this post was submitted on 27 Feb 2024
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So I've been using Rustdesk with a self hosted server for business and personal use now for some time. However, it is definitely the sketchiest foss software I've used. It seems to be based in China but the developers keep lying and saying its in Singapore.

Here is a list if everything I've found:

https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/14kjvkg/community_consensus_on_rustdesk_with_all_the/

https://github.com/rustdesk/rustdesk/discussions/1159

https://www.reddit.com/r/rustdesk/comments/y230hf/my_rustdesk_client_try_to_communication_with/

https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/10ppntj/reminder_about_the_shadyness_of_rustdesk/

https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/109tn1i/rustdesk_server_117_supports_ipv6_now_selfhosted/j42pf4m/

https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/uurta8/_/

https://www.reddit.com/r/selfhosted/comments/y80sw1/as_someone_that_knows_nothing_about_virtualremote/isxvib2/

https://youtu.be/JIAdEGX_sIU

It seems that now the clients and OSS server are completely foss which is good. They also no longer have public servers in China according to them. In the client itself it also now has better defaults so you are less at risk of getting attacked.

It still is sketch but it now is slightly less sketch I guess? Either way its not ideal.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 9 months ago (29 children)

So your point is that a FOSS application made in China is sketchy by default or what exactly?

Damn, you Americans are really brainwashed that everything that originates from China is bad.

You know you are free to use TeamViewer or Anydesk and no one is forcing you to use Rustdesk.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 9 months ago (13 children)

Software and hardware from China is known to be compromised on arrival. The CPP is a dangerous authoritarian government and they heavily influence private business in very nasty ways.

As for Team viewer and Anydesk, they are proprietary and can not be trusted. At least Rustdesk is Libre. The most concerning part about Rustdesk is that they delete issues that question the source of the software or Rust desk's potential to be influenced by the CPP.

[–] MaliciousKebab 6 points 9 months ago (1 children)

I mean the same thing can be said about the USA, also if there are that many problems why don't you just check the code, it's one of the main strengths of open source software.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The USA isn't nearly as bad as China. I can access or create any news source for example. You also don't see people posting about GNU being compromised by the NSA.

Its always good to verify though.

[–] MaliciousKebab 3 points 9 months ago (1 children)

Yeah you are right on that but there still are many backdoors on plenty of applications that are made by American companies. We also know that some agencies wanted to put backdoors on linux kernel etc. In that case why would you not trust an open source app, and trust a closed source one just because of the nationality of developers

[–] [email protected] 1 points 9 months ago

The problem is that China is very bad about backdoors. Free software and transparency is really the only answer to not having backdoors.

As an example China put backdoors in some Chips though Huawei https://www.wired.com/story/huawei-backdoors-us-crypto-ag/

My concern is that the people behind Rustdesk are kind of a mystery. Many projects with have a publicly known dev where you can track the origin and current developments behind a project. Rustdesk just has a user called "rustdesk" for the most part. The people behind that are not known. What complicates the matter is reports of them removing issues that question the integrity of the code authors. It would make me much happier if they ran a security audit on Rustdesk. Hopefully as it gets more popular someone will either find that it is mostly fine or that it is a security nightmare.

I use it because there aren't a lot of options. Maybe someone else will create something more transparent.

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