Hacker News Reader

> Then something like WASM, but avoiding the 1.5x or so slowdown over native. Perhaps WASM is the answer, but with improved runtime.

Once we are done with WASM we will look at it, compare it with Java Applets and say: Look, we already had that!

View on HN

The difference is that Java bytecode is fundamentally insecure. Wasm seems to take inspiration from the research that went into NaCl/pNaCl.

The worst problem with the Java sandbox was not the bytecode (though it did have its share of bytecode validation bugs). The worst problem was the vast API surface with its "blacklist" security model: all methods which should not be called from the sandbox have to explicitly call a AccessController.checkPermission() or similar. Miss one, and you have a hole in the sandbox. WASM instead follows a "whitelist" approach, which is much more robust.

How is Java bytecode fundamentally insecure? (Example?)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com