FIPS Validation

NSS FIPS 140 validation

NSS softoken has completed FIPS 140 validation four times: 1997, 1999, 2002, and 2007. This page documents our recent NSS FIPS 140 validation.

Target Release: Softoken 3.12.2

Softoken is a component of NSS, and has a separate version number. The most recent FIPS validated Softoken is 3.11.4 and is in NSS 3.11.4 and NSS 3.11.5.

Updates

August 27, 2007: Our Level 2 cert has been issued! NSS Level 2 Cert

August 8, 2007: Our Level 1 cert has been issued! NSS Level 1 Cert

August 2, 2007: we advanced to Finalization state according to FIPS 140-2 Pre-validation List. This means the certs should be issued soon.

March 23, 2007: we advanced to Coordination state according to FIPS 140-2 Pre-validation List. This means we are in the final stages, answering questions from NIST. One more state to go...

January 18, 2007: we advanced to the In Review state on the FIPS 140-2 Pre-validation List. This means the two-month wait for a NIST reviewer to be assigned to our case is over.

November 16, 2006: Aspect Labs submitted the test report to NIST for validation. We advanced to the Review Pending state on the FIPS 140-2 Pre-validation List.

June 30, 2006: we have received the remaining four algorithm certificates: RNG (certificate #208), DSA (certificate #172), RSA (certificate #152), and ECDSA (certificate #30).

June 23, 2006: we are now on the FIPS 140-2 Pre-validation List.

June 15, 2006: we addressed the deficiencies in Chapter 1-4 of the documentation.

April 13, 2006 status: we are having RNG, DSA, and RSA validated now. We are updating our Security Policy and writing our responses to the vendor requirements in the FIPS 140-2 Derived Test Requirements (DTR).

January 20, 2006 status: we have received four algorithm certificates: AES (certificate #352), Triple DES (certificate #410), SHS (certificate #426), and HMAC (certificate #152).

Platforms

• Level 1
  • RHEL 4 x86 (was: RHEL 3 x86)
  • Windows XP Service Pack 2
  • 64-bit Solaris 10 AMD64
  • HP-UX B.11.11 PA-RISC
  • Mac OS X 10.4
• Level 2
  • RHEL 4 x86_64 (was: RHEL 4 x86)
  • 64-bit Trusted Solaris 8 SPARC

Schedule

Milestone	Item	Deps	Time	Who	Completed
M1	Initial Setup
1a	Choose validation Lab, approve costs, and sign NDA	all		all	Atlan
1d	Define Algorithms, Key Sizes and modes
M2	Complete NSS 3.12 FIPS dependant bugs
M3	Update documentation (numbers in parentheses refer to sections in FIPS documentation)
3a.	(1.0) Security policy, new algorithms	1d	2 wks	all
3b.	Generate annotated source tree (LXR -> HTML)	M2
3c.	(2.0) Finite State Machine	3b	3 wks
3d.	(3.0/4.0) Cryptographic Module Definition	3b	2 wks
3e.	(6.0) Software Security (rules-to-code map)	3b	2 wks
3f.	(8.0) Key Management Generate 20K random #'s		1 day
3g.	(9.0) Cryptographic Algs	3a	3 days
3h.	(10.0) Operational Test Plan		1 day
3i.	Document architectural changes between 3.2 and 3.11		5 days
M4	Send docs to testing lab
4a.	Security Policy		all
4b.	Finite State Machine	3c
4c.	Module Def. / rules-to-code	3d,3e
M5	Operational validation
5a.	Algorithm testing		1 month
5b.	Operational testing	3h	1 week
5c	set up machines for Lab to run operational tests on, provide Lab tech with access to machines (last time we both sent a box to the lab and set up a temporary account in the intranet for them)
M6	Internal QA of docs	M2-M5	1 week	all
M7	Communication between NSS team / Lab / NIST about status of validation / algorithm certificates	M1-5	3-6 mos	all

Algorithms

Plan is to validate all FIPS-approved algorithms that NSS implements and NIST has tests for. There are eight such algorithms. Previous certificates are shown for softoken 3.11.4 and we will update when new certificates are granted.

Algorithms	Key Size	Modes	Certificates (for Softoken 3.11.4)
TripleDES	KO 1,2,3 (56,112,168)	TECB(e/d; KO 1,2,3) TCBC(e/d; KO 1,2,3)	Certificate #410 for x86 CPUs Certificate #469 for non-x86 CPUs
AES	128/192/256	ECB(e/d; 128,192,256) CBC(e/d; 128,192,256)	Certificate #352
SHS (including all variants: SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-384, and SHA-512) SHS	SHA-1 (BYTE-only) SHA-256 (BYTE-only) SHA-384 (BYTE-only) SHA-512 (BYTE-only)	N/A	Certificate #426
HMAC	HMAC-SHA1, HMAC-SHA256, HMAC-SHA384, HMAC-SHA512	KeySize < BlockSize, KeySize = BlockSize, KeySize > BlockSize	Certificate #152
RNG	N/A	FIPS 186-2 [(x-Change Notice); (SHA-1)] FIPS 186-2 General Purpose [(x-Change Notice); (SHA-1)]	Certificate #208
DSA	512-1024	PQG(gen)MOD(ALL); PQG(ver)MOD(ALL); KEYGEN(Y)MOD(ALL); SIG(gen)MOD(ALL); SIG(ver)MOD(ALL);	Certificate #172
RSA	1024-8192	ALG[RSASSA-PKCS1_V1_5]; SIG(gen); SIG(ver);	Certificate #152
ECDSA (Extended ECC)	163-571	PKG: CURVES( ALL-P ALL-K ALL-B ); PKV: CURVES( ALL-P ALL-K ALL-B ); SIG(gen): CURVES( ALL-P ALL-K ALL-B ); SIG(ver): CURVES( ALL-P ALL-K ALL-B );	Certificate #30
ECDSA (Basic ECC)	256-521	PKG: CURVES( ALL-P P-256 P-384 P-521 ); PKV: CURVES( ALL-P P-256 P-384 P-521 ); SIG(gen): CURVES( ALL-P P-256 P-384 P-521 ); SIG(ver): CURVES( P-256 P-384 P-521 );	Certificate #37

Dependant Bugs

Bug	Description	Completed
439115	DB merge allows nickname conflicts in merged DB
360426	separate NSS softoken into it's own separately pullable and buildable package

Testing Lab

Atlan Labs

FIPS 140 Information

NIST Cryptographic Module Validation Program

NIST Crypto Toolkit

NSS FIPS 140-2 Validation Docs

NSS FIPS 140-2 Validation Docs

FIPS 140-2 Derived Test Requirements (DTR)

FIPS 140-2 Derived Test Requirements (DTR)