News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by quesera on Thursday January 23, 2025 @02:36PM (#42807254)
Interpreting Animats' question as concern for the user population, I think it's a valid one.

The new administration in the US is openly hostile, and a lot of damage could be done to peoples' lives if, say, the community was hacked and private email addresses (or other PII) was leaked.

And I also agree with you -- now's the time for those of us who can afford it, to fly our ally flags as loudly and proudly as possible.

OP: Please make sure your secure coding and operational security practices are excellent and meet the challenge here.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by t4t on Thursday January 23, 2025 @02:38PM (#42807269)
I am taking security very seriously. All sensitive rows are protected by RLS, and I have gone even further by adding random noise to all location data. Locations are locked down, but in the unfortunate event of a hack what would be leaked is location within a 5 or so mile range, not exact location.

If it is possible on Supabase I would like to eventually obscure emails and oauth info.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by alt227 on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:58PM (#42807986)
5 mile range is pretty serious, it narrows someones locations down to a single town in the entire world. Just dont store it at all and you're all good.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by mmooss on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:34PM (#42808781)
You'd need just a little more data to find the individual.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by 2muchcoffeeman on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:42PM (#42807849)
Why even keep location data at all?
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by t4t on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:57PM (#42807980)
One of the main selling points of the app is that you can filter posts by distance, to facilitate people meeting and talking with their community.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by 2muchcoffeeman on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:30PM (#42808288)
So list a city?
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by nyanpasu64 on Friday January 24, 2025 @06:03AM (#42812053)
I'm wondering if it's more or less safe (from doxxers attacking individual users, or the entire service being compromised) to share location with this app vs. Lex. In any case I chose not to share location yet, and don't know if Lex is any safer (they require location).
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by gowld on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:06PM (#42808070)
I'm sorry, but considering your rapid pace of development and team size, and the extremely sensitive content and vulnerable user base, I have no faith that security and privacy are well-maintained against malicious users and attackers.

This is no disrespect to the quality of the prototype you have built. This is a real-world pragmatic observation.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by whalesalad on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:12PM (#42808143)
this is the most insane thread I have ever seen on hn.

"no good deed goes unpunished" comes to mind

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by otterley on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:35PM (#42808327)
That's not an observation. That's speculation.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by bigiain on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:24PM (#42808687)
Fairly valid speculation, I my opinion.

If I were in the US, and particularly in one of the seriously intolerant red states, there's no way I'd want and of my details in their database.

I don't think it's catastrophising to consider there may well be very real risks to being openly trans in the US in the near future. Risks of not only blackhat 4chan hackers, but also from government and legal system attacks on sites like this.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by otterley on Friday January 24, 2025 @01:39PM (#42815890)
There's nothing new about this, sad though it is. People, particularly insecure people, have tried to suppress minorities since the dawn of time, and they're constantly inventing new ways to do it.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by mmooss on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:39PM (#42808814)
Interesting ... why can't I Vouch for this post?
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by dang on Thursday January 23, 2025 @06:22PM (#42809093)
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by asmor on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:02PM (#42807489)
email me if you need a code review
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by etothepii on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:44PM (#42807868)
Without wishing to appear overly snippy, this is how I would begin hacking such a site.

Offer to do a "code review".

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by PaulHoule on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:03PM (#42808045)
I got an offer of a "code review" like that once for an authentication system and never heard back; it was open source anyway so anybody could have downloaded it and found my rookie mistakes like

  signed_token = content + MD5(secret_key+content)
which doesn't stop anyone from appending to the content (might not have really been exploitable, but any honest review from somebody who knew more than me would have turned it up)
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by asmor on Friday January 24, 2025 @05:36AM (#42811948)
> Without wishing to appear overly snippy

You failed.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by dang on Friday January 24, 2025 @02:35PM (#42816264)
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by comprambler on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:31PM (#42808758)
Threat model this shit.

I would dead man switch the storage's Azure instance. Mayybe the whole thing. Mayybe shouldn't be on azure.

Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by comprambler on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:36PM (#42808794)
Nm assumed RLS as a MS TLA. PGsql has it as well. Comment stands, watch data residency.
Re:Show HN: I built an active community of trans people online by mmooss on Thursday January 23, 2025 @05:33PM (#42808775)
> if, say, the community was hacked and private email addresses (or other PII) was leaked.

Or just basic ISP, or other provider, logging domains visited per user.