From: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2013 17:48:04 GMT
Subject: Re: git ate my home directory :-(
Message-ID: <20130326174804.GB10383@sigill.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To: <CANgJU+Wihp=rSQevij6R7SnZtW8UpDtRpFYE00aKKAwiYi9Q_Q@mail.gmail.com>

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 06:20:09PM +0100, demerphq wrote:

> Seconded. At $work lots of people started asking anxious questions
> about this. It was suggested it is a potential security hole, although
> I am not sure I agree, but the general idea being that if you could
> manage to set this var in someones environment then they might use git
> to do real damage to a system. (The counterargument being that if you
> can set that in someones environment you can do worse already... But
> im a not a security type so I cant say)

IMHO, that is just silly. Setting GIT_WORK_TREE=/ would be just as
destructive. Or GIT_EXTERNAL_DIFF="rm -rf /" (or GIT_PAGER, etc).
If there is a danger to the implicit-workdir behavior, it is due to
accidental usage, not from a malicious attack.

-Peff