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solyin • yesterday at 6:17 PM • 1 reply • view on HN

Yes it is.

Say I release a fix. I'm some rando but I go out to the world and say I fixed an issue with php. Use my version instead! Not telling you what I fixed, it's a secret, just trust me.

It will take, with LLM help, attackers a couple hours, tops, to reverse engineer my fix into active exploitation. Meanwhile, I'm some rando so no one's even heard of me, people who do hear don't automatically trust me to install my fix, so very few people have my fix. Meanwhile, the exploit is out there thanks to me and people are getting their sites hacked thanks to me.

That seems like a problem, no?


Replies

charcircuit • yesterday at 8:23 PM

How is what you are describing any different than what happened today? Except the vulnerabilities were also explained. You can say that sites are getting hacked right now due to them releasing the security update.

>I'm some rando so no one's even heard of me

Why do think people need to have heard of you. If you are reporting this issue directly to distro maintainers, security companies, hosting companies, etc first you can help use their names as part of the marketing push to raise awareness.

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