Hi everyone,

This is a bit of a public service announcement.  I tried to look at this bug:

https://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=38451

The poster offered a ZIP download of their project, but it's hosted by a questionable site, since it requires browser add-ons (including Adobe Flash) and a client program (which apparently was digitally signed and recognised by Windows).  It installed Opera and a number of 3rd Party Windows Services without permission. I've managed to uninstall said programs, and now I'm running a full virus scan because, frankly, I don't trust everything to be gone.

I made a post on the bug report suggesting the author use a different download provider.  But long story short, DO NOT DOWNLOAD FROM THE LINK PROVIDED.

Gareth aka. Kit

A follow-up.  I did some research on one of the 3rd party tools that was installed... IdleBuddy.  IT IS MALWARE.  Specifically it is a crypto miner (one that uses your resources and gives the credit to someone else).

Ironically, I use my laptop for crypto mining, so all my hardware resources are in use anyway!  Still, you bet I'm going to be giving my laptop a thorough scan now.  Curses.

Gareth aka. Kit

Gareth,

I don't know what you've been doing on that site, but I downloaded the bugreport file without problems. I didn't have to install anything, just downloaded a zip without the need to download or install anything else. The zip file contains only (a lot of) pascal files.

I agree the method is somewhat unusual but as far as I can see the download is bona fide.

Michael.

I tried to download the file but the link had me download an installer for the file instead, which installed malware.

Gareth aka. Kit

It was through Mozilla Firefox though, so it might behave differently on different browsers.

I am also using Mozilla Firefox.

Michael.

AM Michael Van Canneyt wrote

I am also using Mozilla Firefox.

So do I.
I have downloaded that file (some time ago) just to see if I could simplify the problem.
I had no problems, it was just a zip file with enormous amounst of code with a gazillion of ifdefs (so I gave up trying to simplifyt the problem).

I even downloaded the file with wget from the link in the page. No problems whatsoever.

Michael.

J. Gareth Moreton wrote

It was through Mozilla Firefox though, so it might behave differently on different browsers.

Perhaps a malicious ad on the site hijacked your click? If you don't use it yet, I'd strongly recommend adding
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ublock-origin/ to Firefox.

Jonas

AM Bart wrote

I have downloaded that file (some time ago)

The download links seems to have gone from the bugreport? (Or maybe I need new glasses)

No, it is still there, comment from 2021-02-09 22:25:

https://bugs.freepascal.org/view.php?id=38451#c128844

Time for a visit to Pearle opticians ;-)

Michael.

El 24/2/21 a les 12:11, Michael Van Canneyt via fpc-devel ha escrit:

I don't see any comment made on that date. I see one made at 2021-02-07 22:07 and the next one is at 2021-02-23 21:57

Bye

It's a private comment. I can only see it when I'm logged in.

Jonas

On Wed, Feb 24, 2021 at 1:50 PM Luca Olivetti via fpc-devel <

wrote: I don't see any comment made on that date. I see one made at 2021-02-07 22:07 and the next one is at 2021-02-23 21:57

I also see the same gap from the 7th to the 23rd. Perhaps the message was marked as private and one needs admin or developer status to view it?

Okay, it works as expected for me now too - sorry for the panic. I've just never had something like that happen before.

The messages are marked as private.

Gareth aka. Kit

PM J. Gareth Moreton wrote

The messages are marked as private.

They weren't in the past though.
The good news is that I don't have to get new glasses.