fips mode and key management

[Matthias St. Pierre]

On 21.01.20 10:36, Richard Levitte wrote:
> I think that the misunderstanding lies in when FIPS_MODE is defined.

Reading this sentence it occurred to me that the misunderstanding comes from
the fact that the define is indeed misnamed. The term "FIPS mode" is a relict
from FIPS 2.0, where the OpenSSL 1.0.x library had an API to enable FIPS mode
*at runtime*.

(Note that the *compile time* option to include the FOM was called OPENSSL_FIPS,
not FIPS_MODE. So the misleading name must have crept in only recently.)

> It's defined when the FIPS provider module is being built, never otherwise.

Exactly, in OpenSSL 3.0 the DEFAULT and the FIPS provider are partially built from
the same source files, which is the reason why we need a build time constant to
distinguish those two cases. Maybe the name OSSL_FIPS_PROVIDER would be
more fitting than FIPS_MODE?


     #ifdef OSSL_FIPS_PROVIDER
         ...
     #endif


Matthias


P.S: Even though it is an internal define, it should have an OSSL_ prefix IMHO.
P.P.S: Optionally, one could also #define an OSSL_DEFAULT_PROVIDER, OSSL_LEGACY_PROVIDER, ...