| Internet-Draft | QUIC Tunnel Session | November 2020 |
| Piraux, et al. | Expires 6 May 2021 | [Page] |
This document specifies methods for grouping QUIC tunnel connections in a single session enabling the exchange of packets of Internet protocols over several QUIC connections.¶
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Mobile devices such as laptops, smartphones or tablets have different requirements than the traditional fixed devices. These mobile devices often change their network attachment. They are often attached to trusted networks, but sometimes they need to be connected to untrusted networks where their communications can be eavesdropped, filtered or modified. In these situations, the classical approach is to rely on VPN protocols such as DTLS or IPSec. These VPN protocols provide the encryption and authentication functions to protect those mobile clients from malicious behaviors in untrusted networks.¶
Today's mobile devices are often multihomed and many expect to be able to perform seamless handovers from one access network to another without breaking the established VPN sessions. In some situations it can also be beneficial to combine two or more access networks together to increase the available host bandwidth. A protocol such as Multipath TCP [RFC6824] supports those handovers and allows aggregating the bandwidth of different access links. It could be combined with single-path VPN protocols to support both seamless handovers and bandwidth aggregation above VPN tunnels. Unfortunately, Multipath TCP is not yet deployed on most Internet servers and thus few applications would benefit from such a use case.¶
This document explores how QUIC could be used to enable multi-homed mobile devices to communicate securely in untrusted networks.¶
This document is organized as follows. Section 3 describes the reference environment. Then, we propose a new mode of operation, explained in Section 4, that use the recently proposed datagram extension ([I-D.pauly-quic-datagram]) for QUIC to transport plain IP packets over a QUIC connection. Section 5 specifies how a connection is established in this document proposal. Section 6 details the format of the messages introduced by this document.¶
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "NOT RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in BCP 14 [RFC2119] [RFC8174] when, and only when, they appear in all capitals, as shown here.¶
The reference environment is illustrated in Figure 1, in which a client-initiated flow is tunneled through the concentrator.¶
+---------+
.----| Access |----.
| | network | |
| | A | |
v +---------- v +-------------+
+--------+ +--------------+ | Final |
| Client | | Concentrator |<===\ ... \===>| destination |
+--------+ +--------------+ | server |
^ +---------+ ^ +-------------+
| | Access | |
| | network | | Legend:
.----| B |----. --- QUIC connection
+---------+ === Tunneled flow
Such a multihomed client would like to benefit from the different access networks available to reach the concentrator. These access networks can be used for load-sharing, failover or other purposes. One possibility to efficiently use these two access networks is to rely on the proposed Multipath extensions to QUIC [I-D.deconinck-quic-multipath]. Another approach is to create one QUIC connection using the single-path QUIC protocol [I-D.ietf-quic-transport] over each access network and glue these different connections together in a single session on the concentrator. Given the migration capabilities of QUIC, this approach could support failover with a single active QUIC connection at a time.¶
The "tunnel session" mode enables the client and the concentrator to exchange packets of several network protocols through the QUIC tunnel connection at the same time. It also leverages the QUIC datagram extension [I-D.pauly-quic-datagram].¶
This document specifies the following format for encoding packets in QUIC DATAGRAM frame. It allows encoding packets from several protocols by identifying the corresponding protocol of the packet in each QUIC DATAGRAM frame. Figure 2 describes this encoding.¶
1 2 3
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Protocol Type (16) | Packet Tag (16) |
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Packet (*) ...
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
This encoding defines three fields.¶
,->+----------+
| | IP |
QUIC packet | +----------+
containing | | UDP |
a DATAGRAM | +----------+
frame | | QUIC |
| |..........|
| | DATAGRAM |
| | P. Type |
| | P. Tag |
| |+--------+|<-.
| || IP || |
| |+--------+| | Tunneled
| || UDP || | UDP packet
| |+--------+| |
| | .... |<-.
`->+----------+
Figure 3 illustrates how a UDP packet is tunneled using the tunnel session mode. The main advantage of the tunnel session mode is that it supports IP and any protocol above the network layer. Any IP packet can be transported using the datagram extension over a QUIC connection. However, this advantage comes with a large per-packet overhead since each packet contains both a network and a transport header. All these headers must be transmitted in addition with the IP/UDP/QUIC headers of the QUIC connection. For TCP connections for instance, the per-packet overhead can be large.¶
If the client is multihomed, it can use Multipath QUIC [I-D.deconinck-quic-multipath] to efficiently use its different access networks. This version of the document does not elaborate in details on this possibility. If the concentrator does not support Multipath QUIC, then the client creates several QUIC connections and joins them at the application layer. This works as illustrated in figure Figure 4. Each message is exchanged over a dedicated unidirectional QUIC stream. Their format is detailed in Section 6. When the client opens the first QUIC connection with the concentrator, (1) it can request a QUIC tunnel session identifier. (2) The concentrator replies with a variable-length opaque value that identifies the QUIC tunneling session. When opening a QUIC connection over another access network, (3) the client can send this identifier to join the QUIC tunneling session. The concentrator matches the session identifier with the existing session with the client. It can then use both sessions to reach the client and receive tunneled packets from the client.¶
1-Req. Sess. ID->
.-----------------------------.
| <-Sess. ID.-2 |
v v
+--------+ +--------------+
| Client | | Concentrator |
+--------+ +--------------+
^ ^
| 3-Join. Sess.-> | Legend:
.-----------------------------. --- QUIC connection
Joining a tunneling session allows grouping several QUIC connections to the concentrator. Each endpoint can then coordinate the use of the Packet Tag across the tunneling session as presented in Section 4.1.1.¶
Both QUIC tunnel endpoints open their first unidirectional stream (i.e. stream 2 and 3), hereafter named the QUIC tunnel control stream, to exchange these messages. A QUIC tunnel endpoint MUST NOT close its control stream and SHOULD provide enough flow control credit to its peer.¶
The messages format used for this purpose are described in Section 6. The client initiates the procedure and MAY either start a new session or join an existing session. This negotiation MUST NOT take place more than once per QUIC connection.¶
When using the tunnel session mode, each packet is associated with a 16-bit value called Packet Tag. This document leaves defining the meaning of this value to implementations. This section provides some examples on how it can be used to implement packet reordering across several QUIC tunnel connections grouped in a tunneling session.¶
A first simple example of use is to encode the timestamp at which the datagram was sent. Using a millisecond precision and encoding the 16 lower bits of the timestamp makes the value wrapping around in a bit more than 65 seconds.¶
Another example of use is to maintain a value counting the datagrams sent over all QUIC tunnel connections of the tunneling session. The 16-bit value allows distinguishing at most 32768 packets in flight.¶
The QUIC tunnel receiver can then distinguish, buffer and reorder packets based on this value. Mechanisms for managing the datagram buffer and negotiating the use of the Packet Tag are out of scope of this document.¶
During connection establishment, the tunnel session mode support is indicated by setting the ALPN token "qt-session" in the TLS handshake. Draft-version implementations MAY specify a particular draft version by suffixing the token, e.g. "qt-session-00" refers to the first version of this document.¶
In the following sections, we specify the format of each message introduced in this document. They are encoded as TLVs, following the format defined in Section 7 of [I-D.piraux-intarea-quic-tunnel].¶
This document specifies additional QUIC tunnel control TLVs:¶
+------+----------+--------------+----------------+-------------------+ | Type | Size | Sender | Mode | Name | +------+----------+--------------+----------------+-------------------+ | 0x01 | Variable | Client | tunnel session | New Session TLV | | 0x02 | Variable | Concentrator | tunnel session | Session ID TLV | | 0x03 | Variable | Client | tunnel session | Join Session TLV | +------+----------+--------------+----------------+-------------------+
The New Session TLV is used by the client to initiate a new tunneling session. The Session ID TLV is used by the concentrator to communicate to the client the Session ID identifying this tunneling session. The Join Session TLV is used to join a given tunneling session, identified by a Session ID. All QUIC these tunnel control TLVs MUST NOT be sent on other streams than the QUIC tunnel control streams.¶
When the tunnel session mode is in use, the Access Report TLV defined in Section 7.1.1 of [I-D.piraux-intarea-quic-tunnel] MUST be sent on other streams than the QUIC tunnel control stream.¶
1 2 3
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Type (8) | Length (8) | [QoS Flow Indication (*)] ...
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
The New Session TLV contains an optional value. It initiates a new tunneling session at the concentrator, and can contain an opaque value giving an indication on the type of traffic conveyed over this session. The concentrator can use this indication for QoS purposes for instance.¶
The concentrator MUST send a Session ID TLV in response, with the Session ID corresponding to the tunneling session created. After sending a New Session TLV, the client MUST close the QUIC tunnel control stream.¶
The concentrator MUST NOT send New Session TLVs.¶
1 2 3
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Type (8) | Length (8) | Session ID (*) ...
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
The Session ID TLV contains an opaque value that identifies the current tunneling session. It can be used by the client in subsequent QUIC connections to join them to this tunneling session. The concentrator MUST send a Session ID TLV in response of a New Session TLV, with the Session ID corresponding to the tunneling session created.¶
The client MUST NOT send a Session ID TLV. The concentrator MUST close the QUIC tunnel control stream after sending a Session ID TLV.¶
1 2 3
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
| Type (8) | Length (8) | Session ID (*) ...
+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+
The Join Session TLV contains an opaque value that identifies a tunneling session to join. The client can send a Join Session TLV to join the QUIC connection to a particular tunneling session. The tunneling session is identified by the Session ID. After sending a Join Session TLV, the client MUST close the QUIC tunnel control stream.¶
The concentrator MUST NOT send Join Session TLVs. After receiving a Join Session TLV, the concentrator MUST use the Session ID to join this QUIC connection to the tunneling session. Joining the tunneling session implies merging the state of this QUIC tunnel connection to the session. A successful joining of connection is indicated by the closure of the QUIC tunnel control stream of the concentrator.¶
In cases of failure when joining a tunneling session, the concentrator MUST send a RESET_STREAM with an application error code discerning the cause of the failure. The possible codes are listed below:¶
The security considerations of [I-D.piraux-intarea-quic-tunnel] are also applicable to this document.¶
This document creates a new registration for the identification of the QUIC tunnel protocol in the "Application Layer Protocol Negotiation (ALPN) Protocol IDs" registry established in [RFC7301].¶
The "qt-session" string identifies the QUIC tunnel protocol tunnel session mode.¶
The following subsections detail new registries within "QUIC tunnel control Parameters" registry.¶
This document creates three new registrations to identify the QUIC tunnel control TLVs defined in this document in the "QUIC tunnel control TLVs Types" sub-registry defined in [I-D.piraux-intarea-quic-tunnel].¶
The values to be added in the registry are as follows:¶
+------+-----------------------+------------+ | Code | Name | Reference | +------+-----------------------+------------+ | 1 | New Session TLV | [This-Doc] | | 2 | Session ID TLV | [This-Doc] | | 3 | Join Session TLV | [This-Doc] | +------+-----------------------+------------+¶
This document establishes a registry for QUIC tunnel control stream error codes. The "QUIC tunnel control Error Code" registry manages a 62-bit space. New values are assigned via IETF Review (Section 4.8 of [RFC8126]).¶
The initial values to be assigned at the creation of the registry are as follows:¶
+------+-----------------------+------------+ | Code | Name | Reference | +------+-----------------------+------------+ | 0 | UNKNOWN_ERROR | [This-Doc] | | 1 | UNKNOWN_SESSION_ID | [This-Doc] | | 2 | CONFLICTING_STATE | [This-Doc] | +------+-----------------------+------------+¶