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Let’s say I operate my own authoritative DNS servers and my own web server. Which I do. With DNSSEC, I know that anyone asking for IP addresses of my web server will get the correct address, and in the future it may be possible to use TLSA records (and/or HTTPS records) so that the user’s web browser can be certain that it is connecting to the correct site, with the correct key. The only weak point is that the user might be using a DNS resolver which may be correctly checking the DNSSEC signatures, but the DNS replies, sent from the resolver to the user, are not signed, only “authenticated” by the AD bit. (This is where DoT – or even, blech, DoH – might actually help.) Or the user could run their own local resolver with no untrusted path between their device and their resolver, closing the gap completely. Contrast that with using no DNSSEC, only DoH (or DoT). The user asks the resolver for the IP address (and possibly HTTPS/TLSA records), and the resolver asks the authoriative DNS server for the information. But the whole conversation between the resolver and the authoritative DNS server is completely unsigned, and can be manipulated at will by any middlemen. Also, it is not even TCP (which is hard, but not impossible) to manipulate as a man-in-the-middle, but DNS is most often UDP. But let’s say there is no manipulation here. How do you trust the identity of the resolver? Because they have a nice certificate from “Honest Achmed's Used Cars and Certificates”¹, which says they they are indeed the DoH resolver the user has configured? The same problem also applies to the web site certificate; how can you trust it, when any CA in the world can issue any certificate at will? 1. <https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=647959> |
Which is where you get to the crunch point though: this is not a digital problem, it's a social problem. The way you establish trust is by generating a suitable preponderance of evidence that someone is who they say they are.
On the internet we outsourced this to a couple of big players who broadly benefit from decent standards, but the ultimately it is just "might makes right" - Google says they don't like you, your business ceases to exist.
The trouble is some of our standards in this area are complete junk and so widely implemented they're near impossible to change - i.e. why CA certificates don't have a limited domain scope (technically yes, they can, but it's an extension and a lot of implementations don't check it to the point you can't rely on it at all).
IMO this is where open-source and it's anti-government bent has to some extent done a huge disservice to the internet. The vast majority of internet traffic people need to be "no questions secure" is traffic that interacts with government or government-recognized entities and their associated legal systems. The identity people are trying to establish is most frequently "Are you under a legal jurisdiction providing me recourse if dealt with unfairly, and honestly representing yourself?"
Which incidentally is why I wish like hell the Signal project would create a paid enterprise offering to fund itself. I want my bank to use Signal to send me things, and I want some assurances around proving that's who it is.