The software that has a political opinion implies a bias and high risk for security. Avoid software with a "position" today, so you don't get hacked tomorrow.
I think it’s absolutely fine for software to show support for something political (e.g. supporting Ukraine against Russia), but I agree with the author that it’s not ok to act violently against certain group of users (e.g. wiping Russian PCs).
Not because I don’t like the idea of Russian PCs getting wiped, knowing majority of them support the agression against Ukraine, but because they can do the same thing. They will wipe our PCs with theirs NPM packages or whatnot, we will malwarize more of our software to attack them and so on. The end result will be that:
unradicalized Russians will be radicalized because we wiped their PCs (and vice versa)
we can’t use a lot of great software out of fear that it’s authors will wipe our PCs (and vice versa)
I see nothing good coming from this type of cyber war for either side of the conflict, and thus I don’t think we should support it.
Agreed that it’s an entirely acceptable position to try and avoid being stuck in the crossfire of cyber warfare. Let’s be clear though, cyber warfare is already going on and Russia+China are pulling no punches routinely wiping American and European servers in various ways. Anyone on the front line of cybersecurity sees them knocking ceaselessly.
I think it’s absolutely fine for software to show support for something political (e.g. supporting Ukraine against Russia), but I agree with the author that it’s not ok to act violently against certain group of users (e.g. wiping Russian PCs). Not because I don’t like the idea of Russian PCs getting wiped, knowing majority of them support the agression against Ukraine, but because they can do the same thing. They will wipe our PCs with theirs NPM packages or whatnot, we will malwarize more of our software to attack them and so on. The end result will be that:
unradicalized Russians will be radicalized because we wiped their PCs (and vice versa)
we can’t use a lot of great software out of fear that it’s authors will wipe our PCs (and vice versa)
I see nothing good coming from this type of cyber war for either side of the conflict, and thus I don’t think we should support it.
Agreed that it’s an entirely acceptable position to try and avoid being stuck in the crossfire of cyber warfare. Let’s be clear though, cyber warfare is already going on and Russia+China are pulling no punches routinely wiping American and European servers in various ways. Anyone on the front line of cybersecurity sees them knocking ceaselessly.
Do make me laugh with your sources.