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Question: why have the protocol based on pixels when you could use vanilla css and html? Like SSR, you could render the page with js remotely and capture the li

by jadbox 7y ago

Question: why have the protocol based on pixels when you could use vanilla css and html? Like SSR, you could render the page with js remotely and capture the live html/css render to display. Of course, this process would be tricky as you'd also have to look for iframes and also generate bake out its render too. While much more complex, it would be far more efficient than sending back a pixel video stream.

slowenough 7y ago
It's too complicated. The complexity in the code leads to more opportunities for bugs and exploits and more maintenance cost. Also it breaks the isolation model since you can do all sorts of crazy exploits just with HTML and CSS (animation event listeners for XSS etc). I investigated this path after PoCing the original (you can see the code in a directory plugins/appminifier and public/voodoo/src/plugins/appminifer, I think) but there's all sorts of interaction issues that arise when you attempt to filter the HTML in this way. Efficient in terms of what? Bandwidth, from a certain point of view but you lose the "source of absolute truth" that a screenshot is, and at the cost of interaction quirks. Also, not necessarily CPU efficient, as you have to do a lot of bookkeeping to transmit events to the right places and keep the local tree in sync with the remote tree. The main reason I avoided it was the security holes introduced by breaking the strict isolation model of pixels, and the complexity. You're welcome to fork and improve on the work begun in appminifier! If you go down that path, just know, there be dragons, and good luck!
Erlich_Bachman 7y ago
The entire point of this project is to bypass the browser rendering engine locally and risk exposing all of its bugs, zero days, vulnerabilities, tracking etc. If you would be just copying HTML, that would give a regular old proxy server. This project is about security, not just hiding the ip address. > it would be far more efficient than sending back a pixel video stream Yes it would also deliver back exactly all the vulnerabilities to you that this project was specifically made for protecting against... Are you sure you have read its description? The whole point is to do dumb pixels that can't be exploited.
- slowenough 7y ago
  Thank you for this! You really explained that well and clearly.

by jadbox 7y ago

slowenough 7y ago

It's too complicated. The complexity in the code leads to more opportunities for bugs and exploits and more maintenance cost. Also it breaks the isolation model since you can do all sorts of crazy exploits just with HTML and CSS (animation event listeners for XSS etc). I investigated this path after PoCing the original (you can see the code in a directory plugins/appminifier and public/voodoo/src/plugins/appminifer, I think) but there's all sorts of interaction issues that arise when you attempt to filter the HTML in this way. Efficient in terms of what? Bandwidth, from a certain point of view but you lose the "source of absolute truth" that a screenshot is, and at the cost of interaction quirks. Also, not necessarily CPU efficient, as you have to do a lot of bookkeeping to transmit events to the right places and keep the local tree in sync with the remote tree. The main reason I avoided it was the security holes introduced by breaking the strict isolation model of pixels, and the complexity. You're welcome to fork and improve on the work begun in appminifier! If you go down that path, just know, there be dragons, and good luck!

Erlich_Bachman 7y ago

The entire point of this project is to bypass the browser rendering engine locally and risk exposing all of its bugs, zero days, vulnerabilities, tracking etc. If you would be just copying HTML, that would give a regular old proxy server. This project is about security, not just hiding the ip address. > it would be far more efficient than sending back a pixel video stream Yes it would also deliver back exactly all the vulnerabilities to you that this project was specifically made for protecting against... Are you sure you have read its description? The whole point is to do dumb pixels that can't be exploited.

slowenough 7y ago
Thank you for this! You really explained that well and clearly.