Aqua Nautilus researchers have identified a security issue that arises from the interaction between Ubuntu’s command-not-found package and the snap package repository. While command-not-found serves as a convenient tool for suggesting installations for uninstalled commands, it can be inadvertently manipulated by attackers through the snap repository, leading to deceptive recommendations of malicious packages.
Tl;dr Someone makes a package called “chromee”, you try to install “chrome” via apt, it’s not found, but finds “chromee” in Snap and suggests it.
They could simply make it so the auto suggestion only suggests FOSS apps from verified publishers, since they already have that data
Which is probably how they’re gonna fix it.
What a surprise. Its almost like forcing snap is a bad idea
Steam snap was so broken Valve told people to use the .deb or flathub.
Wait… Snap packages aren’t manually verified? Why Canonical? Doesn’t every other Linux package manager have their main packages repository manually vetted?
Neither Canonical"s Snapstore, nor Flathub manually verify apps. They’re both similar to the Play Store or App Store where it’s managed by the app developer.
For Flathub there are verified apps though, which are confirmed to be by the original developer.
Snap store does similar I believe
yeah, but i can still make a Github Repo for Firefoxx and be Verified on Flathub, even though i am masquerading as Firefox. That’s not the Problem.
Since you need to pass a manual review during initial submission of the app, no, you can’t
A fake malware password manager made it on to Apple’s app store, passed manual review. Manual reviews are not bulletproof
That’s still not the same as impersonating a known app or developer though
That’s exactly what they did, imitated lastpass or something
Flathub has manual reviews during initial submission though. Also they’re working on automatically needing a manual review when e.g. new permissions are granted to apps
It’s funny bc I’m seeing this as karma for a dark pattern.
Seems like the problem is more that they allowed random unverified apps to be uploaded in the first place rather than the suggestion prompt. Even then this seems like a good reason to not recommend unverified sources by default.
I’ve still never quite been able to understand the problem being solved by going back to what we were happy to leave behind with Windows: The google, download, install, hope it’s not malicious, software installation model.
I should add that it’s VERY common when one of these “OMG I tried Linux and I can’t even install anything” posts come up, it’s because they are still doing that. Google, download, install, hope it’s not malicious. And they grab something that’s a bad choice for their distro, or not the best way to install something etc.
Not that many years ago, you could quickly explain that in the Linux ecosystem that’s really not how it works, and is not a good choice until they are experienced enough to make an informed decision. How do you tell the noobies that now without having to then get into snaps/flatpak/appimage and all their differences and caveats?
Saw just such a post in the past few days, and didn’t even try to explain their problem looked to be that they’d randomly installed shit they found googling, which is normal in Windows, but a bad idea in Linux. I’m not, nor will I ever be, an expert in all those ways of packaging, especially since I’ve eschewed their use myself.
I see these as solutions without a problem, and that have made it harder, not easier, to help out the noobies when they come in trying to do things “Windows-style.”
I’m sure there are people who love this evolutionary step, and that’s fine. I’m not a hater, so please don’t come at me as if I am. If these things work for you, I am happy they do so. I just feel we’ve put a lot of effort into trying to throw out the baby with the bathwater on this topic in recent years.
Instead of looking to refine how package managers work and packages are maintained, we now have 15 competing standards. (/xkcd)
Yeah, fuck snap. I’ve been actively recommending against using Ubuntu because of it to new users.
I’ve been really enjoying LMDE (Linux Mint Debian Edition) as a main distro. It asks you during the install what package systems you want to include and you can just not select snap 👌
Does canonical not verify snaps when they’re submitted to them like flathub does now?
Nope. It’s automated and doesnt detect malicious name-squatting (what caused the last security drama within snap)
Doesn’t help that unlike flatpak, snaps are pretty much exclusively used on Ubuntu so many Devs won’t bother porting their apps to it so snaps are rife with dodgy repacked apps and people squatting official names of popular flatpak apps
That’s messed up. I’m going to stay away from them for sure.
FWIW Flatpak also does it automated, but as others said they manually verify new entries, and since it’s such a widely adopted standard there’s less opportunity to name-squat a popular app that isn’t already available.
I don’t know what flatpak does to stop, say, someone releasing a legit/dummy app to pass manual verification before replacing it with a malicious app and a new name, so can’t comment on how effective their security is beyond the initial release
