Edited: Image hotlinking temporarily down while DU admins make security patch

[JHB]

Last edited Sat Feb 29, 2020, 01:53 PM - Edit history (1)

I'd been about to put up a TOON post when Preview showed something very different from what I expected. My original post asking if others were seeing the same issue is in the excerpt box below.

EarlG explains it in #5. I've edited this post to avoid more "yup, me too" posts since we have an answer.


Original post:

Anyone else seeing URLs instead of images today?

For example, below should be a Darrin Bell cartoon, but all I'm seeing at the time of this posting is a URL without the file type extension:



Just double-checking it's not just me.

[dweller]

1. same here

also vids don't play for me anymore, but that started early in week

✌🏼

[LakeArenal]

4. Man o man, I thought I was needing a new phone.

[dweller]

14. i can make the vid show me the url

then i just open that in new window, so it's a workaround for now

✌🏼

[JHB]

10. Vids play fine for me (just checked). I don't know when this image thing started

After I put up the TOON post on Thursday, and presumably after 2:30 pm (US Eastern time) on Friday, because that was the time of the last comment on that thread. I wasn't able to put a new post up yesterday, but discovered this issue when I was attempting to put up one today.

[gredinger]

2. Hrm.

Just had this happen with an imgur post. I'm pretty sure embeds were disallowed for a bit...

It'll be fixed in the next couple days probably.

[LakeArenal]

6. Weren't you just posting how easy it should be to hack?

[AllaN01Bear]

3. saw the entire cartoon at the link you provided.

Last edited Sat Feb 29, 2020, 02:37 PM - Edit history (1)

. on edit via the du admins ,,https://www.democraticunderground.com/10139731

[EarlG]

5. We are patching a security issue which involved image hotlinking

Image hotlinking is temporarily disabled while we work on this. Hopefully it won't take long and images will be back to normal shortly. Thanks for your patience.

[LakeArenal]

8. Thanks. I thought my tech-disability was messing things up.

[gredinger]

9. Quick response!

Mitigation was really fast... sorry about the headache

[EarlG]

13. No worries -- thanks for pointing it out

[Coventina]

34. As long as we're good for LOLCats tomorrow!

[MontanaMama]

11. Thanks for this!

[JHB]

12. Thanks for the info

Figured it might be something like that.

[MontanaMama]

7. Yep.

Thought it was just me. We had a troll with some tech skills causing some trouble this morning.

[rzemanfl]

16. Bookmarking.

[JimGinPA]

17. They're Still Active Too

Signed up yesterday, 3 hidden posts & killed most posted images here.

[gredinger]

22. The night is always darkest before dawn.

The vulnerability was quite serious.

I'm glad the administration took quick action.

[JimGinPA]

30. Yeah, I Hope The Admins Take A Little More Action As Well...

[dalton99a]

18. A Revolutionary troll

[MontanaMama]

20. Right?

Revolutionary troll with skills.

[gredinger]

24. Viva la revolution

Calling people names is mean

[dalton99a]

25. It is either vive la revolution or viva la revolucion

[gredinger]

26. Pardon, je ne sais pas francias :(

I'm actually working on learn French, but it's a slow and tedious process.

[ismnotwasm]

33. Thank you for pointing the flaw out

I am NOT very techie, and it’s always interesting to find people who are. You’ve probably saved the admins a lot of trouble down the road.

[MontanaMama]

27. ...

[mr_lebowski]

15. Regardless of DU, that particular photo doesn't have an extension no matter where you paste it ...

The URL to the photo itself isn't exposed by that webpage so all you get when you copy that image's address/link is a link to the page itself.

DU needs the actual photo's URL (and as I'm sure you know, to have with a photo mime type like jpg) to preview the image.

[JHB]

19. EarlG explained above that it's temprarily disabled while DU Admins patch a security issue

Being the guy who puts up the TOON posts almost every day, I have some familiarity with how to post images and what the URL is supposed to look like.

I put up the correct URL, but with hotlinking disabled it shows up with the extension truncated.

[mr_lebowski]

29. Ah ... yeah, I knew you knew about the extension hence your mentioning it ...

It is odd though that when I click on your link I'm able to go the page with the photo (of course) but once there, I am also unable to acquire the direct URL to the photo, only the URL to the page itself (a process which is totally independent of DU).

What, if I may, is the correct URL to this photo? If you spell out the dotjpg at the end it should show up. Just curious ...

[JHB]

31. The extension for that sample is .gif

What's happening is that with image hotlinking disabled, DU is cutting off the extension in the displayed version. In 'edit post' mode, the extension is still there. Once hotlining is re-enabled, the image should show up.

[mr_lebowski]

35. Yes I completely understand the DU side of the equation ...

Now that I know it's gif not jpg I understand what's going on (outside of DU).

I thought that particular photo might have a strange issue entirely separate of the 'DU previewing being turned off issue' (a coincidence, if you will).

Thanks

[packman]

21. Yep, drove me crazy this A.M.

Thought something was wrong on my end, viruses and all. None of my images showed up regardless of the posting site. Seems like its definitely a DU problem.

[JHB]

23. See #5 above. Admins making a security patch.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

28. Yes likewise

Almost like DU is running in safe mode.

[JHB]

32. See #5 above. Admins fixing a security issue.