cypherpunks

joined 3 years ago
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[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 weeks ago

also "you may not remove or obscure any functionality in the software related to payment to the Licensor in any copy you distribute to others." 🤡

FUTO's license meets neither the free software definition nor the open source definition.

[–] [email protected] 97 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (5 children)

Btw, DeadDrop was the original name of Aaron Swartz' software which later became SecureDrop.

it’s zero-knowledge encryption. That means even I, the creator, can’t decrypt or access the files.

I'm sorry to say... this is not quite true. You (or your web host, or a MITM adversary in possession of certificate authority key) can replace the source code at any time - and can do so on a per-user basis, targeting specific IP addresses - to make it exfiltrate the secret key from the uploader or downloader.

Anyone can audit the code you've published, but it is very difficult to be sure that the code one has audited is the same as the code that is being run each time one is using someone else's website.

This website has a rather harsh description of the problem: https://www.devever.net/~hl/webcrypto ... which concludes that all web-based cryptography like this is fundamentally snake oil.

Aside from the entire paradigm of doing end-to-end encryption using javascript that is re-delivered by a webserver at each use being fundamentally flawed, there are a few other problems with your design:

  • allowing users to choose a password and using it as the key means that most users' keys can be easily brute-forced. (Since users need to copy+paste a URL anyway, it would make more sense to require them to transmit a high-entropy key along with it.)
  • the filenames are visible to the server
  • downloaders send the filename to the server prior to the server sending them the javascript which prompts for the password and decrypts the file. this means you have the ability to target maliciously modified versions of the javascript not only by IP but also by filename.

There are many similar browser-based things which still have the problem of being browser-based but which do not have these three problems: they store the file under a random identifier (or a hash of the ciphertext), and include a high-entropy key in the "fragment" part of the URL (the part after the # symbol) which is by default not sent to the server but is readable by the javascript. (Note that the javascript still can send the fragment to the server, however... it's just that by default the browser does not.)

I hope this assessment is not too discouraging, and I wish you well on your programming journey!

[–] [email protected] 30 points 3 weeks ago (2 children)

The industry will take whatever steps it needs to protect itself and protect its revenue streams ... It will not lose that revenue stream, no matter what ... Sony is going to take aggressive steps to stop this. We will develop technology that transcends the individual user. We will firewall Napster at source – we will block it at your cable company. We will block it at your phone company. We will block it at your ISP. We will firewall it at your PC ... These strategies are being aggressively pursued because there is simply too much at stake. - Steve Heckler, senior vice president of Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc, August 2000

quote from https://web.archive.org/web/20010201204600/http://www.nyfairuse.org/sony.xhtml

via https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_BMG_copy_protection_rootkit_scandal

"Pepperidge Farm Remembers" meme, but with the face of Elrond (Hugo Weaving) from the "i was there 3000 years ago" meme. no text

[–] [email protected] 11 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

This is a very misleading headline and blog post.

Copy-pasting my comment from another thread:

Here is an excerpt of the CNBC article about this lawsuit:

On Dec. 3 — a day before Thompson was fatally shot — the company issued guidance that included net earnings of $28.15 to $28.65 per share and adjusted net earnings of $29.50 to $30.00 per share, the suit notes. And on January 16, the company announced that it was sticking with its old forecast.

The investors described this as “materially false and misleading,” pointing to the immense public scrutiny the company and the broader health insurance industry experienced in the wake of Thompson’s killing.

The group, which is seeking unspecified damages, argued that the public backlash prevented the company from pursuing “the aggressive, anti-consumer tactics that it would need to achieve” its earnings goals.

“As such, the Company was deliberately reckless in doubling down on its previously issued guidance,” the suit reads.

The company eventually revised its 2025 outlook on April 17, citing a needed shift in corporate strategy — a move that caused its stock to drop more than 22% that day.

The linked Medium post's headline is not entirely false but its framing is sensationalist clickbait and misleads the reader: "BlackRock is Suing UnitedHealth for Giving “Too Much Care” to Patients After the CEO was Murdered" gives the incorrect impression that this lawsuit is demanding UnitedHealth go back to providing less care, but in fact the lawsuit appears to condemn their "anti-consumer tactics" while seeking damages from their "materially false and misleading" statement to investors in January.

The Medium article also lists only BlackRock as the plaintiff, when in fact it is a class action suit which presumably will include many far more sympathetic class members such as pension funds etc.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

Which part of it is fake?

Here is an excerpt of the CNBC article about it:

On Dec. 3 — a day before Thompson was fatally shot — the company issued guidance that included net earnings of $28.15 to $28.65 per share and adjusted net earnings of $29.50 to $30.00 per share, the suit notes. And on January 16, the company announced that it was sticking with its old forecast.

The investors described this as “materially false and misleading,” pointing to the immense public scrutiny the company and the broader health insurance industry experienced in the wake of Thompson’s killing.

The group, which is seeking unspecified damages, argued that the public backlash prevented the company from pursuing “the aggressive, anti-consumer tactics that it would need to achieve” its earnings goals.

“As such, the Company was deliberately reckless in doubling down on its previously issued guidance,” the suit reads.

The company eventually revised its 2025 outlook on April 17, citing a needed shift in corporate strategy — a move that caused its stock to drop more than 22% that day.

The Medium post's headline is not entirely false but its framing is sensationalist clickbait and misleads the reader: "BlackRock is Suing UnitedHealth for Giving “Too Much Care” to Patients After the CEO was Murdered" gives the incorrect impression that this lawsuit is demanding UnitedHealth go back to providing less care, but in fact the lawsuit appears to condemn their "anti-consumer tactics" while seeking damages from their "materially false and misleading" statement to investors in January.

The Medium article also lists only BlackRock as the plaintiff, when in fact it is a class action suit which presumably will include many far more sympathetic class members such as pension funds etc.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago

i'm not a chess expert but i think one of the pieces is at the wrong angle?

[–] [email protected] 13 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

i wondered, who is this person who is so out of touch that she thinks that is a reasonable price, and... she is a former member of congress from orange county who is currently campaigning to be governor of california 🤡

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago

it's giving Zoë Roth

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