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I don't quite understand the outrage. Quite sure most HN readers were doing/involved in similar experiments one way or another. Isn't A/B testing an experiment

I don't quite understand the outrage. Quite sure most HN readers were doing/involved in similar experiments one way or another. Isn't A/B testing an experiment on consumers (people) without their consent?

1_player 5y ago
There is a sea of difference between A/B testing your own property, and maliciously introducing a bug on a critical piece of software that's running on billions of devices.
- InsomniacL 5y ago
  >> https://www-users.cs.umn.edu/~kjlu/papers/clarifications-hc.pdf https://www-users.cs.umn.edu/~kjlu/papers/clarifications-hc.... "We did not introduce or intend to introduce any bug or vulnerability in the Linux kernel. All the bug-introducing patches stayed only in the email exchanges, without being adopted or merged into any Linux branch, which was explicitly confirmed by maintainers. Therefore, the bug-introducing patches in the email did not even become a Git commit in any Linux branch. None of the Linux users would be affected."
  - _djo_ 5y ago
    That's a false claim, though. There's evidence that at least one of the students involved did not do anything to alert kernel maintainers or prevent their code from reaching stable. https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/log/?h=v5.11.15&qt=author&q=pakki001%40umn.edu https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux...
  - DetroitThrow 5y ago
    That seems to directly contradict gkh and others (including the researchers) in the email exchange in the original post - these vulnerable patches reached stable trees and maintainers had to revert them. They may not have been included in a release, but should gkh not have intervened *this would have reached users*, especially if the researchers weren't apparently aware their commits were reaching stable.
  - Koiwai 5y ago
    https://lore.kernel.org/linux-nfs/YH%2FfM%2FTsbmcZzwnX@kroah.com/ https://lore.kernel.org/linux-nfs/YH%2FfM%2FTsbmcZzwnX@kroah... This message contradicted that.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
duxup 5y ago
Isn't a/b testing usually things like changing layout or two things that....work as opposed to bugs?

1_player 5y ago

There is a sea of difference between A/B testing your own property, and maliciously introducing a bug on a critical piece of software that's running on billions of devices.

InsomniacL 5y ago
>> https://www-users.cs.umn.edu/~kjlu/papers/clarifications-hc.pdf https://www-users.cs.umn.edu/~kjlu/papers/clarifications-hc.... "We did not introduce or intend to introduce any bug or vulnerability in the Linux kernel. All the bug-introducing patches stayed only in the email exchanges, without being adopted or merged into any Linux branch, which was explicitly confirmed by maintainers. Therefore, the bug-introducing patches in the email did not even become a Git commit in any Linux branch. None of the Linux users would be affected."
- _djo_ 5y ago
  That's a false claim, though. There's evidence that at least one of the students involved did not do anything to alert kernel maintainers or prevent their code from reaching stable. https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git/log/?h=v5.11.15&qt=author&q=pakki001%40umn.edu https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux...
- DetroitThrow 5y ago
  That seems to directly contradict gkh and others (including the researchers) in the email exchange in the original post - these vulnerable patches reached stable trees and maintainers had to revert them. They may not have been included in a release, but should gkh not have intervened *this would have reached users*, especially if the researchers weren't apparently aware their commits were reaching stable.
- Koiwai 5y ago
  https://lore.kernel.org/linux-nfs/YH%2FfM%2FTsbmcZzwnX@kroah.com/ https://lore.kernel.org/linux-nfs/YH%2FfM%2FTsbmcZzwnX@kroah... This message contradicted that.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

duxup 5y ago

Isn't a/b testing usually things like changing layout or two things that....work as opposed to bugs?