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It's scary how things like this can become invisible to the user. WebRTC is a great concept that could really improve decentralization, but so incredibly easy t

by lvass 5y ago

It's scary how things like this can become invisible to the user. WebRTC is a great concept that could really improve decentralization, but so incredibly easy to misuse that it's absurdly irresponsible browser developers enable it by default. Remember how people went to jail for simply having certain p2p file sharing software running? All this one takes is opening a web page.

leephillips 5y ago
> Remember how people went to jail for simply having certain p2p file sharing software running? No. Do you have a link?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- lvass 5y ago
  https://www.reddit.com/r/torrents/comments/30jlz0/raided_after_using_tribler/ https://www.reddit.com/r/torrents/comments/30jlz0/raided_aft... Similar cases though they might require downloading something, perhaps innocent looking: https://www.propublica.org/article/prosecutors-dropping-child-porn-charges-after-software-tools-are-questioned https://www.propublica.org/article/prosecutors-dropping-chil... https://forum.emule-project.net/index.php?showtopic=161954 https://forum.emule-project.net/index.php?showtopic=161954 https://www.robertslawteam.com/criminal-defense-overview/articles/the-dangers-of-peer-to-peer-sharing-how-innocent-users-can-be-arrested-for-illegal-child-pornography/ https://www.robertslawteam.com/criminal-defense-overview/art... https://mashable.com/archive/child-porn-download https://mashable.com/archive/child-porn-download
  - leephillips 5y ago
    The story is about a raid, not jail, but point taken in any case. EDIT: Later he mentions being “released”, so I guess there was some jail involved.
vbezhenar 5y ago
What's so irreponsible about it? Any website can waste your download/upload/CPU/RAM/disk. WebRTC does not make anything worse, but rather allows for a plenty of useful applications, some of them might help to reduce centralization which is the plague of the web IMO.
- lvass 5y ago
  >waste your download/upload/CPU/RAM/disk Those are present here but not the largest threat. This service apparently makes you download ~300MB you have no idea what is and SHARES it in the background. What if it is child abuse content? This isn't even a "think of the children" argument, it can have very real consequences to anyone cluelessly browsing the web unlike your usual p2p network. WebRTC has additional insecurities and deanonymization potential like VPN leaks. I'm fairly certain the only reason so many people have it enabled is a certain large browser distributor happens to own some services that use WebRTC to reduce server bandwidth costs, and they want to make it's usage seamless without displaying even a small warning about the risks. Perhaps they also consider deanonymization a feature.
  - vbezhenar 5y ago
    > Those are present here but not the largest threat. This service apparently makes you download ~300MB you have no idea what is and SHARES it in the background. What if it is child abuse content? This isn't even a "think of the children" argument, it can have very real consequences to anyone cluelessly browsing the web unlike your usual p2p network. HN can upload 300 MB of child abuse content to your computer. WebRTC is not required for that. Even JavaScript is not required for that, create tiny 1px images and link those to (un)desired content, they'll be cached in your browser according to cache headers, possibly infinitely. That's the nature of the web: you have very little control over your browser, unless you'll scrutinize every HTTP response which nobody does. > WebRTC has additional insecurities and deanonymization potential like VPN leaks. Legitimate issues should be fixed or put behind prompts, I agree with that. But issues inherent for Web should not be blamed for WebRTC IMO.
vmoore 5y ago
> it's absurdly irresponsible browser developers enable it by default And not absurd for people who disable it because it leaks your real IP when using a VPN
schmorptron 5y ago
Yep, this is the same reason I uninstalled manyverse based on https://scuttlebutt.nz/ https://scuttlebutt.nz/ from my phone again as well, despite it not having any of my friends on it, joining any public room could download any sort of content onto my phone which I would then be responsible for. Cool idea in theory, questionable abusability in practice.

by lvass 5y ago

leephillips 5y ago

> Remember how people went to jail for simply having certain p2p file sharing software running? No. Do you have a link?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
lvass 5y ago
https://www.reddit.com/r/torrents/comments/30jlz0/raided_after_using_tribler/ https://www.reddit.com/r/torrents/comments/30jlz0/raided_aft... Similar cases though they might require downloading something, perhaps innocent looking: https://www.propublica.org/article/prosecutors-dropping-child-porn-charges-after-software-tools-are-questioned https://www.propublica.org/article/prosecutors-dropping-chil... https://forum.emule-project.net/index.php?showtopic=161954 https://forum.emule-project.net/index.php?showtopic=161954 https://www.robertslawteam.com/criminal-defense-overview/articles/the-dangers-of-peer-to-peer-sharing-how-innocent-users-can-be-arrested-for-illegal-child-pornography/ https://www.robertslawteam.com/criminal-defense-overview/art... https://mashable.com/archive/child-porn-download https://mashable.com/archive/child-porn-download
- leephillips 5y ago
  The story is about a raid, not jail, but point taken in any case. EDIT: Later he mentions being “released”, so I guess there was some jail involved.

vbezhenar 5y ago

What's so irreponsible about it? Any website can waste your download/upload/CPU/RAM/disk. WebRTC does not make anything worse, but rather allows for a plenty of useful applications, some of them might help to reduce centralization which is the plague of the web IMO.

lvass 5y ago
>waste your download/upload/CPU/RAM/disk Those are present here but not the largest threat. This service apparently makes you download ~300MB you have no idea what is and SHARES it in the background. What if it is child abuse content? This isn't even a "think of the children" argument, it can have very real consequences to anyone cluelessly browsing the web unlike your usual p2p network. WebRTC has additional insecurities and deanonymization potential like VPN leaks. I'm fairly certain the only reason so many people have it enabled is a certain large browser distributor happens to own some services that use WebRTC to reduce server bandwidth costs, and they want to make it's usage seamless without displaying even a small warning about the risks. Perhaps they also consider deanonymization a feature.
- vbezhenar 5y ago
  > Those are present here but not the largest threat. This service apparently makes you download ~300MB you have no idea what is and SHARES it in the background. What if it is child abuse content? This isn't even a "think of the children" argument, it can have very real consequences to anyone cluelessly browsing the web unlike your usual p2p network. HN can upload 300 MB of child abuse content to your computer. WebRTC is not required for that. Even JavaScript is not required for that, create tiny 1px images and link those to (un)desired content, they'll be cached in your browser according to cache headers, possibly infinitely. That's the nature of the web: you have very little control over your browser, unless you'll scrutinize every HTTP response which nobody does. > WebRTC has additional insecurities and deanonymization potential like VPN leaks. Legitimate issues should be fixed or put behind prompts, I agree with that. But issues inherent for Web should not be blamed for WebRTC IMO.

vmoore 5y ago

> it's absurdly irresponsible browser developers enable it by default And not absurd for people who disable it because it leaks your real IP when using a VPN

schmorptron 5y ago

Yep, this is the same reason I uninstalled manyverse based on https://scuttlebutt.nz/ https://scuttlebutt.nz/ from my phone again as well, despite it not having any of my friends on it, joining any public room could download any sort of content onto my phone which I would then be responsible for. Cool idea in theory, questionable abusability in practice.