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AIR currently secures application updates published with renewed certificates by comparing the publisher ID computed from the old and new certificates. If the publisher IDs are identical the update is allowed; otherwise, it's not.

Recently we've been made aware that the publisher ID computation is flawed in ways that make it quite likely that renewed certificates will not have identical publisher IDs. These range from the trivial to the unresolvable:

• In one case, an original certificate contained a typo in the publisher's identity. This was corrected in the renewal. However, the publisher ID computation requires that the publisher's identity matches exactly.
• In another case, similar, key information changed--but in one of the intermediate certificates in the certificate chain. The change was legitimate, but again fell outside the scope of changes that the publisher ID computation allows.
• In perhaps the most serious issue, the publisher ID algorithm requires that the root certificate in the certificate chain be identical across renewals. Root certificates are typically valid for 20 years or more, so this was not anticipated as a serious limitation. However, many root certificates will be retired in the next few years in favor of certificates with longer key lengths--long before they expire.

If you've run into this situation, you should use the migration signature feature, which was first added in AIR 1.1. It was originally designed to allow secured updates across unrelated certificates (i.e., not renewals). As a general purpose mechanism, however, it also works just as well with renewals, whether or not they run into this issue.

There are, however, two drawbacks to the migration signature mechanism:

1. You have to use the mechanism before your old certificate expires. Certificate renewals are often issued only after the previous certificate has expired.
2. When you migrate between certificates your publisher ID changes. Among other things, this causes the application to lose access to any data stored in the EncryptedLocalStore.

This is an unfortunate turn of events for a feature that was designed to make things easier, and we apologize for the trouble all of this has caused. To address these issues, we will be making two significant changes in an otherwise minor release of AIR. This release is currently scheduled for December. The changes are:

1. Applications will use a specified, not computed, publisher ID. This will allow them to change certificates without losing access to existing data.
2. For purposes of changing certificates, certificates will be accepted as valid for six months after they expire. This allows plenty of time to renew and update the application.

Further details will be made available in conjunction with the upcoming release.

I was recently asked why AIR fetches a Thawte CRL (from http://tss-geotrust-crl.thawte.com/ThawteTimestampingCA.crl) every time an application is installed--even if the application was signed with a certificate from another CA. It turns out there is a good reason for this, and the clue is in the URL itself.

By default, all AIR application signatures are timestamped. Timestamps are created by a timestamp server, and are themselves signatures. When AIR validates the timestamp signature, it downloads the CRL associated with the timestamp signing certificate--just like it would when validating any other signature. And the Thawte timestamp server uses a certificate that--no surprise here--has a CRL hosted by Thawte.

This default is easy to override using the "-tsa" option to the AIR file packaging tool, adt. A value of "-tsa none" turns off timestamps entirely. To specify an alternate timestamp server, specify the URL of that server after the -tsa flag.

For more on AIR code signing, including why timestamping is used, take a look at Code Signing in Adobe AIR.

New to the AIR 1.5.2 release (and the corresponding Flash Player, 10.0.32) is the LocalConnection.isPerUser property. Note that you'll need to update your application's namespace to .../1.5.2 to access this property. Here's why you should do that.

LocalConnection provides local (i.e., on the same machine) communication between SWFs and AIR applications. It operates via a shared memory segment that's visible to all processes that use the mechanism.When LocalConnection was first implemented on Mac OS, it used a memory segment that is visible to all processes running on the machine. This was reasonable at the time, but problematic now that Mac OS is a multi-user operating system. The unfortunate result is that LocalConnection can be used to communicate across user accounts on Mac OS.

To address this a new, per-user implementation has been implemented on Mac OS. You should always use this mode; it's safer. To do that, set LocalConnection.isPerUser = true on every LocalConnection object you create.

Unfortunately, AIR can't do this for you transparently. The problem is that, if it did, you could get into a situation where version skew breaks use of LocalConnection. For example, this can occur if an application is running on AIR 1.5.2 and attempts to communicate with a SWF in the browser running on Flash Player 9. Until both sides are updated, there's no way to use the isPerUser = true option. By adding an API and making this an option, we've given you a chance to migrate to this option without breaking anything along the way.

This issue is specific to Mac OS. Windows and Linux use a user-scoped LocalConnection in all cases, regardless of the isPerUser setting. You can safely set LocalConnection.isPerUser = true everywhere and be confident that the Windows and Linux behavior won't change.

Final note: The default setting of this property is likely to change to true in a future release, in order to be consistent with our general philosophy of defaulting to safe behavior.

Most certification authorities will issue certificates only to businesses. This can be a drag for individuals publishing applications on their own. If you're in that camp, you may want to take a look at ChosenSecurity's AIR code signing certificates, which are available to individuals.

No, I'm not receiving anything from ChosenSecurity for posting this.

GlobalSign is currently running a discount on Adobe AIR code signing certificates, selling one-year certificates for $99.

If your applications are publicly available, you should be using a CA-issued certificate, such as one from GlobalSign, VeriSign, or Thawte. This price is a discount of $130, making this a good time to make the switch. See Code Signing in Adobe AIR for more on why this matters, and Switching Certificates for information on how to transition from your current certificate to a new one.

For those who are wondering, no, I'm not receiving anything from GlobalSign for posting this.