Re: [clipboard] Semi-Trusted Events Alternative

>>> On Sat, Jul 26, 2014 at 9:19 AM, Perry Smith <pedzsan@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Sorry if this is a lame question but I never understood the dangers of Copy
>>>> and Paste that the web is trying to avoid.  Can someone explain that to me?

There's some text attempting to explain it in the spec
http://dev.w3.org/2006/webapi/clipops/clipops.html#other-security-and-privacy-considerations
if it should be clarified, please suggest edits :)

>>> Or, it could be another program with the browser scraping the data and
>>> hauling it off to a site.

This - the privacy angle - is the main threat. Triggering copy operations mostly has nuisance potential (like a misguided site placing "This text covered by copyright" messages on the clipboard instead of what you wanted to copy) - the "phishing URL" and "pasting risky code into terminal" problems are relatively far fetched. But allowing any website you keep open in some tab to monitor your clipboard and log everything you copy while using the computer is out of the question..


> If this is really the case, it seems that separating Copy from Paste would be proper.

The spec sort of distinguishes them (but this should probably be spelled out in detail): per the current spec text, copy/cut can be triggered from any trusted or semi-trusted event, while paste is only allowed if the UA is explicitly configured to allow it. But I should explain this better in the spec - especially because I keep forgetting about this myself ;)

-Hallvord

Received on Saturday, 26 July 2014 17:20:29 UTC