Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)                          J. Arkko
Request for Comments: 5872                                      Ericsson
Updates: 5191                                                   A. Yegin
Category: Standards Track                                        Samsung
ISSN: 2070-1721                                                 May 2010


                           IANA Rules for the
     Protocol for Carrying Authentication for Network Access (PANA)

Abstract

   This document relaxes the IANA rules for the Protocol for Carrying
   Authentication for Network Access (PANA).

Status of This Memo

   This is an Internet Standards Track document.

   This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
   (IETF).  It represents the consensus of the IETF community.  It has
   received public review and has been approved for publication by the
   Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG).  Further information on
   Internet Standards is available in Section 2 of RFC 5741.

   Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
   and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
   http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc5872.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2010 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
   (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
   publication of this document.  Please review these documents
   carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
   to this document.  Code Components extracted from this document must
   include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
   the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
   described in the Simplified BSD License.

1.  Introduction

   This document relaxes the IANA rules for the Protocol for Carrying
   Authentication for Network Access (PANA) [RFC5191].  Rules for the
   following protocol fields, all defined in [RFC5191], are affected:

   o  Message Types

   o  Message Flags

   o  Attribute-Value Pair (AVP) Flags

   o  Result-Code AVP Values

   o  Termination-Cause AVP Values

   The rationale for this update is that there can be situations in
   which it makes sense to grant an allocation under special
   circumstances.  At the time of this writing, the IETF is in the
   process of approving one such allocation.  By changing the current
   IANA rules to allow for IESG Approval [RFC5226] as well, it has
   become possible for the Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG) to
   consider an allocation request, even if it does not fulfill the
   default rule.  For instance, an experimental protocol extension could
   perhaps deserve an allocation from a field of reserved bits, as long
   as a sufficient number of bits still remain for other purposes, and
   the PANA community is happy with such allocation.

2.  IANA Considerations

   IANA has updated the registries related to PANA Message Types,
   Message Flags, AVP Flags, Result-Code AVP Values, and Termination-
   Cause AVP Values, as specified below.  All other PANA IANA registries
   are to remain unchanged.

2.1.  Message Types

   The Message Types namespace is used to identify PANA messages.  Value
   0 is not used and is not assigned by IANA.  The range of values from
   1 - 65,519 are for permanent, standard Message Types, allocated by
   IETF Review or IESG Approval [RFC5226].  Previously, the rule for
   this range was allocation by IETF Review only.  [RFC5191] defined the
   range of values from 1 - 4.  The same Message Type is used for both
   the request and the answer messages, except for type 1.  The Request
   bit distinguishes requests from answers.

   The range of values from 65,520 - 65,535 (hexadecimal values 0xfff0 -
   0xffff) is reserved for experimental messages.  As these codes are
   only for experimental and testing purposes, no guarantee is made for
   interoperability between the communicating PANA Client (PaC) and PANA
   Authentication Agent (PAA) using experimental commands, as outlined
   in [RFC3692].

2.2.  Message Flags

   There are 16 bits in the Flags field of the PANA message header.
   Section 6.2 of [RFC5191] assigned bit 0 ('R'), 1 ('S'), 2 ('C'), 3
   ('A'), 4 ('P'), and 5 ('I').  Allocations from the remaining free
   bits in the PANA header Flag field are made via Standards Action or
   IESG Approval [RFC5226].  Previously, the rule for these bits was
   allocation by Standards Action only.

2.3.  AVP Flags

   There are 16 bits in the AVP Flags field of the AVP header, defined
   in Section 6.3 of [RFC5191].  That RFC also assigned bit 0 ('V').
   The remaining bits are assigned via Standards Action or IESG Approval
   [RFC5226].  Previously, the rule for these bits was allocation by
   Standards Action only.

2.4.  Result-Code AVP Values

   As defined in Section 8.7 of [RFC5191], the Result-Code AVP (AVP
   Code 7) defines the values from 0 - 2.

   All remaining values are available for assignment via IETF Review or
   IESG Approval [RFC5226].  Previously, the rule for these values was
   allocation by IETF Review only.

2.5.  Termination-Cause AVP Values

   As defined in Section 8.9 of [RFC5191], the Termination-Cause AVP
   (AVP Code 9) defines the values 1, 4, and 8.

   All remaining values are available for assignment via IETF Review or
   IESG Approval [RFC5226].  Previously, the rule for these values was
   allocation by IETF Review only.

3.  Security Considerations

   This specification does not change the security properties of PANA.

   However, a few words are necessary about the use of the experimental
   code points defined in Section 2.1.  Potentially harmful side effects
   from the use of the experimental values need to be carefully
   evaluated before deploying any experiment across networks that the
   owner of the experiment does not entirely control.  Guidance given in
   [RFC3692] about the use of experimental values needs to be followed.

4.  References

4.1.  Normative References

   [RFC5191]  Forsberg, D., Ohba, Y., Patil, B., Tschofenig, H., and A.
              Yegin, "Protocol for Carrying Authentication for Network
              Access (PANA)", RFC 5191, May 2008.

   [RFC5226]  Narten, T. and H. Alvestrand, "Guidelines for Writing an
              IANA Considerations Section in RFCs", BCP 26, RFC 5226,
              May 2008.

4.2.  Informative References

   [RFC3692]  Narten, T., "Assigning Experimental and Testing Numbers
              Considered Useful", BCP 82, RFC 3692, January 2004.

Appendix A.  Changes from RFC 5191

   This document changes the IANA rules for: Message Types, Message
   Flags, AVP Flags, Result-Code AVP Values, and Termination-Cause AVP
   Values.

Appendix B.  Acknowledgments

   The authors would like to thank Yoshihiro Ohba, Ralph Droms,
   Magnus Westerlund, and Alfred Hoenes for reviews and comments on this
   topic.

Authors' Addresses

   Jari Arkko
   Ericsson
   Jorvas  02420
   Finland

   EMail: jari.arkko@piuha.net


   Alper Yegin
   Samsung
   Istanbul
   Turkey

   EMail: alper.yegin@yegin.org