Internet-Draft MoLE Protocols June 2026
Schlesinger Expires 25 December 2026 [Page]
Workgroup:
Network Working Group
Internet-Draft:
draft-schlesinger-mole-protocols-latest
Published:
Intended Status:
Informational
Expires:
Author:
S. Schlesinger
Google LLC

MoLE Protocols

Abstract

TODO Abstract

About This Document

This note is to be removed before publishing as an RFC.

The latest revision of this draft can be found at https://moderation-of-unlinkable-endorsements.github.io/internet-drafts/draft-schlesinger-mole-protocols.html. Status information for this document may be found at https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-schlesinger-mole-protocols/.

Source for this draft and an issue tracker can be found at https://github.com/Moderation-of-unLinkable-Endorsements/internet-drafts.

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction

In this document, we'll register all the token type that privacy pass is lacking and that we need. I suspect this is likely to lead to another registry, but maybe not needed.

We will NOT use the vocabulary from [RFC9576] but rather use [REVERSE-FLOW] vocabulary We indeed need to use credentialRequest/response and distinguish finalisation from presentation.

These are not specific to MoLE, but MoLE must constrain them.

2. Conventions and Definitions

The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown here.

Unless otherwise specified, this document encodes protocol messages in TLS notation (Section 3 of [TLS13]). Moreover, all constants are in network byte order.

3. Protocols

Beyond ACT (with some improvement), we'll need to specify the following protocol

3.1. Issuance Protocol for Issuer-unlinkable Privately Verifiable Tokens

Token type 0x0531

Configuration (these bits will probably differ for MoLE, and we should define the discovery we want)

  1. Issuer Request URL <-- issuer name is going to be th erequest URL. Name is a footgun meant for private deployment

  2. Issuer public key

  3. Challenge value

  4. Issuer set <-- magic crypto bits?

This token follws this flow with properties

  1. how do we build context to get the endorsement

  2. challenge?

  3. presentation context: does it need to be flexible?

  4. obtention of the issuer set from the origin: what information can the client validate to not reveal themselves

Note: this issuance protocol DOES NOT require a reverse flow, even if in MoLE it will use it to obtain a credential from an endorsement.

Realisation: there is work to do something like https://eprint.iacr.org/2026/870.pdf but without pairing

3.1.1. Client to Issuer

struct CredentialRequest {
  uint16_t token_type = 0x0531; /* Type something(something) */
  uint8_t truncated_token_key_id; /* Allow for multiple keys per issuer */
  ...
}

3.1.2. Issuer to Client

struct CredentialResponse {
  opaque response
}

The client finalises the response into a Credential

struct Credential {
  uint16_t token_type = 0x0531;
  opaque cred
}

3.1.3. Client to Origin

The client knows the set of issuers it needs to present to. It presents the credential to obtain a token

struct Token {
  uint16_t token_type = 0x0531;
  opaque token
}

4. Crypto Bits

We define a two round protocol between an Anchor and Client to produce an endorsement, and then a half-round Credential generation step presuming the Client knows the Anchors the Issuer accepts. We let hash2curve be the Hash2Curve function from [Hash2Curve], and H be hash function whose output length is sufficiently long.

The Endorsement is a structure with m, Y=Hash2Curve(m), Zhat, Xhat and private data gamma. The Anchor has a public key X and a private key x, and X = xG. The public form of a credential Zhat, Xhat, and a proof that Xhat = vG, Zhat = vY. Xhat = gamma X, and the client will prove it knows gamma such that Xhat is a power of one of the public keys of an Anchor the moderator trusts.

4.1. Issuance Step One: Statement and Commitment

Client randomly selects scalars v and gamma, and sends Yprime = v Y to the anchor.

The Anchor computes Zprime = x Yprime, selects three random scalars aprime, bprime, and tprime. It computes a commitment. It then computes T1prime = tprime Yprime, T2Prime = tprime G. It then transmits Zprime, Cprime, and T1prime and T2prime to the client.

4.2. Issuance Step Two: Opening and Proof

The client now has to compute some proof elements and send a scalar to the server. The client lets Zhat = gamma v^-1 Z. It then picks alpha, a random nonzero scalar, beta, a random scalar, epsilon, a random nonzero scalar, and rho, a random scalar. The client computes C = alpha^-1 C' - beta H, T1 = epsilon ^ -1 v ^ -1 (T1prime - rho Yprime), T2 = epsilon ^ -1 (T2prime - rho G).

The client now computes e = H(Y, Zhat, T1, T2, C), and sends eprime = epsilon alpha^{-1} gamma e to the anchor

The anchor computes rprime = tprime + eprime aprime x and sends back rprime aprime and bprime.

The client then checks Cprime = aprime G + bprime H, that aprime is invertable, and then computes a = alpha ^-1 aprime, b=alpha^-1 bprime - beta, r = epsilon ^ -1 (rprime - rho). The client then verifies Xhat, Zhat, m, e, a, b, r are a valid endorsement as in the section below.

4.3. Verifying such an endorsement

A verifier gets Xhat, Zhat, m and e, a, b, r. The verifier computes Y=Hash2Curve(m), and then lets T1 = r Y - e a Zhat, T2 = rG - e a Xhat, C = a G + b H. It checks a is not zero and Y is not the identity and then checks e = H(Y, Zhat, T1, T2, C).

4.4. Connecting to the issuer

In addition to the above endorsement, the client must prove knowledge of a value gamma such that Xhat = gamma Xi for some i, where the Xi is the list of issuers trusted. This is a standard OR sigma proof, and we can use sigma stacking to compact the proof.

5. IANA Considerations

This document has no IANA actions.

6. References

6.1. Normative References

[Hash2Curve]
Faz-Hernandez, A., Scott, S., Sullivan, N., Wahby, R. S., and C. A. Wood, "Hashing to Elliptic Curves", RFC 9380, DOI 10.17487/RFC9380, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc9380>.
[RFC2119]
Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, DOI 10.17487/RFC2119, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc2119>.
[RFC8174]
Leiba, B., "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC 2119 Key Words", BCP 14, RFC 8174, DOI 10.17487/RFC8174, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8174>.
[TLS13]
Rescorla, E., "The Transport Layer Security (TLS) Protocol Version 1.3", RFC 8446, DOI 10.17487/RFC8446, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8446>.

6.2. Informative References

[REVERSE-FLOW]
Meunier, T., "Privacy Pass Reverse Flow", Work in Progress, Internet-Draft, draft-meunier-privacypass-reverse-flow-05, , <https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-meunier-privacypass-reverse-flow-05>.
[RFC9576]
Davidson, A., Iyengar, J., and C. A. Wood, "The Privacy Pass Architecture", RFC 9576, DOI 10.17487/RFC9576, , <https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc9576>.

Acknowledgments

TODO acknowledge.

Author's Address

Samuel Schlesinger
Google LLC