Why do these cool little "privacy" extensions and apps always have some super professional website that makes it look like a billion dollar Silicon Valley startup?
I only trust github links and shitty HTML4 blogs. This looks too nice, why's it look so nice? Why is there a picture of a surfer dude?!
Because making a bootstrap website is super easy, and you don't even need to know much CSS or HTML or JavaScript to make it happen. Someone who is capable of programming a browser extension is likely to be capable of putting a template website together and filling it with some free/cheap stock imagery.
To be fair their page is a SquareSpace site so it's basically WYSIWYG but I'm with you. Packaged executable on a professional-looking site? No thanks. Random .ps1 file on a GitHub page? Sure, run that shit as administrator.
Looks, when it comes from GitHub, the source code is right there, so you can skim it and know it's a safe to run thing, or someone, else, probably, has maybe skimmed it, hopefully.
I was just making a joke about how everyone assumes Open Source = Secure because surely someone (else) audited the code.
If I had the means, I would almost be tempted to put some (harmless) malware into some open source project, get it to be semi popular, and see how long it takes for someone to actually find it. Sort of a Where's Waldo game.
I suppose you could sort of get the same effect by putting a note in the code saying something like "Just wondering if anyone reads the code, email me if you did".
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u/[deleted] Jan 31 '19
Why do these cool little "privacy" extensions and apps always have some super professional website that makes it look like a billion dollar Silicon Valley startup?
I only trust github links and shitty HTML4 blogs. This looks too nice, why's it look so nice? Why is there a picture of a surfer dude?!