README.site
1Copyright (C) Internet Systems Consortium, Inc. ("ISC")
2
3See COPYRIGHT in the source root or https://isc.org/copyright.html for terms.
4
5How to use site.h for the PKCS#11 provider of your HSM
6------------------------------------------------------
7
8First run "pkcs11-tokens" (in bin/pkcs11). This tool is built when BIND9
9is configured with the --with-pcks11 flag. It prints the addresses of
10selected tokens per algorithm:
11
12 - random number generation
13 - RSA (sign/verify)
14 - DSA (sign/verify)
15 - DH (secret derivation)
16 - digest (hash)
17 - EC (ECDSA, sign/verify)
18 - GOST (Russian hash and sign/verify)
19 - AES (encrypt/decrypt)
20
21...and a summary of PKCS#11 tokens that have been found.
22
23Current well-known HSMs are predefined in site.h according to HSM "flavors":
24
25 - Thales nCipher (default)
26 - OpenDNSSEC SoftHSMv2
27
28...and with experimental status:
29
30 - OpenDNSSEC SoftHSMv1 with SHA224 support added
31 - Cryptech
32 - AEP Keyper
33
34If BIND9 is configured with native PKCS#11 support (--enable-native-pkcs11),
35then pkcs11-tokens will raise an error when a mandatory algorithm is not
36supported. (The usual error is 0x70, or CKR_MECHANISM_INVALID; 0x0
37indicates that a required flag is not available.) The following steps
38may be taken, depending on which algorithms indicate failures:
39
40 - rand or RSA: nothing can be done; native PKCS#11 is not supported
41 in BIND9 with this HSM.
42
43 - DSA or DH: run pkcs11-tokens with the -v (verbose) flag. If the
44 parameter generation mechanism is not supported you can make the token
45 selection to ignore the error. Note DSA and DH are not critical
46 algorithms; you can use BIND9 in production without them.
47
48 - digest: run pkcs11-tokens with the -v (verbose) flag. If the problem is
49 with HMAC mechanisms, use the corresponding REPLACE flags in site.h.
50 If the problem is with MD5, use the corresponding DISABLE flag in
51 site.h. If the problem is with SHA224, contact the implementor of the
52 PKCS#11 provider and ask to have this hash algorithm implemented. For
53 any other problem, nothing can be done; native PKCS#11 is not supported
54 with this HSM.
55
56 - EC: you may wish to configure BIND9 without ECDSA support by adding
57 --without-ecdsa to the "configure" arguments.
58
59 - GOST: you SHOULD configure BIND9 without GOST support by adding
60 --without-gost to the "configure" arguments.
61
62 - AES: you MUST reconfigure bind9 without AES support by adding
63 --without-aes to configure arguments.
64
65You can disable some algorithms (e.g. DSA, DH and MD5) using the
66"disable-algorithms" option in named.conf, and some other algorithms can be
67disabled at compile time (ECDSA, GOST, AES). Note, however, that disabling
68algorithms can have unwanted side effects; for instance, disabling DH breaks
69TKEY support.
70
71A final note: the DISABLE flags in site.h work for OpenSSL code too, but
72this feature is not officially supported yet and should not be relied on.
73