JMAP extension for S/MIME signing and encryption

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Table of Contents

4. Extension to Email/set for S/MIME signing and/or encryption

[RFC8621] defines Email/set method for creating new email messages. This document defines the following additional request arguments that can be used to create S/MIME signed and/or encrypted messages:¶

• smimeSign: "Boolean" (default: false). If included and has the value "true", this requests the JMAP server to create an S/MIME signed message from the message constructed according to other specified arguments (the "original message"). This is done by encapsulating the original message either inside application/pkcs7-mime or multipart/signed container. The signature's private key/certificate is associated with the email address in the Sender header field, if present; otherwise, it is associated with the email address in the From header field, if present.¶

  If multiple addresses are present in one of these header fields, or there is more than one Sender/From header field, the server SHOULD reject the Email/set as invalid; otherwise, it MUST take the first address in the last Sender/From header field.¶

• smimeEncrypt: "Boolean" (default: false). If included and has the value "true", this requests the JMAP server to create an S/MIME encrypted message from the constructed message. This is done by encapsulating the message inside application/pkcs7-mime media type. The message MUST be encrypted to the sender and all To/Cc/Bcc recipients. This extension assumes that there is some kind of per user or organizational addressbook, that can be used to lookup public keys of recipients. If lookup of a particular public key fails, or results in an expired or revoked certificate, the Email/set operation MUST fail.¶

If both "smimeSign" and "smimeEncrypt" are set to true, the message is first signed and then the signed version is encrypted (in that order).¶

(Note that this extension doesn't allow management of private keys/certificates. How private keys are managed or configured for a particular user is out of scope for this document.)¶

[[How to control header protection?]]¶

      [[ "Email/set", {
        "accountId": "ue150411c",
        "create": {
          "k192": {
            "mailboxIds": {
              "2ea1ca41b38e": true
            },
            "keywords": {
              "$seen": true,
              "$draft": true
            },
            "from": [{
              "name": "Joe Bloggs",
              "email": "joe@example.com"
            }],
            "subject": "World domination",
            "receivedAt": "2021-07-07T01:03:11Z",
            "sentAt": "2021-07-10T11:03:11+10:00",
            "smimeSign": true,
            "smimeEncrypt": true,
            "bodyStructure": {
              "type": "text/plain",
              "partId": "bd48",
              "header:Content-Language": "en"
            },
            "bodyValues": {
              "bd48": {
                "value": "I have the most brilliant plan.  Let me tell
                  you all about it.",
                "isTruncated": false
              }
            }
          }
        }
      }, "0" ]]

This will result in the following response:

      [[ "Email/set", {
        "accountId": "ue150411c",
        "oldState": "780823",
        "newState": "780839",
        "created": {
          "k192": {
            "id": "Mf40b5f831efa7233b9eb1c7f",
            "blobId": "Gf40b5f831efa7233b9eb1c7f8f97d84eeeee64f7",
            "threadId": "Td957e72e89f516dc",
            "size": 5096
          }
        },
        ...
      }, "0" ]]

6. Security Considerations

This JMAP extension assumes trust between the user and the JMAP server for purposes of signing and encrypting messages on user's behalf.¶

This JMAP extension also relies on access to user's (or organization's) addressbook which contain up-to-date certificates for recipients.¶

This JMAP extension doesn't support management of user's private keys and corresponding certificates.¶

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