this post was submitted on 10 Aug 2023
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Vulnerabilities in Sogou Keyboard encryption expose keypresses to network eavesdropping.

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[–] [email protected] 351 points 1 year ago (4 children)

I live in China and this software is cancerous not just in the encryption failure, it also nestles into a computer like a trojan. Creates 2 fallback installations and will reinstall itself after removal if you reboot in between, unless you get rid of all 3 installations at once, where they are deliberately trying to obfuscate the uninstall button (triple confirmation, swapping the confirm/cancel buttons and button background colors, etc.).

It's a nasty piece of crap that come preloaded on any phone (android, at least) and Windows-PC here.

[–] [email protected] 73 points 1 year ago (3 children)

It's time to switch to Linux!

[–] [email protected] 120 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I mean the CCP is aiming to have people use Kylin? If the government and the entire populace starts using Linux instead we'll just see the same BS on Linux instead. It's not an OS/platform issue, but an issue of bad actors.

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[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Don't worry, there is also a Linux version.

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Do people generally try to circumvent it? Are they too scared to uninstall it? Or do they just not care?

[–] [email protected] 57 points 1 year ago (13 children)

Worse. They think it's useful.

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[–] [email protected] 259 points 1 year ago (111 children)

Alright China shills, you can stop changing the subject to how Google and the US are the "same".

The troops advanced into central parts of Beijing on the city's major thoroughfares in the early morning hours of 4 June and engaged in bloody clashes with demonstrators attempting to block them, in which many people – demonstrators, bystanders, and soldiers – were killed. Estimates of the death toll vary from several hundred to several thousand, with thousands more wounded.[15][16][17][18][19][20]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Tiananmen_Square_protests_and_massacre

If you lived in China you'd likely not know about this, since people who talk about it go to prison.

Yeah the US is exactly like this so let's not talk about the Chinese government being awful to their citizens /s

[–] [email protected] 98 points 1 year ago (8 children)

Simple solution is to block lemmygrad and hexbear in your app. That cuts down quite a few tankies and mainlaind Taiwan shills.

[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Imagine being in Taiwan and having full access to information about China and the west and still shilling for China. Those types of people should be looking for a dominatrix, not a political philosophy...

[–] [email protected] 52 points 1 year ago (9 children)

I think they might be using "mainland Taiwan" as a way of saying China - Taiwan is an island which China thinks is "theirs" for some reason.

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[–] [email protected] 222 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (9 children)

This is one of my favorite things about kbin over Reddit. So neat to see gifs in chat.

[–] [email protected] 81 points 1 year ago (8 children)

They're viewable on Lemmy too!

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[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Reddit added the same functionality some time ago, I'm a bit sad it's a thing here too but oh well. People seem to like it. My favourite thing about reddit was it being text-based though

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[–] [email protected] 151 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (53 children)

Didn't swiftpad or whatever its called send every key pressed to Microsoft?

Not a China shill. China is horrible. Microsoft less so as they don't commit genocide in slow motion. But still, I think this sort of thing is more common than we think.

Use FOSS.

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[–] [email protected] 109 points 1 year ago (7 children)

It's stories like this that don't surprise me as much as make me ask: How the fuck do you store and process this much data to get anything useful out of it.

[–] [email protected] 64 points 1 year ago (4 children)

You just save the first 50 digits typed after some email is typed, and you have all the passwords you need!

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[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 year ago (3 children)

I could be wrong, and this is a generalization of any country you can name, but my impression is data is stored on everyone so when they decide someday to look you up they already have all the data collected. It's not really processed until needed.

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[–] [email protected] 85 points 1 year ago (10 children)

China being China, no surprise here.

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[–] [email protected] 75 points 1 year ago

Oh wow, who would have ever thought they'd do that? What a fucking surprise.

[–] [email protected] 66 points 1 year ago (3 children)

As if other keyboard apps are any different, I don't think Microsoft bought SwiftKey just for fun?!

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[–] [email protected] 60 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 57 points 1 year ago

I don't get it? Why are they talking in the article about not using the right type of encryption. The problem isn't the encryption, but the fact that it is sending your keystrokes to the mothership, right?

[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 year ago (3 children)

In a surprise to absolutely nobody, China spies on their people.

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[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 year ago (7 children)

I feel like there should be a Lemmy version of everything now

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I recommend free and open source software for everyone. Everything on this list is curated to feature the best alternatives to common proprietary software (according to Linux Cafe):

https://gitlab.com/linuxcafefederation/awesome-alternatives/-/blob/master/README.md

This list is good free, open source (FOSS) Android keyboards:

https://github.com/offa/android-foss#-keyboard

I think the best two are Simple Keyboard and AnySoftKeyboard. Simple Keyboard is pleasant to use, but is missing a several advanced features. ASK would be perfect if the swipe typing worked (it's currently listed as beta, and is mostly actuate, but unfortunately when it does make a mistake fixing it is almost painful).

Finally, try to get comfortable going to alternativeto.net when you get frustrated with software. Worst case scenario you get frustrated with different software for a bit and switch back. Of course it notes the price and license model for each alternative.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 year ago (2 children)

These findings underscore the importance for software developers in China to use well-supported encryption implementations such as TLS instead of attempting to custom design their own.

lol.

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[–] [email protected] 38 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (23 children)

The people here acting like their Gboard doesn't do the same is so funny.

Edit : never used nor installed tiktok.

[–] [email protected] 112 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It probably doesn't though. Obviously it's closed source making it harder to tell what's actually happening, but there's nothing stopping security analysts from looking at network usage and such. I would imagine that Google doesn't install a keylogger on every Android phone, not out of the goodness of their hearts, but because they don't want the bad publicity and lawsuits when it would inevitably be discovered.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

they do collect usage stats by default though.
which include typed sentences passed through their ai model and words usage counts.
it can all be turned off and gboard seems to respect these options. it doesn't access online services unless requested with these options off.

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[–] [email protected] 58 points 1 year ago (5 children)

If you have any evidence that it does, it would be big news. Please share.

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 year ago (41 children)

I'm going to guess you're one of the people who defends tiktok and compares it to every other social media app by saying the US government is basically the same as the Chinese government

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It's not a bug, it's a feature.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

And the Platinum Award for Least Surprising News Headline goes to...

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (24 children)

And gboard or SwiftKey don't?

[–] [email protected] 34 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

Every single time something sketchy is happening in Chinese tech a Lemmy user will slide the conversation and accusations to American tech. It's a rule.

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[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Never use a closed source keyboard app. It can read what you send for messages, websites you go to, search engine queries.

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