this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2024
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Programmer Humor

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[–] [email protected] 114 points 8 months ago (3 children)

There are two types of backdoors, the ones that were fixed and the ones we don't know about.

[–] [email protected] 70 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

The only reason why xz got exposed was because someone noticed SSH was a bit slower and decided to take it to their own hands to investigate. It’s possible this backdoor would go unnoticed for far longer if the attacker didn’t make this slight oversight.

So it might be that there have been other, successful attacks before. It’s just that this one is the one that got exposed.

[–] [email protected] 69 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Slower as in 500ms slower iirc.

Linux users when bloat

[–] [email protected] 56 points 8 months ago (1 children)

tbh given the context 500ms is a lot.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yeah. 500ms for ssh feels like an eternity.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

SSHing into my less powerful machines takes a good few seconds, so I'm not sure if I'd notice an extra 500ms. For the more powerful ones that are basically instant it would be much more noticeable.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 8 months ago (2 children)

And the ones you leave for yourself to check during development and forgotten to close before release.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago

Shhh we don't talk about these !

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

This is why you should secure your own bureaucracy-bypassing backdoor with a long ass key (bonus point if you use pki instead of a simple static key).

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

I just use the Konami code as a secret password.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

don't forget the ones we got paid for very well and the ones we introduced to not go to prison