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Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

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Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#61

Post by deith »

rahuldottech wrote: post #27
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you run pihole or a local dnsmasq/unbound it should be possible to mitigate it by sinkholing any unicode domains, e.g. with dnsmasq (requires a patch https://github.com/spacedingo/dnsmasq-regexp_2.76 ) you can do this: address=/:xn--*:/0.0.0.0 does anyone know if something like this is possible with unbound?

But... What about legit unicode domains? I own a couple that I use for personal projects or file sharing.

I've yet to see a legit unicode domain, and my country doesn't speak English as a first language.

To tell you the truth IDN domains feel like a failure, a gimmick. Their biggest market probably was meant to be countries that don't use the Latin alphabet, and they've failed spectacularly.

If you use Firefox, for your own security, set network.IDN_show_punycode to true.

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#62

Post by downerending »

ncmncm wrote: post #55
downerending wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps ironically, URLs were never meant for human consumption in the first place. You were meant to "travel" to various sites via search indices, etc. (Think Google.) Viewed in that light, restricting DNS names to ASCII as a way to reduce bugs, security issues, etc., makes a lot of sense.

Search engines happened remarkably late. Nobody understood how easy search engines would be. People thought you would follow links from directory pages linked from your "home page", hence the house symbol still seen in browsers. Yahoo! is a leftover of an attempt at a directory.

Indeed--this is what was meant by "indices".

It's kind of like XML. It was never meant to be seen by human eyes, except in a few debugging scenarios. Unfortunately, that intention was ignored, and now we have a usability disaster. (At least in the case of XML, it can just die.)

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#63

Post by dual_dingo »

kylek wrote: post #54
rahuldottech wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But... What about legit unicode domains? I own a couple that I use for personal projects or file sharing.

I've never seen a legit unicode domain personally, but, is this not compatible with whitelisting specific domains? (in pihole, anyways...)

In countries that use diacritical characters, umlauts etc., unicode domains are somewhat common (but are often just an alias for a non-unicode primary domain).

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#64

Post by LadyCailin »

kylek wrote: post #54
rahuldottech wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But... What about legit unicode domains? I own a couple that I use for personal projects or file sharing.

I've never seen a legit unicode domain personally, but, is this not compatible with whitelisting specific domains? (in pihole, anyways...)

I have, but I live in Norway, where we have æøå in the standard alphabet. I suspect it’s more common still in Asian countries, because at least in Norwegian, there are standard ascii replacements for all the extra letters, å = aa, ø = oe, æ = ae

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#65

Post by htfu »

kick wrote: post #51
manifestsilence wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These would be less than convenient to type, but perhaps as we go more and more towards a non-typing web where a walled-garden start page and predefined links lead to the most popular sites with a click, these URLs will become fashionable. I think if so, this will herald the impending death of the human-read and typed URL in favor of start page links and search results.

There are more mobile users than there are desktop users, and for them it's just the same to type.

How is switch to emoji input -> press search box -> start typing apple -> press apple symbol and so on “just the same” as app?

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#66

Post by Nullabillity »

LadyCailin wrote: post #64
kylek wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never seen a legit unicode domain personally, but, is this not compatible with whitelisting specific domains? (in pihole, anyways...)

I have, but I live in Norway, where we have æøå in the standard alphabet. I suspect it’s more common still in Asian countries, because at least in Norwegian, there are standard ascii replacements for all the extra letters, å = aa, ø = oe, æ = ae

Here in Sweden I have never encountered a single legit IDN domain.

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#67

Post by LadyCailin »

ncmncm wrote: post #55
downerending wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps ironically, URLs were never meant for human consumption in the first place. You were meant to "travel" to various sites via search indices, etc. (Think Google.) Viewed in that light, restricting DNS names to ASCII as a way to reduce bugs, security issues, etc., makes a lot of sense.

Search engines happened remarkably late. Nobody understood how easy search engines would be. People thought you would follow links from directory pages linked from your "home page", hence the house symbol still seen in browsers. Yahoo! is a leftover of an attempt at a directory.

Oh man, do you remember aol keywords?

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#68

Post by kick »

htfu wrote: post #65
kick wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are more mobile users than there are desktop users, and for them it's just the same to type.

How is switch to emoji input -> press search box -> start typing apple -> press apple symbol and so on “just the same” as app ?

You don't have to search. Just hit the apple emoji. If you use it frequently, it'll probably be on the front. If not, it takes two seconds to hit the category it's in and then press it.

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#69

Post by TimTheTinker »

rahuldottech wrote: post #27
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you run pihole or a local dnsmasq/unbound it should be possible to mitigate it by sinkholing any unicode domains, e.g. with dnsmasq (requires a patch https://github.com/spacedingo/dnsmasq-regexp_2.76 ) you can do this: address=/:xn--*:/0.0.0.0 does anyone know if something like this is possible with unbound?

But... What about legit unicode domains? I own a couple that I use for personal projects or file sharing.

I predict that blacklisting unicode domains will become a "best practice" for security, but that eventually their use will become normal and accepted when the security issues have been worked out (perhaps by something as simple as using a different background color for unicode characters in the browser's location bar).

Re: Add '127.0.0.1 xn–9q8h' to /etc/hosts gives you "localghost"

#70

Post by LadyCailin »

Nullabillity wrote: post #66
LadyCailin wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have, but I live in Norway, where we have æøå in the standard alphabet. I suspect it’s more common still in Asian countries, because at least in Norwegian, there are standard ascii replacements for all the extra letters, å = aa, ø = oe, æ = ae

Here in Sweden I have never encountered a single legit IDN domain.

rødt.no comes to mind, but I know I’ve seen others.
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