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Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

chromium-review.googlesource.com

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Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#21

Post by kyleee »

l0b0 wrote: post #13

> With Schools using Google Forms as a testing platform, students are able to use this shortcut to search through the source of the page, and determine the correct answers. So they're serving the answers with the questions, and get annoyed when the students figure this out. What a lark. How about using a system which doesn't do that?

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#22

Post by smashah »

kyleee wrote: post #21
l0b0 wrote: post #13

> With Schools using Google Forms as a testing platform, students are able to use this shortcut to search through the source of the page, and determine the correct answers. So they're serving the answers with the questions, and get annoyed when the students figure this out. What a lark. How about using a system which doesn't do that?

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

Precisely!

I wonder what chain of events lead this PR being filed.

How did the kid(s) get caught? Did a teacher decide to tell the IT department head? Did the head of department then tell the IT maintenance team? Then the IT maintenance team told the test vendor?

Very odd chain of events to lead to such a dangerous change.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#23

Post by rp1 »

smashah wrote: post #22
kyleee wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

Precisely! I wonder what chain of events lead this PR being filed. How did the kid(s) get caught? Did a teacher decide to tell the IT department head? Did the head of department then tell the IT maintenance team? Then the IT maintenance team told the test vendor? Very odd chain of events to lead to such a dangerous change.

These types of "hacks" spread very quickly in school. Once the flaw is discovered, the entire class likely "aced" the test. From there, it's pretty obvious how the vendor found out: the school could no longer use the testing software and demanded an answer.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#24

Post by gregmac »

kyleee wrote: post #21
l0b0 wrote: post #13

> With Schools using Google Forms as a testing platform, students are able to use this shortcut to search through the source of the page, and determine the correct answers. So they're serving the answers with the questions, and get annoyed when the students figure this out. What a lark. How about using a system which doesn't do that?

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

I got a crash course in running proxy servers and various VPNs when I was in school, due to the school blocking stuff. I don't recall what sites I was even trying to get to (pre-facebook) nor do I remember really caring about them, but just working around the blocks was particularly fun.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#25

Post by _AzMoo »

advisedwang wrote: post #10

This is for the chromeos devices/managed chrome browsers [1]. From the bug [2] it looks like this was relevant in a school setting, where this is common. So the school hands out some chromebooks and wants to use that managed environment to prevent kids cheating on quizzes by looking at source code. DRM and related technologies are an effort to wrest control of devices away from their owners, and give control the manu…

It also prevents kids from using their machine to learn how to write HTML. What an incredibly short-sighted change. If kids can see the answers to their quizzes in the source code, purchase better software that doesn't allow that.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#26

Post by YPPH »

kyleee wrote: post #21
l0b0 wrote: post #13

> With Schools using Google Forms as a testing platform, students are able to use this shortcut to search through the source of the page, and determine the correct answers. So they're serving the answers with the questions, and get annoyed when the students figure this out. What a lark. How about using a system which doesn't do that?

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

Students will not get by in life by viewing the source code when confronted with any problem.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#28

Post by vagrantJin »

missblit wrote: post #7
crakenzak wrote: post #2

What are the implications of this? Can’t you just curl/wget the html?

This kind of stuff can make sense when you consider "enterprise" environments like school labs. Notice on the bug report that the reproduction steps include setting a "DeveloperToolsDisabled" registry entry. Curl / wget wouldn't always be accessible in this kind of locked down setup (and they're probably trying to make it difficult even if it's impossible to block completely).

Doesnt this solution strike you as scorched earth? Kids figure out things, instead of improving said software, lockdown the actual browser?

It's nearsighted to the point of disbelief.

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#29

Post by [deleted] »

smashah wrote: post #22
kyleee wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is also the type of thing that plants the seed of interest for a career or hobby of computing, which is another reason it's stupid. Reward people's curiousity instead of punishing it, especially in a schooling situation!

Precisely! I wonder what chain of events lead this PR being filed. How did the kid(s) get caught? Did a teacher decide to tell the IT department head? Did the head of department then tell the IT maintenance team? Then the IT maintenance team told the test vendor? Very odd chain of events to lead to such a dangerous change.

[deleted]

Re: Chromium: Permit blocking of view-source: with URLBlocklist

#30

Post by grayfaced »

magicalist wrote: post #11
crakenzak wrote: post #2

What are the implications of this? Can’t you just curl/wget the html?

Chrome uses a `view-source` scheme to trigger showing the source of a web page. This change allows Chrome Enterprise administrators to add `view-source:*` to their blocklist so Chrome instances governed by an enterprise policy with that enabled (like at a school or company) wouldn't be able to visit those pages and so wouldn't be able to view source in the browser.

Would also need to block ctrl+s/save. Which seems pretty drastic for anything other then a dedicated testing machine.
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