this post was submitted on 31 Mar 2024
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An antivirus wouldn't protect against the xz exploit. Imagine it did pull down the database of hashes and found a malicious xz binary, what is it going to do?
It can't quarantine it, because that would break programs. It could update it, but shouldn't your package manager be the one in charge of that? So the best it can do is notify you of the exploit... Which also feels like a thing the package manager should be doing.
I think instead of an antivirus, we should have a stricter permissions model. Certain applications can identity locations as "private" which blocks untrusted applications. So a random file you downloaded won't be able to read your browser cookie jar or Discord session.
Random files you download from the internet should be executed in an unprivileged context which requires a "do you want this application to have access to this?" prompt whenever it does something sketchy.
Interestingly, afaik, Valve already runs Windows games in a secure container when using Proton. Fun fact.
I'd add that if one of the basic libraries is compromised, you can't trust the anti-virus or really any other program on that system.
Yep, the antivirus might need a compression library to manage its database. :P
The xz issue might not directly affect an anti-virus, so maybe in this specific case, it would work fine. But it wouldn't be hard to come up with another library that would make the anti-virus moot. And even in the xz situation, doesn't it affect systemd?
All bets are off when you can no longer trust low level software like this.
Also, the Ken Thompson Hack comes to mind.
Didn't Guix solve that one with its full-source bootstrap?
Sorta.
You still need to trust a full Linux kernel and x86 hardware system.
I am not familiar with that. From a quick glance it looks like the new HURD. But I think even there you're relying on the work of others.
I did not know that about proton. Interesting.