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Comment by lazy_gator | Hacker News Reader

A unreported zero day is a de facto backdoor. The chain you mentioned has similar flaws as the current strategy. Step 3 would be incredibly difficult. It would be similar to detecting a virus signature, which are easily circumvented. The second party can use trivial techniques to change the signature in a way that makes it incredibly difficult to detect.

Many 0-days are built of of multiple bugs. A triple letter may use bug #1 and bug #2 to get a result, but another party will use bug #1 and bug #3 to get a similar result. Back to square one with corporate/government/personal equipment getting hacked reducing overall security.

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> A unreported zero day is a de facto backdoor

Traditionally the meaning of “backdoor” has involved intent as well as access. Unlike a basic bug, the system is working as designed but the designer wasn't trustworthy.

> A unreported zero day is a de facto backdoor.

This is not true. A backdoor indicates that Microsoft is aware of it (and/or colluded to put it in), but there is no evidence of that. I respect your disagreement with my thoughts on how they should handle 0-days, but re-defining "backdoor" does not seem helpful.

We can debate the meaning of words, but the goal of a backdoor from the perspective of the government is to gain access to a system. The effect of a backdoor is accomplished through a literal backdoor or a figurative backdoor by hoarding exploits, which both are a detriment of security.

By de facto, I was implying that they both accomplish the same things with almost the same list of pros and cons.

When I worked on jailbreaking tools for iOS devices, we routinely held onto multiple 0-days, waiting for a major iOS release to ensure compatibility.

While I know there may be reasons to disagree with that practice, I think it would be a major stretch to say that it meant iOS suddenly had a backdoor.

I agree that it is not a true backdoor, but I am simply pointing out that the goal is accomplished by hoarding 0-days or creating an actual backdoor.

The 0-day you were not reporting gave you escalated access to iOS devices. If Apple had given you a backdoor, you would have had the exact same access to the device.

Not saying its the same thing, which is why I used "de facto". The government just wants the access. Regardless the hole is intentional or unintentional, if a hole exists, then overall security is weakened

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