[Info-vax] DECnet Phase IV and VMS code comments

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2016-11-22 15:17, Bob Koehler wrote:
> In article <o11bd0$qds$1 at Iltempo.Update.UU.SE>, Johnny Billquist <bqt at softjar.se> writes:
>>
>> I don't know about VMS much, but I do know that RSX will check incoming
>> packets so that the MAC address agrees with the claimed node address.
>
>    Nice to have, but DECnet predates ethernet.  Did DDCMP include any
>    such information to verify against?

Good point. No, DDCMP do not have any information similar to the MAC 
address. DDCMP is mostly just a point-to-point protocol anyway, so such 
a piece of information is not really needed. That said, the MAC address 
isn't really enhancing security in any real way. You can fake a MAC 
address just as easily as the DECnet address in a packet.

If you want some security, you should use passwords for the circuits. 
Then you will not get any traffic across until the other side 
authenticated itself.

	Johnny