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Duffbeer703
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@Ejc3 At my employer, we issue our own root certificates to authenticate computers. So when we use the proxy to decrypt incoming SSL connections, we re-encrypt the session between the proxy and browser with using an internally trusted certificate.
You should assume that any public computer at a hotel, coffee shop, library, etc is doing this.
To the end user, this is transparent, unless you inspect the SSL data.
For a nefarious network operator (ie. not an IT organization in a company), this is a little harder to do. You either need to compromise a PC and inject a false Root Certificate, or obtain fraudulent certificates from an intermediate CA trusted by your browser already.
Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted?
The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making ma...
This assumes that the network operator is not a bad actor.
A problem with HTTPS is that it can give you a false sense of security. In an enterprise IT environment, you usually cannot have any confidence that your HTTPS session is terminated at the website that you are visiting.
In a coffeeshop, this is harder, as the snoop needs to have a trusted SSL certificate. But still possible.
Should All Web Traffic Be Encrypted?
The prevalence of free, open WiFi has made it rather easy for a WiFi eavesdropper to steal your identity cookie for the websites you visit while you're connected to that WiFi access point. This is something I talked about in Breaking the Web's Cookie Jar. It's difficult to fix without making ma...
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Feb 14, 2012
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