this post was submitted on 21 Feb 2024
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A Bitcoin investor was recently scammed out of 9 Bitcoin (worth around $490K) in a fake “Exodus wallet” desktop application for Linux, published in the Canonical Snap Store. This isn’t the first time; if nothing changes, it likely won’t be the last.

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[–] coolmojo@lemmy.world 7 points 8 months ago (6 children)
[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

That's is the genuine one. There is a genuine company called Exodus for Crypto. The problem is that a scammer made their own clone and nobody verified whether they really are from the Exodus company.

If you check the manifest on Flathub you'll see they verified it belongs to the real Exodus

[–] coolmojo@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago

Yes. You are right. Thanks. Just listened to the Linux Matters podcast episode about this. Crazy.

[–] danielquinn@lemmy.ca 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

42,396 installs.... Holy shit.

Edit, from the article:

This “Exodus” application published in the Snap store was indeed a scam application. There is a genuine organisation that developed a real, seemingly ’legitimate’ cryptocurrency wallet application. This is not that.

Any chance that the FlatHub one is legit?

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 5 points 8 months ago

Apparently the Flathub one is indeed legit

[–] qaz@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

It’s produced without upstream involvement but does seem to be legit so far. I placed a post seeking clarification about the Flatpak situation on Reddit 6 months ago. I quickly got a response after posting it. However, the response was from some scammers and I never got a response from the company behind it itself.

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 2 points 8 months ago (3 children)

I mean FlatHub isn't safe in general. You could just target someone downloading the package and give them a malicious package instead. FlatHub doesn't check sigs, so its a hot mess

[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

They seem to be doing more on that side than Canonical is. But I agree, it should be MANDATORY that the developer is thoroughly vetted and approved and the code run and checked before publishing.

I hope this is a wake up call for Snaps and Flatpaks.

Apps from the repo have the security, which is why I always default to the distribution repo

[–] qaz@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

it should be MANDATORY that the developer is thoroughly vetted and approved and the code run and checked Brexit before publishing.

Brexit?

[–] danielfgom@lemmy.world 2 points 8 months ago

Damn autocorrect...

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Its not terrible but its certainly not great either

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Its pretty terrible compared to normal OS package managers.

[–] possiblylinux127@lemmy.zip 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

How so? I just open up gnome software an search for the application I need

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 1 points 8 months ago

Cryptographic verification of the packages authenticity

[–] AProfessional@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

The repo is gpg signed. I don’t know why you think thats not sufficient.

“packages” don’t exist like traditional distros. Its a large repo of data.

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Point me to the documentation that describes this

[–] AProfessional@lemmy.world 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)
[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

This isn't even the right project's documentation

[–] AProfessional@lemmy.world 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

… I assumed you knew the basics.

Flatpak uses ostree for all data. https://docs.flatpak.org/en/latest/under-the-hood.html

I'm disappointed you criticize the project so harshly with no knowledge of it.

[–] delirious_owl@discuss.online 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

No, my point is that if flat pak doesn't document that they cryptographically verify the authenticity of packages, then they dont.

Even the ostree docs say that it supports it gpg encryption. It supports it. It doesn't enforce it. That depends on the implementation.

I will continue to harshly criticize projects that leave users vulnerable. Want to prove me wrong? Link me to the flat pak docks that clearly say that all packages are cryptographically verified after download and before upload.

[–] AProfessional@lemmy.world 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Look, Flatpak does, and it’s secure. You can spread misinformation if you like but don’t be proud of it.

You clearly have no capacity to accept new information in good faith.