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Nginx core developer quits project in security dispute, starts “freenginx” fork (arstechnica.com)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/technology@lemmy.world
17 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 
  • A core developer of Nginx, the popular web server, has quit the project and started a fork called freenginx.
  • The developer cited disagreements with the new management at F5, which acquired Nginx Inc. in 2019, over security policies.
  • The dispute arose from the assigning of Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVEs) to bugs in the experimental HTTP/3 code.

Archive link: https://archive.ph/U4XRN

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[–] 66 points 2 years ago (2 children)

So I am a bit confused on this one. Why does this particular developer or anyone really, disagree with assigning CVEs to releases code? I mean I get that it is experimental but having associated CVEs adds to disclosure on the experimental features. What is the downside of the assigned CVEs? I was all ready to jump on F5 being wrong but it sounds like they may have taken the right position. Can someone elaborate on why that may not be the case?

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  • [–] 25 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    I believe what this is saying is that management decided to only fix CVEs in certain versions going forward, instead of older versions. It's hard to tell for sure.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 years ago (4 children)

    There was another article I read that had a snippet from F5. As I read it, their concern was that they have two release tracks: the paid/subscription track, and the free track. They are actually the same code, but the free track is just 2 releases behind, so the idea is that if you want the "latest and greatest" stuff, you gotta pay. It's a fairly common strategy in the industry.

    So, the concern is that for security vulnerabilities that are not CVEs, info about the vulnerability (and how to exploit it) is out in the wild for two whole releases, before the patch reaches the free-tier users.

    Seems like an actively good position on F5's part, from this angle.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago

    Not particularly when you consider it is standard practice to NOT be charging for CVE and emergency for released products from similar companies. Hell, even RedHat pushed upstream and downstream packages to CentOS if they were the first to patch. Happens with Canonical and the Debian team as well. This engineer saw what F5 was doing, thought it was wrong, and bailed. Seems like a valid response to me.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    What's considered as a release in the nginx world?

    Any minor update or just the major updates?

    Eg. 1.25.4 was recently released. 4 months prior was 1.25.3. 2 months prior to that it was 1.25.2. etc

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    • [–] 35 points 2 years ago (5 children)

    So the team were actually having a serious discussion this afternoon.

    Is the new project called:

    • Free-en-jin-ex
    • Freen-ginks
    • Free-ne-ginks
    • something else
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  • [–] 8 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    They should parse it the same way as "postgresql".

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  • [–] 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    You mean "Postgres"?

    shh

    I call it this every chance I get because its like nails on a chalkboard to many DBAs.

    edit: huh. both my clients have spoiler tags, but both are apparently broken. I can't decipher what Lemmy wants me to do for the markdown to fix it, probably the client not displaying it right.

    edit 2: yeah, it looks correct on the default browser interface, but both apps I use (Boost for Lemmy and Eternity) fail to render a spoiler.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago

    Your spoiler tag works fine on the web client. That is the supported way to do spoilers on Lemmy. However, Sync, if you use that doesn't support Lemmy spoilers and only supports reddit spoilers. Unfortunately no matter what spoiler method you use, it will not work for someone, somewhere. There is no unified spoiler markup across the fediverse, but there really should be.

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    • [–] [B] 15 points 2 years ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:

    A core developer of Nginx, currently the world's most popular web server, has quit the project, stating that he no longer sees it as "a free and open source project… for the public good."

    Later that year, two of Nginx's leaders, Maxim Konovalov and Igor Sysoev, were detained and interrogated in their homes by armed Russian state agents.

    While the criminal charges and rights do not appear to have materialized, the implications of a Russian company's intrusion into a popular open source piece of the web's infrastructure caused some alarm.

    Comments on Hacker News, including one by a purported employee of F5, suggest Dounin opposed the assigning of published CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) to bugs in aspects of QUIC.

    MegaZone wrote to Ars (noting that he only spoke for himself and not F5), stating, "It's an unfortunate situation, but I think we did the right thing for the users in assigning CVEs and following public disclosure practices.

    F5 is committed to delivering successful open source projects that require a large and diverse community of contributors, as well as applying rigorous industry standards forassigning and scoring identified vulnerabilities.

    The original article contains 833 words, the summary contains 188 words. Saved 77%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!

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