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LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

engineering.linkedin.com

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Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#301
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This service shouldn't exist. It breaks the very concept of email security. They're marketing it as though it's safe. Want hyperbole? Imagine Bayer marketing heroin as safe because you know, it's opt-in.

Not that hard to imagine really given Bayer did market heroin as safe. Is very good for coughs, apparently.

I think that's the lost point on some of the reactions.

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since this only works with Gmail, Google Apps, Yahoo, AOL, and iCloud, the email is already with a third party.

That is an interesting note, but if the business is using Gmail ( http://www.google.com/enterprise/apps/business/products.html ) maybe that's because they trust Google's services. Trusting one third party doesn't imply that you trust all third parties.

Agreed.

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#303
post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would only say that it is a violation of trust if they somehow installed the certificate on your phone when installing the linkedIn app... If a user knowingly installs this, with the understanding that linkedin is essentially a proxy for their entire email ecosystem - then they are knowingly trusting linkedin. To be honest, I can see this being used by sales reps. They are often interested in connecting to people a…

1) Your average user has no idea what an iOS cert is doing. 2) Your average IT department in any publicly traded company would NEVER let this fly. 3) Any general council would shat all over this. No one likes fighting with lawyers, and this is a battle I'd never put on my plate. It's odd to assume generic users understands IMAP or what a proxy is. Remember how Apple makes products for dumb people? Yeah. They ran a ca…

You are correct. I guess it all comes down to how transparent Linkedin are with the users installing this stuff. Will they disclose to the user exactly how this works like in their blog post - or will they obfuscate the whole activity and represent something else to the user.

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#305
For some weird reason (having dealt with newsletter projects), manipulating the html through the IMAP services was the first thing i could think of.

But i wouldn't do that, because this way, you can intercept all messages that people are mailing and it would harm your business image (at least, in my eyes).

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#306
post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How about "the world isn't perfect and whilst it would be great to live up to our every ideal, our primary responsibility is running a business and providing a great experience for our users who, ultimately, in the vast majority regularly engage in such egregious violations of sensible security protocol that most-anything we do is unlikely to affect them and in cases where it would, said users are usually sufficientl…

That's a pretty long-winded explication of, "it's a race to the bottom."

It's a pretty long-winded explanation of "the world ain't perfect". :P

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Want hyperbole? Compare an opt in social network to heroin.

Why the hell not? Heroin from Bayer would not have the quality control issues Heroin typically has. It only becomes problematic when you consider that the user is getting themselves into a situation that they do not fully understand and potentially cannot easily back themselves out of. With drugs that have a high potential to cause harm, we typically force the consumer to consult a professional before allowing them t…

I specifically used the example of Heroin as Bayer marketed it as a non-addictive alternative to morphine, proclaiming it safe.

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#308
post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly in a world of front-end JS frameworks you could fix this by encoding client-side before submission.

DON'T! Just don't. Encrypting user credentials in JS is probably even worse than parsing HTML with regular expressions: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1732348/regex-match-open-... Just send it in cleartext, but over properly verified https.

I was just musing hypothetically, but can you elaborate on why this is bad? Surely sending an encoded password is better than a non-encoded one, and in a worst case only as bad as sending a cleartext password (i.e. what happens now).

Re: LinkedIn Intro: Doing the Impossible on iOS

#309
post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly in a world of front-end JS frameworks you could fix this by encoding client-side before submission.

Or, use TLS and get it for free. Crypto on JS is a scary, scary world.

I don't think I was proposing not using TLS, just that if you interpret sending cleartext password over TLS as "plain-text" then sending it encoded over TLS sounds better.
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