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How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

homakov.blogspot.com

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Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#31

Post by voyou »

jxf wrote: post #6

People in various forums (a couple on HN, SO, Egor's blog, Twitter itself) seem to be saying something like "this isn't really a bug". It's definitely a bug. Twitter requires clients to ask for the DM permission before they can send DMs. With Egor's approach, clients can privilege-escalate themselves to send DMs even if they never asked for that permission (although they still need to be authorized to send tweets). A…

"Twitter requires clients to ask for the DM permission before they can send DMs"

Perhaps it should, but it doesn't - apps can use the normal API to send DMs without asking for the special DM permission. So the use of the "d" command through the API isn't a vulnerability (it doesn't let anyone do anything they aren't supposed to be able to do), even if it is weird.

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#32

Post by md224 »

tripzilch wrote: post #25
md224 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course you understand it, but do you agree with it? If you seek out bugs in a company's code with the expectation that you'll be rewarded for it, and then the company fails to reward you, I can see that it might be perceived as unfair, especially if the company indicated that such an expectation was reasonable. If you happen across a bug in a company's code, and then publicize it because they aren't going to pay y…

> People really shouldn't orient their moral systems around money. Neither do corporations, but whenever you hear anyone say "corporations shouldn't base their moral systems around money", then it's all about "free market", "profit" and "shareholder values". I'm not saying I'd do the same in this case, but it's a bit of a stretch to assume people-people morals apply to people-corporate situations.

> Neither do corporations, but whenever you hear anyone say "corporations shouldn't base their moral systems around money", then it's all about "free market", "profit" and "shareholder values".

I'm not sure if you're trying to highlight an aspect of communal hypocrisy, but I will say that I wouldn't be one of the people shouting back stuff about "shareholder values" in response to a call for corporate social responsibility.

> it's a bit of a stretch to assume people-people morals apply to people-corporate situations

Sure, there's a bit of a power dynamic in play. But we should also remember that corporations are just huge groups of people working together for some kind of common cause. If you do something kind for a corporation (like, for example, responsibly reporting a security vulnerability instead of releasing it into the wild) then you're essentially doing something kind for the people that work there.

I'm not saying anyone needs to go out of their way to be kind to corporations... I'm just saying we shouldn't treat them like they're not "real" and don't deserve a single iota of basic respect. (Of course, if they show a lack of respect to others, that complicates the picture, but the same would hold for "people-people" morality as well.)

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#33

Post by md224 »

drewcrawford wrote: post #28
md224 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course you understand it, but do you agree with it? If you seek out bugs in a company's code with the expectation that you'll be rewarded for it, and then the company fails to reward you, I can see that it might be perceived as unfair, especially if the company indicated that such an expectation was reasonable. If you happen across a bug in a company's code, and then publicize it because they aren't going to pay y…

Well given that homakov has found this bug, there are a few possibilities: A. Homakov could do nothing. This leaves Twitter in the same state that it is now, but it if everybody did this, it is likely that nefarious people would find and exploit bugs in Twitter B. Homakov could donate his time, as a skilled and highly-trained professional consultant, to a $32bn publicly-traded company C. Homakov could practice full d…

> This isn't even close to blackmail. This is a security consultant publishing a vulnerability that he discovered on his own time, that apparently Twitter's internal security team missed. That might be embarrassing for Twitter, but that's hardly homakov's problem as a third party.

Perhaps "blackmail" was too harsh a word. A better analog might be discovering a business left their back door unlocked. Do you announce it to the entire neighborhood because the business doesn't give out "security prizes," or do you attempt to notify the employees? That seems like the point of responsible disclosure.

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#34

Post by Myrmornis »

md224 wrote: post #19
doughj3 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Companies without bug bounties don't deserve responsible disclosure? That seems to be homakov's view, yes, and I can't say I don't understand his view.

Of course you understand it, but do you agree with it? If you seek out bugs in a company's code with the expectation that you'll be rewarded for it, and then the company fails to reward you, I can see that it might be perceived as unfair, especially if the company indicated that such an expectation was reasonable. If you happen across a bug in a company's code, and then publicize it because they aren't going to pay y…

I understand what you say here and below, but basically, whether we wish the world were otherwise or not, when people form corporations a line is crossed, and you enter a game where people will be ruthless in the interests of their own team. Homakov has some information: it's up to him to assess the value of that information and to assess the expected payoff from the different actions he can take. Unless we can make an argument that someone's private life is on the line here then the rules of the business world apply. There's a reason people derided Mitt Romney when he said "Corporations are people too my friend."

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#35

Post by jkrems »

md224 wrote: post #33
drewcrawford wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well given that homakov has found this bug, there are a few possibilities: A. Homakov could do nothing. This leaves Twitter in the same state that it is now, but it if everybody did this, it is likely that nefarious people would find and exploit bugs in Twitter B. Homakov could donate his time, as a skilled and highly-trained professional consultant, to a $32bn publicly-traded company C. Homakov could practice full d…

> This isn't even close to blackmail. This is a security consultant publishing a vulnerability that he discovered on his own time, that apparently Twitter's internal security team missed. That might be embarrassing for Twitter, but that's hardly homakov's problem as a third party. Perhaps "blackmail" was too harsh a word. A better analog might be discovering a business left their back door unlocked. Do you announce i…

Your analogy is missing the public interest: the business is the postal office or similar and has all the neighbors mail laying around. Does not affect your point though (still not okay to just announce it to the neighborhood).

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#36

Post by muyuu »

larrys wrote: post #11
Kiro wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

homakov is as famous as PG on HN.

Where is he "as famous"? On HN? Or somewhere else (if so where?) where he is "as famous as PG on HN". If you mean he is as famous on HN as PG is on HN I don't think that is the case.

You'd be surprised.

HN has become mainstream enough that a lot of readers don't know who pg is. This is what getting linked from reddit, digg, etc leads to. I don't mean this is bad, or good. It's the way it is.

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#37

Post by jkrems »

jxf wrote: post #6

People in various forums (a couple on HN, SO, Egor's blog, Twitter itself) seem to be saying something like "this isn't really a bug". It's definitely a bug. Twitter requires clients to ask for the DM permission before they can send DMs. With Egor's approach, clients can privilege-escalate themselves to send DMs even if they never asked for that permission (although they still need to be authorized to send tweets). A…

Read the API docs, only reading DMs needs a special permission, POST direct message only needs the permissions that writing a "normal" tweet would. There's no bug here. Maybe a confusing security model, but no bug.

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#38

Post by sillysaurus2 »

homakov wrote: post #24
sillysaurus2 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that, but if Twitter was feeling cruel, they could drag him through court (if he's based in the US). That would be a nuclear option, but, when your future welfare is on the line, you really shouldn't screw with companies. Twitter obviously wouldn't drag a hacker to court. I'm saying, in general, don't do this, because other companies might. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Randal_L._Schwartz#Intel_case

Hm, are you sure cracking password and writing about a bug which you didn't exploit on other users are the same thing?

Would you like to keep testing whether a prosecutor is daring enough to bring charges against you, especially in this social climate?

It's not paranoia. Once you start straying from the path of responsible disclosure, the path to danger is quite short.

In this case, I think you're in no real danger since it's Twitter. So don't worry. But if it were some other company, though, you wouldn't be able to rely on goodwill to protect you. And without any protections, there's nothing preventing the (extremely powerful) courts from bringing charges. It's happened before; it will happen again.

Re: How to send DMs on Twitter without permission

#39

Post by drewcrawford »

md224 wrote: post #33
drewcrawford wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well given that homakov has found this bug, there are a few possibilities: A. Homakov could do nothing. This leaves Twitter in the same state that it is now, but it if everybody did this, it is likely that nefarious people would find and exploit bugs in Twitter B. Homakov could donate his time, as a skilled and highly-trained professional consultant, to a $32bn publicly-traded company C. Homakov could practice full d…

> This isn't even close to blackmail. This is a security consultant publishing a vulnerability that he discovered on his own time, that apparently Twitter's internal security team missed. That might be embarrassing for Twitter, but that's hardly homakov's problem as a third party. Perhaps "blackmail" was too harsh a word. A better analog might be discovering a business left their back door unlocked. Do you announce i…

Well I think we are blurring two different issues here. The first question is whether or not full disclosure is acceptable. The second question is whether or not it is acceptable to choose it because one is not being paid.

As far as full disclosure being acceptable, there are a lot of advocates. For example Bruce Schneier, Leonard Rose, and others. Not to mention that this issue isn't in a high impact category like remote code execution, loss of data, privacy, etc. It's also difficult to exploit; it requires authorizing a malicious app. So for all those reasons separately, and certainly all of them together, I think full disclosure is a completely acceptable choice.

Given that it is acceptable, is it still acceptable to do it if it furthers our own interests? Again, I think the answer is yes. The fact it is in my interest does not make an acceptable action into an unacceptable one.

You seem to be hung up on the fact that the researcher here was not particularly nice to Twitter. But people are under no obligation to be nice. It would be nice if you sent me a check for $200. But you won't, because there's no obligation to do that. And you and I--two strangers arguing with each other on the Internet--have a much stronger relationship than this researcher has with Twitter.

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