technique used for
 OIDs.  It can result in interoperability problems if vendors require
 support for particular vendor-specific values.  However, such
 behavior is explicitly prohibited by this specification (in section
 4.1), which dictates that "Posture Collectors and Posture Validators
 MUST NOT require support for particular vendor-specific PA-TNC
 Attribute Types and MUST interoperate with other parties despite any
 differences in the set of vendor-specific PA-TNC Attribute Types
 supported (although they MAY permit administrators to configure them
 to require support for specific PA-TNC Attribute Types)".  Similar
 requirements are included for PA Subtypes, Remediation Parameters
 Types, and PA-TNC Error Codes.

7.1. Designated Expert Guidelines

 For all of the IANA registries defined by this specification, new
 values are added to the registry by Expert Review with Specification
 Required, using the Designated Expert process defined in RFC 5226
 [3].
 This section provides guidance to designated experts so that they may
 make decisions using a philosophy appropriate for these registries.
 The registries defined in this document have plenty of values.  In
 most cases, the IETF has approximately 2^32 values available for it
 to define and each vendor the same number of values for its use.
 Because there are so many values available, designated experts should
 not be terribly concerned about exhausting the set of values.
 Instead, designated experts should focus on the following
 requirements.  All values in these IANA registries MUST be documented
 in a specification that is permanently and publicly available.  IETF
 standard values MUST also be useful, not harmful to the Internet, and
 defined in a manner that is clear and likely to ensure
 interoperability.
 Designated experts should encourage vendors to avoid defining similar
 but incompatible values and instead agree on a single IETF standard
 value.  However, it is beneficial to document existing practice.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 55] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 There are several ways to ensure that a specification is permanently
 and publicly available.  It may be published as an RFC.
 Alternatively, it may be published in another manner that makes it
 freely available to anyone.  However, in this latter case, the vendor
 MUST supply a copy to the IANA and authorize the IANA to archive this
 copy and make it freely available to all if at some point the
 document becomes no longer freely available to all through other
 channels.
 Section 7.2 defines the new PA Subtypes.  The following three
 sections provide guidance to the IANA in creating and managing the
 new IANA registries defined by this specification.

7.2. PA Subtypes

 Section 3.5 of this specification defines several new PA Subtypes
 that have been added to the PA Subtypes registry defined in the PB-
 TNC specification.  Here is a list of these assignments:
 PEN  Integer      Name               Defining Specification
 ---  -------      ----               ----------------------
  0     0          Testing                    RFC 5792
  0     1          Operating System           RFC 5792
  0     2          Anti-Virus                 RFC 5792
  0     3          Anti-Spyware               RFC 5792
  0     4          Anti-Malware               RFC 5792
  0     5          Firewall                   RFC 5792
  0     6          IDPS                       RFC 5792
  0     7          VPN                        RFC 5792
  0     8          NEA Client                 RFC 5792
 These PA Subtypes have been added to the registry for PA Subtypes
 defined in the PB-TNC specification, with this RFC as the reference.

7.3. Registry for PA-TNC Attribute Types

 The name for this registry is "PA-TNC Attribute Types".  Each entry
 in this registry should include a human-readable name, an SMI Private
 Enterprise Number, a decimal integer value between 0 and 2^32-1, and
 a reference to the specification where the contents of this attribute
 type are defined.  This specification must define the meaning of this
 PA-TNC attribute type and the format and semantics of the PA-TNC
 Attribute Value field for PA-TNC attributes that include the
 designated Private Enterprise Number in the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor
 ID field and the designated numeric value in the PA-TNC Attribute
 Type field.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 56] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 The following entries for this registry are defined in this document.
 They are the initial entries in the registry for PA-TNC Attribute
 Types.  Additional entries to this registry are added by Expert
 Review with Specification Required, following the guidelines in
 section 7.1.
 PEN   Integer    Name                 Defining Specification
 ---   -------    ----                 ----------------------
  0      0        Testing                      RFC 5792
  0      1        Attribute Request            RFC 5792
  0      2        Product Information          RFC 5792
  0      3        Numeric Version              RFC 5792
  0      4        String Version               RFC 5792
  0      5        Operational Status           RFC 5792
  0      6        Port Filter                  RFC 5792
  0      7        Installed Packages           RFC 5792
  0      8        PA-TNC Error                 RFC 5792
  0      9        Assessment Result            RFC 5792
  0     10        Remediation Instructions     RFC 5792
  0     11        Forwarding Enabled           RFC 5792
  0     12        Factory Default Password     RFC 5792
                  Enabled
  0 0xffffffff    Reserved                     RFC 5792

7.4. Registry for PA-TNC Error Codes

 The name for this registry is "PA-TNC Error Codes".  Each entry in
 this registry should include a human-readable name, an SMI Private
 Enterprise Number, a decimal integer value between 0 and 2^32-1, and
 a reference to the specification where this error code is defined.
 This specification must define the meaning of this error code and the
 format and semantics of the Error Information field for PA-TNC
 attributes that have a PA-TNC vendor ID of 0, a PA-TNC Attribute Type
 of PA-TNC Error, the designated Private Enterprise Number in the PA-
 TNC Error Code Vendor ID field, and the designated numeric value in
 the PA-TNC Error Code field.
 The following entries for this registry are defined in this document.
 They are the initial entries in the registry for PA-TNC Error Codes.
 Additional entries to this registry are added by Expert Review with
 Specification Required, following the guidelines in section 7.1.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 57] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

    PEN  Integer     Name                      Defining Specification
    ---  -------     ----                      ----------------------
     0     0         Reserved                          RFC 5792
     0     1         Invalid Parameter                 RFC 5792
     0     2         Version Not Supported             RFC 5792
     0     3         Attribute Type Not Supported      RFC 5792

7.5. Registry for PA-TNC Remediation Parameters Types

 The name for this registry is "PA-TNC Remediation Parameters Types".
 Each entry in this registry should include a human-readable name, an
 SMI Private Enterprise Number, a decimal integer value between 1 and
 2^32-1, and a reference to the specification where the contents of
 this remediation parameters type are defined.  This specification
 must define the meaning of this PA-TNC Remediation Parameters Type
 and the format and semantics of the Remediation Parameters field for
 PA-TNC attributes that include the designated Private Enterprise
 Number in the Remediation Parameters Vendor ID field and the
 designated numeric value in the Remediation Parameters Type field.
 The following entries for this registry are defined in this document.
 They are the initial entries in the registry for PA-TNC Remediation
 Parameters Types.  Additional entries to this registry are added by
 Expert Review with Specification Required, following the guidelines
 in section 7.1.
 PEN   Integer   Name              Defining Specification
 ---   -------   ----              ----------------------
  0      0      Reserved                 RFC 5792
  0      1      URI                      RFC 5792
  0      2      Remediation String       RFC 5792

8. Acknowledgments

 Thanks to the Trusted Computing Group for contributing the initial
 text [8] upon which this document was based.  The authors would also
 like to acknowledge the following people who have contributed to or
 provided substantial input on the preparation of this document or
 predecessors to it: Stuart Bailey, Roger Chickering, Lauren Giroux,
 Charles Goldberg, Steve Hanna, Ryan Hurst, Meenakshi Kaushik, Greg
 Kazmierczak, Scott Kelly, PJ Kirner, Houcheng Lee, Lisa Lorenzin,
 Mahalingam Mani, Sung Lee, Ravi Sahita, Mauricio Sanchez, Brad Upson,
 and Han Yin.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 58] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

9. References

9.1. Normative References

 [1]   Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement
       Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
 [2]   Yergeau, F., "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO 10646", STD
       63, RFC 3629, November 2003.
 [3]   Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, "Guidelines for Writing an IANA
       Considerations Section in RFCs", BCP 26, RFC 5226, May 2008.
 [4]   Klyne, G. and C. Newman, "Date and Time on the Internet:
       Timestamps", RFC 3339, July 2002.
 [5]   Sahita, R., Hanna, S., Hurst, R., and K. Narayan, "PB-TNC: A
       Posture Broker (PB) Protocol Compatible with Trusted Network
       Connect (TNC)", RFC 5793, March 2010.
 [6]   Phillips, A., Ed., and M. Davis, Ed., "Tags for Identifying
       Languages", BCP 47, RFC 5646, September 2009.
 [7]   Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
       Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66, RFC 3986,
       January 2005.

9.2. Informative References

 [8]   Trusted Computing Group, "IF-M: TLV Binding",
       http://www.trustedcomputinggroup.org/resources/
       tnc_ifm_tlv_binding_specification, February 2010.
 [9]   Sangster, P., Khosravi, H., Mani, M., Narayan, K., and J.
       Tardo, "Network Endpoint Assessment (NEA): Overview and
       Requirements", RFC 5209, June 2008.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 59] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

Appendix A. Use Cases

A.1. Initial Client-Triggered Assessment

 This scenario involves the assessment of an endpoint initiated during
 network join.  The assessment is triggered by the Posture Broker
 Client (PBC) and involves collection of patch information from both
 Standard Operating System (OS) Posture Collector and vendor-specific
 Patch Posture Collector (PC).  The assessment by both the vendor-
 specific Patch Posture Validator (PV) and Standard OS Posture
 Validator result in a compliant assessment decision that results in a
 compliant System Assessment Decision to be returned by the Posture
 Broker Server (PBS).
 +--------+ +-------+ +---------+ +--------+ +-------++--------+
 | Vndr. X| |  Std. | |   Std.  | |  Std.  | | Std.  || Vndr. X|
 |Patch PC| | OS PC | |   PBC   | |  PBS   | | OS PV ||Patch PV|
 +--+-----+ +-+-----+ +---+-----+ +-+------+ +-+------+--+-----+
    |         |   N/W Join|         |          |         |
    |         |     ----->|         |          |         |
    |         | Req Post. |         |          |         |
    |         |<----------|         |          |         |
    |         | Req Post. |         |          |         |
    |<--------------------|         |          |         |
    |Vndr X Patch Posture |         |          |         |
    |-------------------->|         |          |         |
    |         |OS Posture |         |          |         |
    |         |---------->|         |          |         |
    |         |           | Posture |          |         |
    |         |           | Report  |          |         |
    |         |           |-------->|          |         |
    |         |           |         |  Verify  |         |
    |         |           |         |  Posture |         |
    |         |           |         |--------->          |
    |         |           |         |          | Verify  |
    |         |           |         |          | Posture |
    |         |           |         |------------------->|
    |         |           |         | OS Reslt |         |
    |         |           |         |<---------|         |
    |         |           |         | VndrX Patch Result |
    |         |           | Assess  |<-------------------|
    |         |           | Result  |                    |
    |         |           |<--------|          |         |
    |         | OS Reslt  |         |          |         |
    |         |<----------|         |          |         |
    | VndrX Patch Result  |         |          |         |
    |<--------------------|         |          |         |

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 60] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.1.1. Message Contents

 This section shows the contents of the key fields in each of the PA
 messages exchanged in this use case.  When necessary, additional
 commentary is provided to explain why certain fields contain the
 shown values.  Note that many of the flows shown are between
 components on the same system so no message contents are shown.

A.1.1.1. N/W Join

 This flow represents the event that causes the PBC to decide to start
 an assessment of the endpoint in order to gain access to the network.
 This is merely an event and does not include a message being sent.

A.1.1.2. Request Posture (Req Post.)

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the OS and patch posture
 collectors requesting particular posture attributes to be sent.
 Because this use case is triggered locally, the contents of this flow
 aren't specified by NEA.

A.1.1.3. Vendor X Patch Posture (VndrX Patch Posture)

 This flow contains the PA message from the Patch Posture Collector:
 Vendor X Patch Posture PA Message  {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
    Attribute 1 {
       vendor-id=1 (vendor X)
       type=1 (Vendor X namespace attribute)
       length
       Value = {
          VendorXAttribute1=123
       }
    }
    Attribute 2 {
       vendor-id=1 (vendor X)
       type=2 (Vendor X namespace attribute)
       length
       Value = {
          VendorXAttribute2=456
       }
    }
 }

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 61] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.1.1.4. OS Posture

 This flow contains the PA message from the OS Posture Collector:
 OS Posture PA Message  {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
    Attribute 1 {
       vendor-id=0
       type=2 (product information)
       length
       Value = {
          Product-vendor-id=311   -- Microsoft's PEN
          Product-name="Windows Vista"
       }
    }
    Attribute 2 {
       vendor-id=0
       type=3 (numeric version)
       length
       Value = {
          major-version=6     -- Vista is version 6.0
          minor-version=0
          build-number=456789
          service-pack-major=0   -- No service packs
          service-pack-minor=0
       }
    }
 }

A.1.1.5. Posture Report

 This flow contains the PB message containing the PA messages from the
 Patch and OS Posture Collectors; the message content is described in
 the PB-TNC specification.

A.1.1.6. Verify Posture

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the OS and patch Posture
 Validators requesting verification of the posture attributes
 received.  Because this flow happens locally within the NEA server,
 NEA does not specify the message contents.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 62] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.1.1.7. OS Posture Result (OS Reslt)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Assessment Result) from
 the OS Posture Validator
 OS Posture Result PA Message {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=9 (assessment-result)
            length
            Value = {
               assessment-result=0 (compliant)
            }
      }
  }

A.1.1.8. Vendor X Patch Result (VndrX Patch Result)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Assessment Result) from
 the Vendor X Patch Posture Validator
 Patch Vendor X Posture Result PA Message {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=9 (assessment-result)
            length
            Value = {
               assessment-result=0 (compliant)
            }
       }
  }

A.1.1.9. Assessment Result (Assess Result)

 This flow contains the PB message containing the system assessment
 result computed by the Posture Broker Server and the PA messages from
 the Patch and OS Posture Validators; the message content is described
 in the PB-TNC specification.

A.1.1.10. Posture Result (OS PRslt & Vndr X Post PResult)

 These flows illustrate an invocation of the OS and Vendor X Patch
 Posture Collectors to receive the posture assessment results.
 Because this flow is triggered locally, NEA does not specify the
 contents of this flow.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 63] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2. Server-Initiated Assessment with Remediation

 This scenario involves the assessment of an endpoint initiated by the
 NEA Server.  The assessment is triggered by the Posture Broker Server
 and involves collection of Anti-Virus attributes for two Anti-Virus
 components running on the endpoint.  The endpoint is assessed to be
 compliant by one of the vendor (Vendor X) anti-virus Posture
 Validators and non-compliant by the other vendor (Vendor Y) anti-
 virus Posture Validator.  Based upon the Posture Broker Server's
 policy, this results in a non-compliant system assessment decision to
 be returned by the Posture Broker Server.  The Posture Broker Server
 also returns remediation instructions for the endpoint as part of the
 response.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 64] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 +--------+  +-------+ +---------+ +--------+ +-------+ +--------+
 | Vndr Y |  | Vndr X| |   Std.  | |  Std.  | | Vndr X| | Vndr Y |
 |  AV PC |  | AV PC | |   PBC   | |  PBS   | | AV PV | |  AV PV |
 +----+---+  +---+---+ +-----+---+ +---+----+ +---+---+ +----+---+
      |          |           | N/W Join|          |          |
      |          |           | ------->|          |          |
      |          |           |         |  Create  |          |
      |          |           |         |Post. Req |          |
      |          |           |         |--------->|          |
      |          |           |         |Create Posture Req   |
      |          |           |         |----------+--------->|
      |          |           |         | Vndr Y AV Post Req  |
      |          |           |         |<---------+----------|
      |          |           |         |Vndr X AV |          |
      |          |           |         |Post. Req |          |
      |          |           | Posture |<---------|          |
      |          |           | Request |          |          |
      |          | Vndr X AV |<--------|          |          |
      |          | Post. Req |         |          |          |
      |          |<----------|         |          |          |
      |      Vndr Y AV       |         |          |          |
      |     Posture Req      |         |          |          |
      +<---------+-----------|         |          |          |
      |  Vndr Y AV Posture   |         |          |          |
      +----------+---------->|         |          |          |
      |          | Vndr X AV |         |          |          |
      |          |  Posture  |         |          |          |
      |          |---------->| Posture |          |          |
      |          |           |Response |          |          |
      |          |           |-------->|          |          |
      |          |           |         |  Verify  |          |
      |          |           |         |  Posture |          |
      |          |           |         |--------->|          |
      |          |           |         |     Verify Posture  |
      |          |           |         |----------+--------->|
      |          |           |         |Vndr Y AV Post Result|
      |          |           |         |<---------+----------|
      |          |           |         |Vndr X AV |          |
      |          |           |         |Post Reslt|          |
      |          |           |  Assess |<---------|          |
      |          |           |  Result |          |          |
      |          | Vndr X AV |<--------|          |          |
      |          |Post Reslt |<--------|          |          |
      |          |<----------|         |          |          |
      | Vndr Y AV Post Reslt |         |          |          |
      +<---------+-----------|         |          |          |

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 65] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2.1. Message Contents

 This section shows the contents of the key fields in each of the PA
 messages exchanged in this use case.  When necessary, additional
 commentary is provided to explain why certain fields contain the
 shown values.  Note that many of the flows shown are between
 components on the same system so no message contents are shown.

A.2.1.1. N/W Join

 This flow represents the event that causes the PBS to decide to start
 an assessment of the endpoint in order to gain access to the network.
 This is merely an event and does not include a message being sent.

A.2.1.2. Create Posture Request (Create Posture Req)

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the Vendor X and Vendor Y
 Anti-Virus Posture Validators enabling posture request attributes to
 be created.  Because this use case is triggered locally, NEA does not
 specify the contents of this flow.

A.2.1.3. Vendor Y AV Posture Request (Vndr Y AV Posture Req)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Request) from the Vendor Y
 Anti-Virus Posture Validator
 Vendor Y AV Posture Request PA Message {
     Attribute HDR {Message ID}
        Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=1 (Attribute Request)
            length
            Value = {
               Vendor-id=0 (IETF Standard)
               Type=2 (Standard attribute, Product-Information)
               Vendor-id=1 (Vendor Y)
               Type=2 (Vendor Y attribute, Extended-Dat-Version)
             }
        }
 }

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 66] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2.1.4. Vendor X AV Posture Request (Vndr X AV Post. Req)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Request) from the Vendor X
 Anti-Virus Posture Validator
 Vendor X AV Posture Request PA Message {
     Attribute HDR {Message ID}
        Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=1 (Attribute Request)
            length
            Value = {
               Vendor-id=1 (Vendor X)
               Type=1 (Vendor X attribute, Scan-Engine-Version)
               Vendor-id=0 (IETF Standard)
               Type=5 (Standard, Operational-Status)
            }
        }
  }

A.2.1.5. Posture Request

 This flow contains the PB message containing the PA messages from the
 Vendor X and Vendor Y Anti-Virus Posture Validators; the message
 content is described in the PB-TNC specification.

A.2.1.6. Posture Request (Vndr X AV Post Req & Vndr Y AV Post Req)

 These flows illustrate an invocation of the Vendor X and Vendor Y
 Anti-Virus Posture Collectors to process the Posture Request and
 return the particular posture attributes requested.  Because this
 flow is triggered locally, NEA does not specify the contents of this
 flow.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 67] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2.1.7. Vendor Y AV Posture (Vndr Y AV Posture)

 This flow contains the PA message (response to the Posture Request)
 from the Vendor Y Anti-Virus Posture Collector.
 Vendor Y AV Posture PA Message {
   Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
          vendor-id=0 (IETF Standard)
          Type=2 (Standard attribute, Product-Information)
          length
          Value = {
             product-vendor-id=12345 (vendor Y)
             product-id=987 (AV product id from vendor Y)
             product-name="Vendor Y Anti-Virus"
          }
       }
       Attribute 2 {
          vendor-id=2 (vendor Y)
          type=2 (vendor Y attribute, DAT-Version)
          length
          Value = {
             DAT-version=5678
          }
       }
   }

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 68] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2.1.8. Vendor X AV Posture (Vndr X AV Posture)

 This flow contains the PA message (response to the Posture Request)
 from the Vendor X Anti-Virus Posture Collector.
 Vendor X AV Posture PA Message {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
          vendor-id=1
          type=1 (vendor X attribute, Scan-Engine-Version)
          length
          Value = {
             scan-engine-version=1234
          }
       }
       Attribute 2 {
          vendor-id=0 (IETF Standard)
          type=5 (Standard, Operational-Status)
          length
          Value = {
             status=2 (installed but non-operational)
             result=0 (unknown)
             last use="" (never used)
           }
       }
   }

A.2.1.9. Posture Response

 This flow contains the PB message containing the PA messages from the
 Vendor X and Vendor Y Anti-Virus Posture Collectors; the message
 content is described in the PB-TNC specification.

A.2.1.10. Verify Posture

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the Vendor X and Vendor Y
 Anti-Virus Posture Validators requesting verification of the posture
 attributes received.  Because this flow happens locally within the
 NEA server, NEA does not specify the message contents.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 69] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.2.1.11. Vendor Y AV Posture Result (Vndr Y AV Post Result)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Assessment Result) from
 the Vendor Y Anti-Virus Posture Validator
 Vendor Y AV Posture Result PA Message {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
      Attribute 1 {
         vendor-id=0
         type=9 (assessment-result)
         length
         Value = {
            assessment-result=0 (compliant)
         }
      }
   }

A.2.1.12. Vendor X AV Posture Result (Vndr X AV Post Reslt)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Assessment Result) from
 the Vendor X Anti-Virus Posture Validator
 Vendor X AV Posture Result PA Message {
     Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
          vendor-id=0
          type=9 (assessment-result)
          length
          Value = {
             assessment-result=1 (non-compliant)
          }
       }
  }

A.2.1.13. Assessment Result (Assess Result)

 This flow contains the PB message containing the system assessment
 result computed by the Posture Broker Server and the PA messages from
 the Vendor X and Vendor Y Anti-Virus Posture Validators; the message
 content is described in the PB-TNC specification.

A.2.1.14. Posture Result (Vndr X AV Post Reslt & Vndr Y AV Post Reslt)

 These flows illustrate an invocation of the Vendor X and Vendor Y
 Anti-Virus Posture Collectors to receive the posture assessment
 results.  Because this flow is triggered locally, NEA does not
 specify the contents of this flow.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 70] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.3. Client-Triggered Reassessment

 This scenario involves the reassessment of an endpoint as a result of
 enabling a software component on the endpoint.  The endpoint has two
 VPN client software components, one from vendor X for the user's home
 network and other from vendor Y for the network that the endpoint is
 currently accessing.  The assessment is triggered when the user tries
 to use the Vendor X VPN client; this is a violation of the assessment
 policy.  The Posture Broker Client triggers the posture assessment
 when it receives a notification from the VPN Posture Collector about
 the change to the operational state of the VPN component on the
 endpoint.  Note that the VPN Posture Collector may support standard
 attributes and some vendor-defined attributes from vendor X's and
 vendor Y's namespaces.  This use case does not leverage vendor-
 defined attributes.  The assessment involves verification of the
 standard VPN posture attributes by the standard VPN Posture Validator
 that results in a non-compliant assessment result.
 This use case relies on the use of multiple Posture Collector IDs for
 a single Posture Collector as described in section 3.3 of the PA-TNC
 specification.  In this example, the Posture Collector will obtain
 two Posture Collector IDs to a single Posture Collector (Standard VPN
 PC) and the Posture Collector will generate two separate PA messages
 each using a different ID to report the posture for Vendor X and
 Vendor Y VPN Clients.  The Posture Broker Client will associate the
 assigned IDs in the PB message sent to the NEA Server.  This entire
 behavior will be completely opaque to the NEA Server, which will
 handle the PB message as if there were two VPN Posture Collectors on
 the NEA Client.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 71] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 +--------+  +-------+ +---------+ +--------+ +--------+ +--------+
 |Vndr X  |  |Vndr Y | |Standard | |Standard| |Standard| |Standard|
 |VPNClnt |  |VPNClnt| | VPN PC  | |  PBC   | |  PBS   | | VPN PV |
 +----+---+  +---+---+ +-----+---+ +---+----+ +---+----+ +----+---+
 Enble|          |           |         |          |           |
 ---->|          |           |         |          |           |
      |  VPN Status Change   |         |          |           |
      |--------------------->| Posture |          |           |
      |          |           | Change  |          |           |
      |          |           |-------->|          |           |
      |          |           |Req. Post|          |           |
      |          |           |<--------|          |           |
      |          |Ins/Rq Info|         |          |           |
      |          |<----------|         |          |           |
      | Inspect/Request Info |         |          |           |
      |<---------+-----------|VPNX Post|          |           |
      |          |           |-------->|          |           |
      |          |           |VPNY Post|          |           |
      |          |           |-------->|          |           |
      |          |           |         | Posture  |           |
      |          |           |         |  Report  |           |
      |          |           |         |--------->|           |
      |          |           |         |          |Vrfy Post. |
      |          |           |         |          |---------->|
      |          |           |         |          |VPN PRslt  |
      |          |           |         |  Assess  |<----------|
      |          |           |         |  Result  |           |
      |          |           |         |<---------|           |
      |          |           |VPN PRslt|          |           |
      |          |           |<--------|          |           |

A.3.1. Message Contents

 This section shows the contents of the key fields in each of the PA
 messages exchanged in this use case.  When necessary, additional
 commentary is provided to explain why certain fields contain the
 shown values.  Note that many of the flows shown are between
 components on the same system so no message contents are shown.

A.3.1.1. Enable VPN Client (Enble)

 This flow represents the end user triggered event of starting the VPN
 Client software from Vendor X.  This is merely an event and does not
 include a message being sent.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 72] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.3.1.2. Notify Status Change (VPN Status Change)

 This flow represents the detection of the active state of the Vendor
 X VPN Client software by the VPN Posture Collector.  This is merely
 an event and does not include a message being sent.

A.3.1.3. Notify Posture Change (Posture Change)

 This flow represents the notification of the VPN posture change sent
 from the VPN Posture Collector to the Standard Posture Broker Client.
 This is merely an event and does not include a message being sent.

A.3.1.4. Request Posture (Req. Post)

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the VPN Posture Collector
 requesting particular posture attributes to be sent.  Because this
 use case is triggered locally, NEA does not specify the contents of
 this flow.

A.3.1.5. Inspect/Request Info (Ins/Rq Info)

 This flow illustrates the acquisition of the posture information by
 the VPN Posture Collector from the Vendor X and Vendor Y VPN Client
 components.  Because this flow is triggered locally, NEA does not
 specify the message contents.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 73] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.3.1.6. Vendor X VPN Posture (VPNX Post)

 This flow contains the PA message from the VPN Posture Collector
 describing the Vendor X VPN Client's posture:
 Vendor X VPN Posture PA Message{
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
      Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=2 (product information)
            length
            Value = {
               product-vendor-id=9876 (vendor X)
               product-id=567 (VPN client identifier for Vndr X)
               product-name="Vendor X VPN Client"
             }
       }
       Attribute 2 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=5 (operational status)
            length
            Value = {
               Status=3 (Operational)
               Result=1 (Successful use with no errors detected)
               last Use="2008-07-07T12:00:00Z"
            }
       }

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 74] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.3.1.7. Vendor Y VPN Posture (VPNY Post)

 This flow contains the PA message from the VPN Posture Collector
 including the Vendor Y VPN Client's posture:
 Vendor Y VPN Posture PA Message{
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
        Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=2 (product information)
            length
            Value = {
               product-vendor-id=Vendor Y
               product-id=234 (VPN client identifier for Vndr Y)
               product-name="Vendor Y VPN Client"
             }
       }
       Attribute 2 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=5 (operational status)
            length
            Value = {
              Status=3 (Operational)
              Result=1 (Successful use with no errors detected)
              last Use="2008-07-07T14:05:00Z"
            }
       }
 }

A.3.1.8. Posture Report

 This flow contains the PB message containing the PA message from the
 VPN Posture Collector; the message content is described in the PB-TNC
 specification.

A.3.1.9. Verify Posture (Vrfy Post.)

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the VPN Posture Validator
 requesting verification of the posture attributes received.  Because
 this flow happens locally within the NEA Server, NEA does not specify
 the message contents.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 75] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

A.3.1.10. VPN Posture Result (VPN PRslt)

 This flow contains the PA message (Posture Assessment Result) from
 the VPN Posture Validator
 VPN Posture Result PA Message {
    Attribute HDR {Message ID}
       Attribute 1 {
            vendor-id=0
            type=9 (assessment-result)
            length
            Value = {
               assessment-result=1 (non-compliant)
            }
       }
  }

A.3.1.11. Assessment Result (Assess Result)

 This flow contains the PB message containing the system assessment
 result computed by the Posture Broker Server and the PA messages from
 the VPN Posture Validator; the message content is described in the
 PB-TNC specification.

A.3.1.12. Posture Result (VPN PRslt)

 This flow illustrates an invocation of the VPN Posture Collector to
 receive the posture assessment result.  Because this flow is
 triggered locally, NEA does not specify the contents of this flow.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 76] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

Appendix B. Evaluation against NEA Requirements

 This section evaluates the PA-TNC protocol against the requirements
 defined in the NEA Requirements document.  Each subsection considers
 a separate requirement from the NEA Requirements document.  Only
 common requirements (C-1 through C-10) and PA requirements (PA-1
 through PA-6) are considered, since these are the only ones that
 apply to PA.

B.1. Evaluation against Requirement C-1

 Requirement C-1 says:
 C-1   NEA protocols MUST support multiple round trips between the NEA
 Client and NEA Server in a single assessment.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  It allows an unlimited number of
 round trips between the NEA Client and NEA Server.

B.2. Evaluation against Requirement C-2

 Requirement C-2 says:
 C-2   NEA protocols SHOULD provide a way for both the NEA Client and
 the NEA Server to initiate a posture assessment or reassessment as
 needed.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  PA-TNC is designed to work whether
 the NEA Client or the NEA Server initiates a posture assessment or
 reassessment.

B.3. Evaluation against Requirement C-3

 Requirement C-3 says:
 C-3   NEA protocols including security capabilities MUST be capable
 of protecting against active and passive attacks by intermediaries
 and endpoints including prevention from replay-based attacks.
 Security for PA-TNC messages being sent over the network is provided
 through PT protocol security.  Therefore, PA-TNC does not include any
 security capabilities.  Since this requirement only applies to NEA
 protocols "including security capabilities", this specification is
 not subject to this requirement (see section 5.2).

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 77] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

B.4. Evaluation against Requirement C-4

 Requirement C-4 says:
 C-4   The PA and PB protocols MUST be capable of operating over any
 PT protocol.  For example, the PB protocol must provide a transport-
 independent interface allowing the PA protocol to operate without
 change across a variety of network protocol environments (e.g.,
 EAP/802.1X, PANA, TLS and IKE/IPsec).
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  PA-TNC can operate over any PT
 protocol that meets the requirements for PT stated in the NEA
 Requirements document.  PA-TNC does not have any dependencies on
 specific details of the underlying PT protocol.

B.5. Evaluation against Requirement C-5

 Requirement C-5 says:
 C-5   The selection process for NEA protocols MUST evaluate and
 prefer the reuse of existing open standards that meet the
 requirements before defining new ones.  The goal of NEA is not to
 create additional alternative protocols where acceptable solutions
 already exist.
 Based on this requirement, PA-TNC should receive a strong preference.
 PA-TNC is equivalent with IF-M 1.0, an open TCG specification.  Other
 specifications from TCG and other groups are also under development
 based on the IF-M 1.0 specification.  Selecting PA-TNC as the basis
 for the PA protocol will ensure compatibility with IF-M 1.0, with
 these other specifications, and with their implementations.

B.6. Evaluation against Requirement C-6

 Requirement C-6 says:
 C-6   NEA protocols MUST be highly scalable; the protocols MUST
 support many Posture Collectors on a large number of NEA Clients to
 be assessed by numerous Posture Validators residing on multiple NEA
 Servers.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  PA-TNC supports an unlimited number
 of Posture Collectors, Posture Validators, NEA Clients, and NEA
 Servers.  It also is quite scalable in many other aspects as well.  A
 PA-TNC message can contain up to 2^32-1 octets and about 2^28 PA-TNC
 attributes.  Each organization with an SMI Private Enterprise Number
 is entitled to define up to 2^32 vendor-specific PA-TNC Attribute
 Types, 2^16 vendor-specific PA-TNC Product IDs, and 2^32 vendor-

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 78] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 specific PA-TNC Error Codes.  Each attribute can contain almost 2^32
 octets.  It is generally not advisable or necessary to send this much
 data in a NEA assessment, but still PA-TNC is highly scalable and
 meets requirement C-6 easily.

B.7. Evaluation against Requirement C-7

 Requirement C-7 says:
 C-7   The protocols MUST support efficient transport of a large
 number of attribute messages between the NEA Client and the NEA
 Server.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  Each PA-TNC message can contain about
 2^28 PA-TNC attributes.  PA-TNC supports up to 2^32 round trips in a
 session so the maximum number of attribute messages that can be sent
 in a single session is actually about 2^50.  However, it is generally
 inadvisable and unnecessary to send a large number of messages in a
 NEA assessment.  As for efficiency, PA-TNC adds only 12 octets of
 overhead per attribute and 8 octets per message (which is negligible
 on a per-attribute basis).

B.8. Evaluation against Requirement C-8

 Requirement C-8 says:
 C-8   NEA protocols MUST operate efficiently over low bandwidth or
 high latency links.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  A PA-TNC exchange is envisioned
 (based on current deployment experience) to involve one or two round
 trips with less than 500 octets of PA-TNC messages.  Of course, use
 of vendor-specific PA-TNC attribute types could expand the
 assessment.  However, PA-TNC itself imposes an overhead of only 8
 octets per PA-TNC message and 12 octets per attribute.

B.9. Evaluation against Requirement C-9

 Requirement C-9 says:
 C-9   For any strings intended for display to a user, the protocols
 MUST support adapting these strings to the user's language
 preferences.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  The only field included in a PB-TNC
 attribute for display to the user includes a language tag that could
 be selected based upon the user's PB-TNC negotiated preferred
 language for the assessment (see section 4.10 of the PB-TNC

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 79] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 specification).  With this exception, all of the strings in the
 standard PA-TNC attributes are intended for logging and programmatic
 comparisons.
 If any vendor-specific PA-TNC attribute types or future IETF Standard
 PA-TNC Attribute Types include strings that are intended for display
 to a user, they should be translated to the user's preferred
 language.  The Posture Broker Server will need to expose the user's
 preferences to the Posture Validators through whatever API or
 protocol is used to connect those components.  However, that is all
 out of scope for this specification.

B.10. Evaluation against Requirement C-10

 Requirement C-10 says:
 C-10  NEA protocols MUST support encoding of strings in UTF-8 format.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  All strings in the PA-TNC protocol
 are encoded in UTF-8 format.  This allows the protocol to support a
 wide range of languages efficiently.

B.11. Evaluation against Requirement C-11

 Requirement C-11 says:
 C-11  Due to the potentially different transport characteristics
 provided by the underlying candidate PT protocols, the NEA Client and
 NEA Server MUST be capable of becoming aware of and adapting to the
 limitations of the available PT protocol.  For example, some PT
 protocol characteristics that might impact the operation of PA and PB
 include restrictions on which end can initiate a NEA connection,
 maximum data size in a message or full assessment, upper bound on
 number of round trips, and ordering (duplex) of messages exchanged.
 The selection process for the PT protocols MUST consider the
 limitations the candidate PT protocol would impose upon the PA and PB
 protocols.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  The design of the PA-TNC protocol
 emphasizes efficient transport of information in order to maximize
 its usability in constrained PT environments.  Local APIs could allow
 Posture Collectors and Posture Validators to discover when they are
 operating in a less constrained deployment and then make use of more
 verbose attributes.  Similarly, Posture Collectors could choose not
 to send or use smaller attributes (including assertions from previous
 assessments) when faced with a very constrained network connection.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 80] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

B.12. Evaluation against Requirement PA-1

 Requirement PA-1 says:
 PA-1  The PA protocol MUST support communication of an extensible set
 of NEA standards-defined attributes.  These attributes will be
 uniquely identifiable from non-standard attributes.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  Each attribute is identified with a
 PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID and a PA-TNC Attribute Type.  IETF
 Standard PA-TNC Attribute Types use a vendor ID of zero (0), in
 contrast with vendor-specific PA-TNC Attribute Types, which will use
 the vendor's SMI Private Enterprise Number as the vendor ID.  The
 IANA will maintain a registry of PA-TNC Attribute Types with new
 values added by Expert Review with Specification Required, as
 described in the IANA Considerations section of this specification.
 Thus, the set of standard attribute types is extensible, but all
 standard attribute types are uniquely identifiable.

B.13. Evaluation against Requirement PA-2

 Requirement PA-2 says:
 PA-2  The PA protocol MUST support communication of an extensible set
 of vendor-specific attributes.  These attributes will be segmented
 into uniquely identifiable vendor-specific namespaces.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  Each attribute is identified with a
 PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID and a PA-TNC Attribute Type.  Vendor-
 defined PA-TNC Attribute Types use the vendor's SMI Private
 Enterprise Number as the PA-TNC Attribute Vendor ID.  Each vendor can
 define up to 2^32 PA-TNC Attribute Types, using its own internal
 processes to manage its set of attribute types.
 The IANA is not involved, other than the initial assignment of the
 vendor's SMI Private Enterprise Number.  Thus, the set of vendor-
 specific attributes is segmented into uniquely identifiable vendor-
 specific namespaces.

B.14. Evaluation against Requirement PA-3

 Requirement PA-3 says:
 PA-3  The PA protocol MUST enable a Posture Validator to make one or
 more requests for attributes from a Posture Collector within a single
 assessment.  This enables the Posture Validator to reassess the
 posture of a particular endpoint feature or to request additional
 posture including from other parts of the endpoint.

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 81] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  The Attribute Request attribute type
 is an IETF Standard PA-TNC Attribute Type that permits a Posture
 Validator to send to one or more Posture Collectors a request for one
 or more attributes.  This attribute may be sent at any point in the
 posture assessment process and may in fact be sent more than once if
 the Posture Validator needs to first determine the type of operating
 system and then request certain attributes specific to that operating
 system, for example.

B.15. Evaluation against Requirement PA-4

 Requirement PA-4 says:
 PA-4  The PA protocol MUST be capable of returning attributes from a
 Posture Validator to a Posture Collector.  For example, this might
 enable the Posture Collector to learn the specific reason for a
 failed assessment and to aid in remediation and notification of the
 system owner.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  A Posture Validator can easily send
 attributes to one or more Posture Collectors.

B.16. Evaluation against Requirement PA-5

 Requirement PA-5 says:
 PA-5  The PA protocol SHOULD provide authentication, integrity, and
 confidentiality of attributes communicated between a Posture
 Collector and Posture Validator.  This enables end-to-end security
 across a NEA deployment that might involve traversal of several
 systems or trust boundaries.
 PA-TNC does not include an explicit PA-level security mechanism but
 does lay a foundation allowing attribute-level security protections
 to be added later.  As an existence proof, the NEA working group
 considered an Internet-Draft proposal capable of encapsulating PA
 attributes within a Cryptographic Message Syntax (CMS) security
 wrapper in a new attribute type.  This proposal offered the
 protections described in this requirement.  However, the NEA WG
 decided that the use cases in scope for the working group did not
 require PA-level security.  The use cases involving PA message
 traversal of multiple systems or trust boundaries were considered out
 of scope; therefore, a Posture Validator to Posture Collector end-to-
 end security protection was considered not to be required.
 Instead, PA-TNC attributes are protected by the PT layer
 authentication, integrity, and confidentiality support.  This
 protects the attributes communicated between the Posture Transport

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 82] RFC 5792 PA-TNC March 2010

 Client and Posture Transport Server.  Because the Posture Collector
 is in the same address space as the Posture Broker Client and Posture
 Transport Client and the Posture Validator is in the same address
 space as the Posture Broker Server and Posture Transport Server, the
 underlying broker and transport components are deemed trusted with
 respect to not tampering with the PA messages (see trust model in
 section 5.1 for details).  Encrypting the PA-TNC messages would not
 prevent a hostile broker or transport component from attacking the
 messages.

B.17. Evaluation against Requirement PA-6

 Requirement PA-6 says:
 PA-6  The PA protocol MUST be capable of carrying attributes that
 contain non-binary and binary data including encrypted content.
 PA-TNC meets this requirement.  PA-TNC attributes can contain non-
 binary and binary data including encrypted content.  For examples,
 see the attribute type definitions contained in this specification.

Authors' Addresses

 Paul Sangster
 Symantec Corporation
 6825 Citrine Drive
 Carlsbad, CA 92009
 USA
 EMail: Paul_Sangster@symantec.com
 Kaushik Narayan
 Cisco Systems Inc.
 10 West Tasman Drive
 San Jose, CA 95134
 USA
 EMail: kaushik@cisco.com

Sangster & Narayan Standards Track [Page 83]

/data/webs/external/dokuwiki/data/pages/rfc/rfc5792.txt · Last modified: 2010/03/09 23:00 by 127.0.0.1

Donate Powered by PHP Valid HTML5 Valid CSS Driven by DokuWiki