Add Honest Achmed's root certificate to Mozilla CA root store (2010) | Hacker News Reader

Add Honest Achmed's root certificate to Mozilla CA root store (2010)

bugzilla.mozilla.org

32 pointsShoothe8 comments

Open articleView on HN

He may have found more success in submitting his root certificate to Microsoft:

https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/25/14381174/microsoft-thaila...

https://www.computerworld.com/article/2941594/security/micro...

HN, we need to have a serious discussion about downvoting. This comment informative and relevant.

The website mentioned in the application actually exists: http://www.honestachmed.dyndns.org/

But, (somewhat) disappointingly, their OCSP, chain and root certificate URL don't work. Shame, would have been an even better troll. Got me chuckling though.

Dangit, someone stole my business plan for Five Finger Eddie's Used ID Shack (a division of Abagnale Identity Services).

Was it really necessary to use stereotypical Arabic names (Achmed, Mustafa) as the canonical examples of dishonesty? Surely it's not that hard to come up with a name that isn't an ethnic slur? How about "Honest Donny"? At least with that you're punching up, not kicking down.

Why are those names “slurs” or “examples of dishonesty”?

I actually do have cousins named Ahmad (Persian, not Arab) and I’ve met people named Mostafa. Are you claiming that makes their parents racists? Is it racist when a comedian uses John for a white name? And I’ve met a lot of Asian Steves - did their parents name them ethnic slurs?

The application itself is looks honestly written, much more so than most corporate applications that might use “affiliates” or “partners” instead of uncles and cousins. It is obviously a parady of the deeply flawed nature of certificate authorities.

I think you are letting your personal baggage bias your interpretation.

Because the "honest" modifier is being used ironically. The whole point of this exercise is that Honest Achmed is in fact not honest, and so you should not install his root cert.

Who knows, maybe this guy's name is actually Achmed, and all of his uncles and cousins exist?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com