[Bug 986147] Re: openssl 1.0.1-4ubuntu2 breaks a bunch of ciphers

[Thomas Bushnell, BSG]

Other things that would save us:

1) Any way to disable this regression from configuration files or the like. (Merely adding an option in the library interface wouldn't help unless puppet also can be told to pass that option.)
2) Any way from configuration files to tell SSL to use the equivalent of the -tls1, or -cipher, switches to openssl s_client.
3) Any way from configuration files or command line options to tell puppet to tell SSL the equivalent of (2).

Sadly, this one change has forced us to probably miss our target release
of our precise distro by a month. :(

-- 
You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu
Foundations Bugs, which is subscribed to openssl in Ubuntu.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/986147

Title:
  openssl 1.0.1-4ubuntu2 breaks a bunch of ciphers

Status in “openssl” package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  in version 1.0.1-4ubuntu2, we see:

  
  openssl (1.0.1-4ubuntu2) precise-proposed; urgency=low

    * Backport more upstream patches to work around TLS 1.2 failures
      (LP #965371):
  ...
      - Truncate the number of ciphers sent in the client hello to 50.  Most
        broken servers should now work.
   ...

   -- Colin Watson <cjwatson at ubuntu.com>  Wed, 18 Apr 2012 15:03:56
  +0100

  We have a server which offers a very small number of ciphers. When
  this change hit, suddenly our hosts could no longer contact this
  server, getting the error:

  
  $ openssl s_client -connect HOSTNAME:9140 
  CONNECTED(00000003) 
  139736292189856:error:14077410:SSL routines:SSL23_GET_SERVER_HELLO:sslv3 alert handshake failure:s23_clnt.c:724: 

  The problem here was tracked down to a failure to find a matching
  cipher. If we specify -cipher RC4-SSH (the only one essentially which
  the server permits) or -ssl3, the connection succeeds.

  The problem is this truncation of the number of ciphers sent. RC4-SSH
  shows up at something like #74 on our list, so it is getting
  truncated. When we specify exactly the cipher to use, of course it
  works, and if we say -ssl3, then that also reduces the number which
  would be sent, and now RC4-SSH is in the top fifty again.

  This is a pretty disastrous change, in fact; it means that openssl
  basically now supports only fifty ciphers at a time, and then an
  essentially random and unpredictable set. Not only does this mean a
  loss of functionality, it could be a loss in security if clients get
  pushed to less secure ciphers because the more secure ones happened to
  be after number fifty in the list.

To manage notifications about this bug go to:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/openssl/+bug/986147/+subscriptions