TL;DR there was a backdoor found in the XZ program. All major distros have been updated but it is recommended that you do a fresh install on systems that are exposed to the internet and that had the bad version of the program. Only upstream distros were affected.
Yeah, just never be a dissident, or a whistleblower, or an activist, or a member of a vulnerable marginalized group. Remember, if you obey there’s no reason to fear being spied on.
I really don’t think you understand how serious this kind of backdoor is. It puts certain people in real danger.
And I don’t think you understand OPs point. Of course you should be paranoid as a person like that, but most users aren’t targets. If you, as a regular user, get this paranoid about using computers, maybe you should evaluate your priorities.
“Regular user” seems to be a strange counter to all the people I just listed that would be affected here. I’m not worried about myself, I’m worried about the people whose privacy and security is extremely important in this context.
These people do not seem to be affected unless they run Arch for some reason.
That’s only the case because it was caught fast. That was lucky.
Most definitely