<![CDATA[Ken Thompson, 1983: wouldn't it be awful if someone snuck secret code into a compiler that broke our ability to trust the output of a computer]]>Ken Thompson, 1983: wouldn't it be awful if someone snuck secret code into a compiler that broke our ability to trust the output of a computer

AI Guy, 2026: wouldn't it be cool if we stuck something we know can't be trusted into every part of the computer

]]>https://forum.fedi.dk/topic/4395b695-a98e-4952-b152-996f996c67ed/ken-thompson-1983-wouldn-t-it-be-awful-if-someone-snuck-secret-code-into-a-compiler-that-broke-our-ability-to-trust-the-output-of-a-computerRSS for NodeSat, 24 Oct 2026 06:09:02 GMTTue, 20 Oct 2026 21:17:41 GMT60<![CDATA[Reply to Ken Thompson, 1983: wouldn't it be awful if someone snuck secret code into a compiler that broke our ability to trust the output of a computer on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:51:16 GMT]]>@WellsiteGeo @ricci I haven't read the paper but there's an excellent discussion of it for laypeople in the book "Your computer is on fire." Highly recommend.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Your_Computer_Is_on_Fire

]]>https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://todon.nl/ap/users/116880992493169055/statuses/117480402245458655https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://todon.nl/ap/users/116880992493169055/statuses/117480402245458655Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:51:16 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Ken Thompson, 1983: wouldn't it be awful if someone snuck secret code into a compiler that broke our ability to trust the output of a computer on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:45:20 GMT]]>@WellsiteGeo @ricci Wrong reference! It's p. 52 (PDF p. 56) of https://seclab.cs.ucdavis.edu/projects/history/papers/karg74.pdf#?page=56 (1974).

]]>https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://infosec.exchange/users/hovav/statuses/117480378872570524https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://infosec.exchange/users/hovav/statuses/117480378872570524Wed, 21 Oct 2026 18:45:20 GMT<![CDATA[Reply to Ken Thompson, 1983: wouldn't it be awful if someone snuck secret code into a compiler that broke our ability to trust the output of a computer on Wed, 21 Oct 2026 12:55:13 GMT]]>@ricci For those who didn't do Computing Science (which is different to "coding" or "programming") the paper is at https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/358198.358210
Literally EVERY computer user for a generation *should* have read this. Few have. Fewer have understood it.

]]>https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://masto.ai/users/WellsiteGeo/statuses/117479002185871113https://forum.fedi.dk/post/https://masto.ai/users/WellsiteGeo/statuses/117479002185871113Wed, 21 Oct 2026 12:55:13 GMT