[Info-vax] One possible market for VMS: secure credit card

[Kerry Main]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Info-vax [mailto:info-vax-bounces at info-vax.com] On Behalf Of
> Stephen Hoffman
> Sent: 24-Mar-15 8:09 PM
> To: info-vax at info-vax.com
> Subject: Re: [New Info-vax] One possible market for VMS: secure credit
> card
> 
> On 2015-03-24 21:32:45 +0000, David Froble said:
> 
> > When I first took a look at OpenSSL, it was very confusing to me.  The
> > main reason is because whoever decided to implement it doesn't think
> > very much like me.  (Ok, get in your jabs now ...)
> 
> The OpenSSL API is certainly not the way I'd do it.   The LibreSSL fork
> <http://www.libressl.org> and some others are working on different
> implementations and APIs.  Apple has created their own transport
> library
> <https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/Security/Refe
> rence/secureTransportRef/index.html>
> for OS X and iOS.
> 

[snip...]

> 
> IPSec <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPsec> is all that and a bag of
> chips, at least with IP and DECnet over IP.  Alas, OpenVMS doesn't have
> that support yet.
> 

Sure it does. Not with native stack, but Multinet certainly supports IPSEC
on OpenVMS. 

Since almost no one uses the native backup utility on Windows Servers, 
this statement is like saying Windows does not have much backup 
support  (true, but there are commercial options).

> > Maybe the above would be feasible for DECnet, since that most likely
> > would be VMS to VMS.
> 
> DECnet is a dead-end protocol, as much as I still find occasional use
> for it.  IP hasn't yet been integrated to the degree of DECnet.  If
> (when?) that integration happens within OpenVMS, I'd suspect most
> folks
> won't really miss DECnet all that much.

While no one will argue DECnet in its current state is past its prime, if 
one were looking for a secure *internal* network protocol that only 
maybe <10 hackers in the world know enough to crack it, then DECnet 
might have a place.

I know of quite a few manufacturing environments that run their
very mission critical process control environments using DECnet and
the main reason is stability, security and reliability.

And I am sure folks here know that while TCPIP V4 is the std today, 
it Is what network engineers would likely describe as a std using the 
lowest common denominator protocol design. 

IPV6 is definitely a step up, but there has not been a huge rush to 
adopt this (at least not yet)

[snip..]

Regards,

Kerry Main
Back to the Future IT Inc.
 .. Learning from the past to plan the future

Kerry dot main at backtothefutureit dot com