[saag] Re: Fragmentation, crypto drafts, and a way forwa rd

On Wed, Oct 22, 2025 at 2:27 PM Watson Ladd <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> Dear SAAG,
>
> Over the past few months there's been quite a bit of debate over the
> appropriateness of having algorithm describing drafts emanate from
> working groups particularly post quantum crypto.  That's despite many
> groups opening up IANA registries to try to avoid these issues. I
> suggest that we leave this up to working groups and let them decide
> what they want to describe and with what track. We don't currently
> have a clear signal to do otherwise in the form of IETF or security
> area wide consensus, there is no reason to think there will be one,
> and the current situation is a mess that working groups are best
> positioned to navigate.
>
> To be absolutely clear: I have been told privately, as well as seen in
> public emails, that there is a bias towards NIST favored cryptography
> on the part of IESG members and Security ADs who have intervened to
> delay or downgrade publication of drafts that describe alternatives to
> ML-KEM, and that this favors organizations they currently or in the
> recent past have worked for. I don't think that there are widely used
> protocols where ML-KEM hybrids or pure would not be an option, nor do
> I think that diversity would become a major problem: that's why we
> increasingly opened up the registries in TLS, and I think the market
> would deal with this. I do think what's happening now is harmful to
> the general environment of the IETF and creates a great deal of
> unclarity.

I must apologize to Deb Cooley. I have no reason to think her actions were
anything other than attempting valiantly to find a resolution to a
rather difficult dispute: difficult due to a lack of technical issues,
personalities, and the vehemence with which these things seem to
inevitably be discussed. My email made it seem otherwise
and I profoundly regret that.

I don't personally believe that anyone on the IESG has acted in ways
due to improper conflict of interest per se, rather than due to what
has been called "professional
deformation" - one falls naturally into the worldview of ones
coworkers. I do however think that the current state still leads to
all sorts
of unfortunate consequences, and that leaving the issue of what drafts
to progress and what they should recommend to working groups with the
understanding
that there are lots of different reasons why you may or may not need
an RFC for certain options is the way forward that best avoids these
messes.

Sincerely,
Watson Ladd



>
> Sincerely,
> Watson
>
> --
> Astra mortemque praestare gradatim



--
Astra mortemque praestare gradatim

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