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| author | Jeff Burdges <burdges@gnunet.org> | 2015-10-30 22:24:26 +0100 |
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| committer | Jeff Burdges <burdges@gnunet.org> | 2015-10-30 22:24:26 +0100 |
| commit | 741fc3f88ea20520719d3391d07ce6fb88f609dd (patch) | |
| tree | 43f02fa6085f80c7745c74f97948f0d083a53d8f /api-merchant.rst | |
| parent | c4151f993efcd1b62e6387800f2617dd4c276ce8 (diff) | |
| download | docs-741fc3f88ea20520719d3391d07ce6fb88f609dd.tar.gz docs-741fc3f88ea20520719d3391d07ce6fb88f609dd.tar.bz2 docs-741fc3f88ea20520719d3391d07ce6fb88f609dd.zip | |
acknowledge leaking a bit
Diffstat (limited to 'api-merchant.rst')
| -rw-r--r-- | api-merchant.rst | 14 |
1 files changed, 9 insertions, 5 deletions
diff --git a/api-merchant.rst b/api-merchant.rst index 6555a494..05256d0f 100644 --- a/api-merchant.rst +++ b/api-merchant.rst @@ -53,8 +53,13 @@ may want to make the Taler payment option visible `only if` the user has the Tal wallet active in his browser. So the notification is mutual: * the website notifies the wallet (`s -> w`), so it can change its color -* the wallet notifies the website (`w -> s`), so it can show Taler as a - suitable payment option +* the wallet notifies the website (`w -> s`) by modifing the page's DOM, so + it can show Taler as a suitable payment option + +We acknowledge that notifying the website leaks the fact that Taler is installed, +which could help track or deanonymize users. We believe the usability gained by +leaking this one bit represents an acceptable trade off. It would rapidly become +problematic though if several payment options take this approach. Furthermore, there are two scenarios according to which the mutual signaling would succeed. For a page where the merchant wants to show a Taler-style payment @@ -62,9 +67,8 @@ option and, accordingly, the wallet is supposed to change its color, there are two scenarios we need to handle: * the customer has the wallet extension active at the moment of visiting the page, or -* the customer activates the wallet extension - (regardless of whether he installs it or simply enables it) - `after` downloading the page. +* the customer activates the wallet extension `after` downloading the page, + regardless of whether he installs it or simply enables it. In the first case, the messaging sequence is `s -> w` and `w -> s`. In the second case, the first attempt (`s -> w`) will get no reply; however, as soon as the |