RE: [XHR] Open issue: allow setting User-Agent?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Boris Zbarsky [mailto:bzbarsky@MIT.EDU]
> Sent: Monday, October 15, 2012 9:50 PM
> 
> On 10/15/12 7:18 AM, Jungkee Song wrote:
> > but if certain backend intends to provide its content under some browser
> requirements, isn't "Vary: User-Agent" sort of a required header to have
> related caching proxy, if any, work correctly?
> 
> Yes, it is, but it's rare for websites to think about that sort of thing
> in my experience.
> 
> In particular, I have yet to encounter a site that both does server-side
> UA sniffing _and_ sends Vary: User-Agent.

Yes, I think it's very rare. I found that a Korean web portal site, "Naver", does send "Vary:Accept-Encoding,User-Agent" upon the request to "http://www.naver.com" and "http://m.naver.com", though.

> > Otherwise, subsequent requests on the same resource with different User-
> Agent string would be regarded as a cache HIT in caching proxy anyway.
> 
> Indeed.
> 
> > Anyway, the point here is that if changing of User-Agent is allowed in
> script, it will be possible for malicious third party to set arbitrary
> User-Agent strings in generating XSS attacks.
> 
> While true, a third party can already do this with things like botnets,
> no?  I'm not sure I see the additional threats here.  Can you explain?

>From that perspective, I don't think setting the User-Agent string in script poses any unknown treats. However, it seems like we are permitting another choice which is simply calling a JavaScript function.

FYI, here is another article [1] written about the compatibility problem on changing the UA string at runtime.

[1] http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ieinternals/archive/2009/10/08/extending-the-user-agent-string-problems-and-alternatives.aspx


Jungkee

Received on Tuesday, 16 October 2012 05:44:35 UTC