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Don't touch my clipboard

alexanderell.is

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Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#21

Post by jawns »

adtac wrote: post #8
jawns wrote: post #5

There used to be a time when we could hope that browsers would put users first and disable dark patterns like these. Now, there are so many advertisers that use Tynt and related services to muck with copy/paste that it wouldn't surprise me if the major browsers are incentivized to leave this alone and let users suffer.

And when was that? The 2000-2010 era where everything you clicked added a layer to your Internet Explorer addons list? Or the 2010-2014 era where everything required Java and Flash enabled by default, ridden with zero day exploits? Or the 2014-2016 era with cryptominers, trackers and trivial fingerprinting techniques allowed to exist easily? Or the 2016-current era with heavy Javascript applications which train the u…

I was thinking about the removal of the tag, removed in Firefox 23 Ah, those were the days :)

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#23

Post by sigotirandolas »

SanchoPanda wrote: post #3

My favorite demo on this subject: https://github.com/dxa4481/Pastejacking

Actually my terminal emulator (xfce4-terminal) added a preview + confirmation dialog a few months ago for copy-pastes including newlines (i.e. which will execute a command instantly). I thought that it was to avoid accidental mistakes, but it makes even more sense that it is to avoid this.

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#24

Post by ebg13 »

0zymandiass wrote: post #19
smichel17 wrote: post #14

The wrongest thing about this, from my perspective, is that my browser fires off a js 'copy' event when I press control-c. There are times when I've found it helpful that a browser can copy text to my clipboard when I click a button, but I can't think of a single time when I want a site to react to my attempt to copy text off if it. Is there any way to configure my user agent (Firefox) not to do this? A hack is ok.

about:config -> dom.event.clipboardevents.enabled = false You can't do it through a user agent, though

I'm pretty sure this breaks copying from google docs.

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#25

Post by actionowl »

The last sentence of the article is the absolute best:

> Ironically, a little reverse searching reveals that this code was copied verbatim without attribution from this StackOverflow post (see “Manipulating the selection” from the top answer). Maybe copy/paste isn’t so bad?

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#26

Post by mopsi »

slimsag wrote: post #17

Really, the web just gets more and more vile towards users. Sure, highly technical folk are capable of working around this all -- but the vast majority of people do not have a browser that is _working for them_: - You have little to no control over what content you are seeing. Instead, it is chosen for you. - A large number of videos (not even including movies and shows) are geographically blocked. You cannot access…

Cheer up. Flash was once as ubiquitous as JS is now. :)

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#27

Post by 0zymandiass »

ebg13 wrote: post #24
0zymandiass wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

about:config -> dom.event.clipboardevents.enabled = false You can't do it through a user agent, though

I'm pretty sure this breaks copying from google docs.

I can highlight and ctrl+c without issue in their Writer clone. Never tried any others.

I've only ever seen that setting fix sites that try to prevent you from copying.

Re: Don't touch my clipboard

#30

Post by Dylan16807 »

smichel17 wrote: post #14

The wrongest thing about this, from my perspective, is that my browser fires off a js 'copy' event when I press control-c. There are times when I've found it helpful that a browser can copy text to my clipboard when I click a button, but I can't think of a single time when I want a site to react to my attempt to copy text off if it. Is there any way to configure my user agent (Firefox) not to do this? A hack is ok.

> I can't think of a single time when I want a site to react to my attempt to copy text off if it.

Any time you're not interacting with HTML text is a time it could be useful.

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