linux-kernel - Re: Report on University of Minnesota Breach-of-Trust Incident

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Message-ID: <20210506082616.GA20224@duo.ucw.cz>
Date:   Thu, 6 May 2021 10:26:16 +0200
From:   Pavel Machek <pavel@....cz>
To:     Kees Cook <keescook@...omium.org>
Cc:     linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org, Kangjie Lu <kjlu@....edu>,
        tech-board@...ts.linux-foundation.org
Subject: Re: Report on University of Minnesota Breach-of-Trust Incident

Hi!

> Report on University of Minnesota Breach-of-Trust Incident
> 
> 	or
> 
> "An emergency re-review of kernel commits authored by members of the
>  University of Minnesota, due to the Hypocrite Commits research paper."
> 
> May 5, 2021

Thanks for doing this. I believe short summary is that there was some
deception from UMN researches in 2020:

> 2020 August:
>   - "Hypocrite Commits" patches from UMN researchers sent to kernel developers
>     under false identities:
>     - Aug 4 13:36-0500
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200804183650.4024-1-jameslouisebond@gmail.com
>     - Aug 9 17:14-0500
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200809221453.10235-1-jameslouisebond@gmail.com
>     - Aug 20 22:12-0500
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200821031209.21279-1-acostag.ubuntu@gmail.com
>     - Aug 20 22:44-0500
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200821034458.22472-1-acostag.ubuntu@gmail.com
>     - Aug 21 02:05-0500
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20200821070537.30317-1-jameslouisebond@gmail.com

But there was no deception from UMN in 2021. Yet, we were
spreading... let's say inaccurate information as late as this:

> 2021 April 29:
>   - Greg posts an update on the re-review along with some more reverts.
> 	https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/20210429130811.3353369-1-gregkh@linuxfoundation.org

# Commits from @umn.edu addresses have been found to be submitted in "bad
# faith" to try to test the kernel community's ability to review "known
# malicious" changes.

UMN apologized. Our reaction to their apology was:

https://lore.kernel.org/lkml/YIV+pLR0nt94q0xQ@kroah.com/#t

Do we owe them apology, too?

Best regards,
									Pavel
-- 
http://www.livejournal.com/~pavelmachek

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