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StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

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Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#81

Post by account42 »

sugarpimpdorsey wrote: post #42

How would you like to be the guy that reported this 10 years ago and had the bug closed on some technicality: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=806960 Given enough eyeballs, all bugs are closed as WONTFIX.

It's not a technicality, the package was removed from Debian so there was no reason to keep the bug report open. And it was reopened by a debian developer when the package was reintroduced a year later.

That's not an excuse for why it wasn't dealt with until now but what you are suggesting didn't happen.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#82

Post by lupusreal »

akimbostrawman wrote: post #68
themafia wrote: post #20

> Part of the justification for moving to Wayland over X11 is to make security vulnerabilities relating to one application spying on another more difficult to introduce. Yea, because, how else am I going to run shady poorly maintained dictionary software that ignores system settings from a hostile country? What kind of world are we living in with X11?! The software could just as well hook into your downloads folder a…

>The software could just as well hook into your downloads folder correct which is why wayland is only one piece in improving security, you still need proper sandboxing

By the time you have something that allows you to safety run malware you have a usability nightmare.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#84

Post by account42 »

guappa wrote: post #64
themafia wrote: post #20

> Part of the justification for moving to Wayland over X11 is to make security vulnerabilities relating to one application spying on another more difficult to introduce. Yea, because, how else am I going to run shady poorly maintained dictionary software that ignores system settings from a hostile country? What kind of world are we living in with X11?! The software could just as well hook into your downloads folder a…

You basically need to call a vote or ask the tech committee to rule otherwise if the maintainer says it's fine. It's not really a bug if it's an advertised feature you don't like, so security team cannot do much in theory.

That's a bad policy then.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#85

Post by waterhouse »

dkiebd wrote: post #77
waterhouse wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

~> wc -cl /usr/share/dict/words 235976 2493885 /usr/share/dict/words One might even expect a program to use a common Unix preinstalled dictionary.

"words" is nothing but a list of words. It does not contain definitions for those words, which is what one expects from a dictionary.

Hmm, you are correct.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#86

Post by wat10000 »

CamouflagedKiwi wrote: post #12

> of course a dictionary program will include code to talk to dictionary-providing web sites. I wouldn't say that is just a given, if I've apt-get installed a dictionary I might expect that is the whole thing on my machine. It's not like we haven't had dictionaries in physical books for centuries... It seems like stardict is very much an online thing, which I suppose could be legit, but the whole thing does seem like…

This sort of crap makes me sure I’ll be employable forever.

I may not be on top of the latest trends, but at least I understand how computers work and what they can actually do.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#87

Post by WhyNotHugo »

account42 wrote: post #52
qwertox wrote: post #50

> StarDict on Wayland doesn't have this problem, because Wayland prevents applications from being able to capture text from other applications by default. StarDict on Wayland has a different issue, it causes a segfault. Sat, 02 Aug 2025: Bug#1003710: stardict crash in gnome with message Segmentation fault https://www.mail-archive.com/debian-bugs-dist@lists.debian.o...

Besides, capturing text from other applications is very much required for various utilities. It's as much of a security feature in Wayland as turning off your computer and never turning it back on is.

There is a separate, privileged, interface that this kind of utility can use.

Meanwhile, the other 99% of applications don't need unlimited permissions.

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#88

Post by GrayShade »

account42 wrote: post #72
pabs3 wrote: post #2

There are numerous privacy issues in distros, some known, most probably unknown, some examples from Debian: https://wiki.debian.org/PrivacyIssues Luckily there are things like opensnitch that can block some of these issues: https://github.com/evilsocket/opensnitch

Your link is about privacy issues in upstream software that Debian hasn't sufficiently worked around yet . The main advantage of the Distro model (as opposed to developer-maintained package ecosystems) is exactly that there is someone protecting you from questionable software "features".

Who protects you when the packagers decide to trust a shady CA (adding it to the root store) because it's used by the distro's infra?

Re: StarDict sends X11 clipboard to remote servers

#89

Post by exe34 »

CorrectHorseBat wrote: post #22
Elucalidavah wrote: post #7

Querying a local dictionary on each clipboard seems okay; having a feature to request remote dictionaries is okay; making it easy to combine both is dubious but understandable (would be better off as a special flag); but having them combined by default? That's pretty much malicious.

[flagged]

That's like saying Afgans have a different idea of consent.
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