Traversal Using Relays around NAT (TURN) Resolution Mechanism

Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)                 M. Petit-Huguenin
Request for Comments: 5928                                  Unaffiliated
Category: Standards Track                                    August 2010
ISSN: 2070-1721


     Traversal Using Relays around NAT (TURN) Resolution Mechanism

Abstract

   This document defines a resolution mechanism to generate a list of
   server transport addresses that can be tried to create a Traversal
   Using Relays around NAT (TURN) allocation.

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/rfc5928.

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.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  2
   2.  Terminology  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
   3.  Resolution Mechanism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  3
   4.  Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  6
     4.1.  Multiple Protocols . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  6
     4.2.  Remote Hosting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
     4.3.  Compatibility with TURN  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
   5.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
   6.  IANA Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  9
     6.1.  RELAY Application Service Tag Registration . . . . . . . .  9
     6.2.  turn.udp Application Protocol Tag Registration . . . . . .  9
     6.3.  turn.tcp Application Protocol Tag Registration . . . . . .  9
     6.4.  turn.tls Application Protocol Tag Registration . . . . . . 10
   7.  Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
   8.  References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
     8.1.  Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
     8.2.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

1.  Introduction

   The Traversal Using Relays around NAT (TURN) specification [RFC5766]
   defines a process for a TURN client to find TURN servers by using DNS
   SRV resource records, but this process does not let the TURN server
   administrators provision the preferred TURN transport protocol
   between the client and the server and does not allow the TURN client
   to discover this preference.  This document defines an S-NAPTR
   application [RFC3958] for this purpose.  This application defines
   "RELAY" as an application service tag and "turn.udp", "turn.tcp", and
   "turn.tls" as application protocol tags.

   Another usage of the resolution mechanism described in this document
   would be Remote Hosting as described in [RFC3958], Section 4.4.  For
   example, a Voice over IP (VoIP) provider who does not want to deploy
   TURN servers could use the servers deployed by another company but
   could still want to provide configuration parameters to its customers
   without explicitly showing this relationship.  The mechanism permits
   one to implement this indirection, without preventing the company
   hosting the TURN servers from managing them as it sees fit.

   [TURN-URI] can be used as a convenient way of carrying the four
   components (see Section 3) needed by the resolution mechanism
   described in this document.  A reference implementation is available
   [REF-IMPL].

2.  Terminology

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
   document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119].

3.  Resolution Mechanism

   The resolution mechanism is used only to create an allocation.  All
   other transactions use the IP address, transport, and port used for a
   successful allocation creation.  The resolution mechanism only
   selects the transport used between the TURN client and the TURN
   server.  The transport used by the allocation itself is selected by
   the REQUESTED-TRANSPORT attribute as described in Section 6.1 of
   [RFC5766].

   The resolution algorithm uses a boolean flag, <secure>; an IP address
   or domain name, <host>; a port number that can be empty, <port>; and
   a transport name that can be "udp", "tcp", or empty, <transport> as
   input.  These four parameters are part of the user configuration of
   the TURN client.  The resolution mechanism also uses as input a list,
   ordered by preference of supported TURN transports (UDP, TCP,
   Transport Layer Security (TLS)), that is provided by the application
   using the TURN client.  This list reflects the capabilities and
   preferences of the application code that is using the S-NAPTR
   resolver and TURN client, as opposed to the configuration parameters
   that reflect the preferences of the user of the application.  The
   output of the algorithm is a list of {IP address, transport, port}
   tuples that a TURN client can try in order to create an allocation on
   a TURN server.

   An Allocate error response as specified in Section 6.4 of [RFC5766]
   is processed as a failure, as specified by [RFC3958], Section 2.2.4.
   The resolution stops when a TURN client gets a successful Allocate
   response from a TURN server.  After an allocation succeeds or all the
   allocations fail, the resolution context MUST be discarded, and the
   resolution algorithm MUST be restarted from the beginning for any
   subsequent allocation.  Servers temporarily blacklisted as described
   in Section 6.4 of [RFC5766], specifically because of a 437, 486, or
   508 error code, MUST NOT be used for the specified duration, even if
   returned by a subsequent resolution.

   First, the resolution algorithm checks that the parameters can be
   resolved with the list of TURN transports supported by the
   application:

   o  If <secure> is false and <transport> is defined as "udp" but the
      list of TURN transports supported by the application does not
      contain UDP, then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   o  If <secure> is false and <transport> is defined as "tcp" but the
      list of TURN transports supported by the application does not
      contain TCP, then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   o  If <secure> is true and <transport> is defined as "udp", then the
      resolution MUST stop with an error.

   o  If <secure> is true and <transport> is defined as "tcp" but the
      list of TURN transports supported by the application does not
      contain TLS, then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   o  If <secure> is true and <transport> is not defined but the list of
      TURN transports supported by the application does not contain TLS,
      then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   o  If <transport> is defined but unknown, then the resolution MUST
      stop with an error.

   After verifying the validity of the parameters, the algorithm filters
   the list of TURN transports supported by the application by removing
   the UDP and TCP TURN transport if <secure> is true.  If the list of
   TURN transports is empty after this filtering, the resolution MUST
   stop with an error.

   After filtering the list of TURN transports supported by the
   application, the algorithm applies the steps described below.  Note
   that in some steps, <secure> and <transport> have to be converted to
   a TURN transport.  If <secure> is false and <transport> is defined as
   "udp", then the TURN UDP transport is used.  If <secure> is false and
   <transport> is defined as "tcp", then the TURN TCP transport is used.
   If <secure> is true and <transport> is defined as "tcp", then the
   TURN TLS transport is used.  This is summarized in Table 1.

                +----------+-------------+----------------+
                | <secure> | <transport> | TURN Transport |
                +----------+-------------+----------------+
                | false    | "udp"       | UDP            |
                | false    | "tcp"       | TCP            |
                | true     | "tcp"       | TLS            |
                +----------+-------------+----------------+

                                  Table 1

   1.  If <host> is an IP address, then it indicates the specific IP
       address to be used.  If <port> is not defined, then either the
       default port declared in [RFC5766] for the "turn" SRV service
       name if <secure> is false, or the "turns" SRV service name if
       <secure> is true, MUST be used for contacting the TURN server.
       If <transport> is defined, then <secure> and <transport> are
       converted to a TURN transport as specified in Table 1.  If
       <transport> is not defined, the filtered TURN transports
       supported by the application are tried by preference order.  If
       the TURN client cannot contact a TURN server with this IP address
       and port on any of the transports supported by the application,
       then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   2.  If <host> is a domain name and <port> is defined, then <host> is
       resolved to a list of IP addresses via DNS A and AAAA queries.
       If <transport> is defined, then <secure> and <transport> are
       converted to a TURN transport as specified in Table 1.  If
       <transport> is not defined, the filtered TURN transports
       supported by the application are tried in preference order.  The
       TURN client can choose the order to contact the resolved IP
       addresses in any implementation-specific way.  If the TURN client
       cannot contact a TURN server with this port, the transport or
       list of transports, and the resolved IP addresses, then the
       resolution MUST stop with an error.

   3.  If <host> is a domain name and <port> is not defined but
       <transport> is defined, then the SRV algorithm defined in
       [RFC2782] is used to generate a list of IP address and port
       tuples. <host> is used as Name, a value of false for <secure> as
       "turn" for Service, a value of true for <secure> as "turns" for
       Service, and <transport> as Protocol (Proto) in the SRV
       algorithm. <secure> and <transport> are converted to a TURN
       transport as specified in Table 1, and this transport is used
       with each tuple for contacting the TURN server.  The SRV
       algorithm recommends doing an A query if the SRV query returns an
       error or no SRV RR; in this case, the default port declared in
       [RFC5766] for the "turn" SRV service name if <secure> is false,
       or the "turns" SRV service name if <secure> is true, MUST be used
       for contacting the TURN server.  Also in this case, this
       specification modifies the SRV algorithm by recommending an A and
       AAAA query.  If the TURN client cannot contact a TURN server at
       any of the IP address and port tuples returned by the SRV
       algorithm with the transport converted from <secure> and
       <transport>, then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   4.  If <host> is a domain name and <port> and <transport> are not
       defined, then <host> is converted to an ordered list of IP
       address, port, and transport tuples via the Straightforward
       Naming Authority Pointer (S-NAPTR) algorithm defined in [RFC3958]
       by using <host> as the initial target domain name and "RELAY" as
       the application service tag.  The filtered list of TURN
       transports supported by the application are converted in
       application protocol tags by using "turn.udp" if the TURN
       transport is UDP, "turn.tcp" if the TURN transport is TCP, and
       "turn.tls" if the TURN transport is TLS.  The order to try the
       application protocol tags is provided by the ranking of the first
       set of NAPTR records.  If multiple application protocol tags have
       the same ranking, the preferred order set by the application is
       used.  If the first NAPTR query fails, the processing continues
       in step 5.  If the TURN client cannot contact a TURN server with
       any of the IP address, port, and transport tuples returned by the
       S-NAPTR algorithm, then the resolution MUST stop with an error.

   5.  If the first NAPTR query in the previous step does not return any
       result, then the SRV algorithm defined in [RFC2782] is used to
       generate a list of IP address and port tuples.  The SRV algorithm
       is applied by using each transport in the filtered list of TURN
       transports supported by the application for the Protocol (Proto),
       <host> for the Name, "turn" for the Service if <secure> is false,
       or "turns" for the Service if <secure> is true.  The same
       transport that was used to generate a list of tuples is used with
       each of these tuples for contacting the TURN server.  The SRV
       algorithm recommends doing an A query if the SRV query returns an
       error or no SRV RR; in this case, the default port declared in
       [RFC5766] for the "turn" SRV service name if <secure> is false,
       or the "turns" SRV service name if <secure> is true, MUST be used
       for contacting the TURN server.  Also in this case, this
       specification modifies the SRV algorithm by recommending an A and
       AAAA query.  If the TURN client cannot contact a TURN server at
       any of the IP address and port tuples returned by the SRV
       algorithm with the transports from the filtered list, then the
       resolution MUST stop with an error.

4.  Examples

4.1.  Multiple Protocols

   With the DNS RRs in Figure 1 and an ordered TURN transport list of
   {TLS, TCP, UDP}, the resolution algorithm will convert the parameters
   (<secure>=false, <host>="example.net", <port>=empty,
   <transport>=empty) to the list of IP address, port, and protocol
   tuples in Table 2.

   example.net.
   IN NAPTR 100 10 "" RELAY:turn.udp "" datagram.example.net.
   IN NAPTR 200 10 "" RELAY:turn.tcp:turn.tls "" stream.example.net.

   datagram.example.net.
   IN NAPTR 100 10 S RELAY:turn.udp "" _turn._udp.example.net.

   stream.example.net.
   IN NAPTR 100 10 S RELAY:turn.tcp "" _turn._tcp.example.net.
   IN NAPTR 200 10 A RELAY:turn.tls "" a.example.net.

   _turn._udp.example.net.
   IN SRV   0 0 3478 a.example.net.

   _turn._tcp.example.net.
   IN SRV   0 0 5000 a.example.net.

   a.example.net.
   IN A     192.0.2.1

                                 Figure 1


                 +-------+----------+------------+------+
                 | Order | Protocol | IP address | Port |
                 +-------+----------+------------+------+
                 | 1     | UDP      | 192.0.2.1  | 3478 |
                 | 2     | TLS      | 192.0.2.1  | 5349 |
                 | 3     | TCP      | 192.0.2.1  | 5000 |
                 +-------+----------+------------+------+

                                  Table 2

4.2.  Remote Hosting

   In the example in Figure 2, a VoIP provider (example.com) is using
   the TURN servers managed by the administrators of the example.net
   domain (defined in Figure 1).  The resolution algorithm using the
   ordered TURN transport list of {TLS, TCP, UDP} would convert the same
   parameters as in the previous example but with the <host> parameter
   equal to "example.com" to the list of IP address, port, and protocol
   tuples in Table 2.

   example.com.
   IN NAPTR 100 10 "" RELAY:turn.udp:turn.tcp:turn.tls "" example.net.

                                 Figure 2

4.3.  Compatibility with TURN

   In deployments where it is not possible to guarantee that all TURN
   clients will support the resolution mechanism described in this
   document, the DNS configuration should be done in a way that works
   with both this resolution mechanism and the mechanism described in
   [RFC5766].  The DNS RRs in Figure 3 can be used in conjunction with
   the DNS RRs in Figures 1 and 2 for this purpose.

   _turn._udp.example.com.
   IN SRV   0 0 3478 a.example.net.

   _turn._tcp.example.com.
   IN SRV   0 0 5000 a.example.net.

   _turns._tcp.example.com.
   IN SRV   0 0 5349 a.example.net.

                                 Figure 3

5.  Security Considerations

   Security considerations for TURN are discussed in [RFC5766].

   The application service tag and application protocol tags defined in
   this document do not introduce any specific security issues beyond
   the security considerations discussed in [RFC3958].  [RFC3958]
   requests that an S-NAPTR application define some form of end-to-end
   authentication to ensure that the correct destination has been
   reached.  This is achieved by the Long-Term Credential Mechanism
   defined in [RFC5389], which is mandatory for [RFC5766].

   Additionally, the usage of TLS [RFC5246] has the capability to
   address the requirement.  In this case, the client MUST verify the
   identity of the server by following the identification procedure in
   Section 7.2.2 of [RFC5389] and by using the value of the <host>
   parameter as the identity of the server to be verified.

   An implication of this is that the server's certificate could need to
   be changed when SRV or NAPTR records are added.  For example, a
   client using just A/AAAA records, and configured with
   "turnserver.example.net", expects to find the name
   "turnserver.example.net" in the certificate.  If a second client uses
   SRV records and is configured with <host> parameter "example.com", it
   expects to find "example.com" in the certificate, even if the SRV
   record at _turns._tcp.example.com points to turnserver.example.net.

6.  IANA Considerations

   This section contains the registration information for one S-NAPTR
   application service tag and three S-NAPTR application protocol tags
   (in accordance with [RFC3958]).

6.1.  RELAY Application Service Tag Registration

   Application Protocol Tag: RELAY

   Intended usage: See Section 3.

   Interoperability considerations: N/A

   Security considerations: See Section 5.

   Relevant publications: RFC 5928

   Contact information: Marc Petit-Huguenin <petithug@acm.org>

   Author/Change controller: The IESG

6.2.  turn.udp Application Protocol Tag Registration

   Application Protocol Tag: turn.udp

   Intended usage: See Section 3.

   Interoperability considerations: N/A

   Security considerations: See Section 5.

   Relevant publications: RFC 5928

   Contact information: Marc Petit-Huguenin <petithug@acm.org>

   Author/Change controller: The IESG

6.3.  turn.tcp Application Protocol Tag Registration

   Application Protocol Tag: turn.tcp

   Intended usage: See Section 3.

   Interoperability considerations: N/A

   Security considerations: See Section 5.

   Relevant publications: RFC 5928

   Contact information: Marc Petit-Huguenin <petithug@acm.org>

   Author/Change controller: The IESG

6.4.  turn.tls Application Protocol Tag Registration

   Application Protocol Tag: turn.tls

   Intended usage: See Section 3.

   Interoperability considerations: N/A

   Security considerations: See Section 5.

   Relevant publications: RFC 5928

   Contact information: Marc Petit-Huguenin <petithug@acm.org>

   Author/Change controller: The IESG

7.  Acknowledgements

   Thanks to Cullen Jennings, Alexey Melnikov, Scott Bradner, Spencer
   Dawkins, Pasi Eronen, Margaret Wasserman, Magnus Westerlund, Juergen
   Schoenwaelder, Sean Turner, Ted Hardie, Dave Thaler, Alfred E.
   Heggestad, Eilon Yardeni, Dan Wing, Alfred Hoenes, and Jim Kleck for
   their comments, suggestions, and questions that helped to improve
   this document.

8.  References

8.1.  Normative References

   [RFC2119]   Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
               Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.

   [RFC2782]   Gulbrandsen, A., Vixie, P., and L. Esibov, "A DNS RR for
               specifying the location of services (DNS SRV)", RFC 2782,
               February 2000.

   [RFC3958]   Daigle, L. and A. Newton, "Domain-Based Application
               Service Location Using SRV RRs and the Dynamic Delegation
               Discovery Service (DDDS)", RFC 3958, January 2005.

   [RFC5246]   Dierks, T. and E. Rescorla, "The Transport Layer Security
               (TLS) Protocol Version 1.2", RFC 5246, August 2008.

   [RFC5389]   Rosenberg, J., Mahy, R., Matthews, P., and D. Wing,
               "Session Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN)", RFC 5389,
               October 2008.

   [RFC5766]   Mahy, R., Matthews, P., and J. Rosenberg, "Traversal
               Using Relays around NAT (TURN): Relay Extensions to
               Session Traversal Utilities for NAT (STUN)", RFC 5766,
               April 2010.

8.2.  Informative References

   [RFC2629]   Rose, M., "Writing I-Ds and RFCs using XML", RFC 2629,
               June 1999.

   [TURN-URI]  Petit-Huguenin, M., "Traversal Using Relays around NAT
               (TURN) Uniform Resource Identifiers", Work in Progress,
               January 2010.

   [REF-IMPL]  Petit-Huguenin, M., "Reference Implementation of TURN
               resolver and TURN URI parser", January 2010, <http://
               debian.implementers.org/stable/source/turnuri.tar.gz>.

Author's Address

   Marc Petit-Huguenin
   Unaffiliated

   EMail: petithug@acm.org