magsarion (u/magsarion)

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

int_19h · 3 years ago

Every other player on a public game server is a potential threat actor of this nature, is the point.

magsarion · 3 years ago

Then don't talk to them on a public Mumble/Ventrilo/IRC server without adequate precautions.

Most MMOs & online games offer an in-game chat client that does appropriate cloaking & is also moderated (so an offender risks a ban if they engage in harassment). Nobody is forcing OP to invite these people onto his VoIP server.

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

rcxdude · 3 years ago

It's not a matter of one single identity. Whether you use one or multiple you have a real practical problem which does actually happen which is prevented by discord without the need for using a 3rd party tool or you have a selection of alternatives which don't. Giving discord your phone number (which theoretically could be a problem) is really not an issue by comparison (hint: while not exactly the paragon of virtue, discord in general is more trustworthy than a random user of it).

magsarion · 3 years ago

> a real practical problem

It's not a real practical problem – and I'm not sure why we're pretending that it is one. Let's clearly state what the problem is: OP wants to play MMOs & online games against potential threat actors who may DDoS and/or doxx them. Which is why they simultaneously also want to shield their identity from them. An analogy would be somebody who wants to play games with the neighbourhood meth gang while not wanting to get stabbed.

This is not safe or reasonable behaviour. Even if these people lack a client IP, a motivated attacker can piece your identity together from what you say and/or post eventually. Discord just makes that a bit more difficult at the cost of you handing over PIID of greater importance.

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

rcxdude · 3 years ago

You don't understand the threat model of OP: it's not a case of "general internet port scanner getting into my network" it's a case of "guy I've pissed off in this video game DDossing my residential internet connection or using that information to dox me". For the latter no level of security on my own network is going to prevent the bad outcome, but effectively having a proxy through a 3rd party does (and discord does go to extra lengths to avoid webRTC from leaking IP info)

magsarion · 3 years ago

The "threat model" of OP is the consequence of a wrong usage pattern. You keep your identities separate. If you're in a high-stakes environment where being DDoSed or attacked is an actual threat, you compartmentalize that identity adequately by going through a proxy, VPN, TOR, I2P, or using a different medium altogether. Fortunately, unlike other services, this is extremely easy with IRC since the identity is just a nick, and nothing prevents one from having as many identities as needed.

This obsession with having a single centralized identity where some vendor is trusted to painstakingly guard the linked PIID is misguided, unsafe, and harmful. Discord will fall prey to a data exfiltration attack eventually, and affected people will only then realize that this trust was misplaced. The fact that people are comfortable giving Discord their phone numbers while being worried about their client IP being exposed on IRC is baffling.

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

tester756 · 3 years ago

>Also lack of transparency. The self-hosted open alternatives are auditable and can be inspected. Nobody knows what Discord does with user data or what security issues exist.

This doesnt solve (or doesnt even tries to solve) my issue AT ALL.

I'd rather have Discord have some user data that I'm consciously putting there instead of my enemies from the game DDoSing/Stalking me

I've played hardcore MMORPGs and this is serious concern.

>tl;dr: Web linking + some bot integration and client affordances solve all these. This is how the web is supposed to work.

sounds like: go put effort and decrease your UX.

magsarion · 3 years ago

> I'd rather have Discord some user data that I'm consciously putting there instead of my enemies from the game DDoSing/Stalking me

Security by obscurity is not a real solution. If you have a public IP connected to the internet, you will be subjected to attacks and port scans either way.

Configure your network and firewall correctly and ensure no ports are open instead of trusting the false sense of security given by some proprietary vendor who has your data.

> sounds like: go put effort and decrease your UX.

"UX" is subjective. For me, Discord has horrible UX, with its flashy, slow, obnoxious UI and its incessant cacophony of tips, "new feature" notifications, and advertisements for "Discord Nitro".

Putting in the one-time effort to configure an IRC client (and making it "fancy") seems worth it to me instead of having to continually put up with Discord's whims. At least there is no threat of enshittification with this approach. "IRC Nitro" will never be a real thing. With Discord, you can never be sure. Elon might just decide to buy it on a whim and rename it something like "XDickswords" if he feels like it.

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

tester756 · 3 years ago

Discord haters look, it is simple.

Until Discord appeared we had

Ventrilo, Mumble, TeamSpeak, Skype, etc, etc

I've been using those for like 10 years almost everyday

They had voice chat, some had viable text chat, etc, etc.

And then Discord appeared which had:

Voice Chat,

Good text chat (images, code snippets, emojis, reactions, etc)

Streaming Video (!!)

File share

Robust bot integration

Lack of security problem unlike the self-hosted alternatives have.

This one is important in gaming communities in e.g MMORPG games cuz there's nothing better than being DDoSd cuz you left team or because you talked to somebody on wrong TeamSpeak server 5 months ago :)

Push2Talk - this is also important, I dont understand how e.g Teams dont have this shit.

Imagine you're working on remote with kids in the background - having an ability to push button and talk is really useful! So you don't have constantly mute/unmute yourself! Gamers have been doing it for over 2 decades but with the parents in the background instead of kids

One account between all servers with ability to customize your identity

All of that in one solution. That won its market.

Provide something as innovative and robust as Discord and people may consider switching.

__________________

I know that IRC's simplicity may be beautiful for hacker's mind, but it doesn't solve my problems nor make my life easier, so I'm not going to use it over Discord.

magsarion · 3 years ago

> Voice Chat

Integrating a Jitsi bot into the channel solves this.

> Good text chat (images, code snippets, emojis, reactions, etc)

All possible with good old web linking. Link to an image host, a pastebin, or a file host of your choice. Many IRC clients support inline display of image/media URLs.

All major IRC clients and servers support UTF-8 as well, so emoji away.

> Streaming Video (!!)

Jitsi (with a bot) or web linking.

> File share

Web linking.

> Robust bot integration

Quite possibly one of the strongest arguments for IRC. The protocol is well-documented, and it's very easy to write an IRC bot.

> Lack of security problem unlike the self-hosted alternatives have.

Also lack of transparency. The self-hosted open alternatives are auditable and can be inspected. Nobody knows what Discord does with user data or what security issues exist.

> Push2Talk - this is also important, I dont understand how e.g Teams dont have this shit.

Your (possibly self-hosted) Jitsi instance already has this.

> One account between all servers with ability to customize your identity

Until you get banned/blocked for some arbitrary reason, at which point you might as well start over, since everything is gone.

tl;dr: Web linking + some bot integration and client affordances solve all these. This is how the web is supposed to work.

magsarion commented on IRC is the only viable chat protocol (2022) koshka.love/babel/irc-for... · Posted by u/CHB0403085482

_xivi · 3 years ago

Not receiving a message unless you're online is really the deal breaker for most people

magsarion · 3 years ago

Most IRC networks have a MemoServ, so that's not an issue.