What are the benefits and drawbacks of the HTML5 Keygen element?

Question

As of January 2013, what are the potential benefits and drawbacks of the HTML5 Keygen element?

Answer 1

Pros

• It can improve security when authenticating (in addition to a multi-factor device)

• If used as a "client certificate", it can make MITM attacks much more difficult

• The Keygen tag is implemented across most non-IE browsers, making it very easy to implement

• Works regardless of administrator permission. With IE Active X controls can be disabled and IE and browser settings can make key generation impossible on tightly controlled systems. In this situation the current Keygen in non-IE browsers is often the only error free method to generate and use Client certificates

Cons & Deficiencies

• Certificates are not easily portable between systems (to some, this is a "pro")

• The private key is not stored in a standard location

• The UI is confusing and difficult to understand

• Requires the user to select the appropriate key length from a list. Most users are not equipped to make this decision.

• Poor user experience when the user is prompted to download the certificate. A better approach would have the key submission and certificate response integrated into the same control. (possible solution also this on S.O. )

• <keygen> does not provide a mechanism for managing certificate expiry

• No standard key length or hash implemented across browsers

• Algorithm support is missing (RSA, DSA, ECC, etc)

• Keysize selection should come from the form, not user selectable.

• The signature is based on MD5 (which can be mitigated by a time based challenge)

• Non-Exportable keygen flag is missing

• Hardware protected keygen flag is missing

• Password protection required is missing

• The certificate is limited to RSA based applications

• The HTML form could be modified locally and key generation security reduced accordingly

• If enrolling to a Microsoft Certificate Server, the only supported CertType is "server" via DCOM API

• The format used by is not standard and only provides a subset of already established protocols like PKCS10 , CMC , and CRMF . This prevents from supporting non-RSA based certificates, extensions for additional client information, and key escrow

• Not supported in IE due to better support with CertEnroll and the issues described here