Problems with irrsi and ident
reddit / irc

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coacx · 2023-03-06 23:56

Hello, I have a strange problem here with Irrsi.

First of all, I am on a NetBSD 9.3 that I do not manage. I am a normal
system user.Secondly, I have to say that while writing the question, I
did further research. What remains of the problem can be found in the
last section.

If I start Irrsi without config, it automatically reads out the
following data:

    22:45 -!- Irssi: The following settings were initialized
    22:45                        real_name First name Last name
    22:45                        user_name unixuser
    22:45                             nick unixuser

And add it to the end of the .irssi/config:

    settings = {
      core = {
        real_name = "First name Last name";
        user_name = "unixuser";
        nick = "unixuser";
        recode_transliterate = "no";
      };
      "fe-text" = { actlist_sort = "refnum"; };
    };

This data corresponds to what my Unix user is. It is my real first and
last name and my login name on the system.

If I now close Irrsi and change the config as follows:

    settings = {
      core = {
        real_name = "coacx";
        user_name = "coacx";
        nick = "coacx";
        recode_transliterate = "no";
      };
      "fe-text" = { actlist_sort = "refnum"; };
    };

And then connect to, for example, Freenode, the following appears in
the whois:

    22:54 -!- coacx [unixuser@freenode-4ho.2be.g2b498.IP]
    22:54 -!-  ircname  : coacx
    22:54 -!-  hostname : unixuser@hostname.tld 6.6.6.6
    22:54 -!-  server   : teepee.freenode.net [freenode IRC Server]
    22:54 -!-  modes    : +Riwx
    22:54 -!-           : is using a secure connection
    22:54 -!- End of WHOIS

Nowhere in the Irrsi config is my unix username still to be found. Why
is it still displayed? And no, this is not only the case when I run
whois on myself. It is public.

This is also the case with other networks, I'll continue with the one
I'm interested in.

Irrsi has more options. So I added the following to the config:

      "hackint" = {
        type = "IRC";
        nick = "coacx";
        username = "coacx";
        realname = "coacx";
        sasl_mechanism = "PLAIN";
        sasl_username = "coacx";
        sasl_password = "<mypassword>";
      };

The behaviour remains the same.

On another network, however, it works:

      "autistici" = {
        type = "IRC";
        nick = "coacx";
        username = "coacx";
        realname = "coacx";
        sasl_mechanism = "PLAIN";
        sasl_username = "coacx";
        sasl_password = "<mypassword>";
      };

An explanation of how the whole thing comes about would be [RFC
1413](https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1413.txt). I came across this
standard because when I connected to the various networks I saw that
not all of them made a ident lookup and therefore no ident response
was given. Then the ident used was what was configured as real\_name,
realname, user\_name, username.

I do'nt have this problem on a Debian server. Neither as root nor as a
normal user. There, I start irssi with the same config and do not
disclose my unix username (which is also my real first name) anywhere.

One more thing I tried while writing. I thought that maybe an
.(o)identd.conf would help. But it doesn't. The content is:

    global { reply "coacx" }
    to irc.hackint.org { reply "coacx-test" }

Does anyone have any ideas how I can change the behaviour?

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CannedDeath · 2023-03-07 00:16

Is this system running an ident daemon? If it is, then whoever manages
it needs to either disable the ident daemon or allow you to change
what it says your user is. But part of the point of ident is that
unprivileged users shouldn't be able to change the identity reported
by ident without permission from the system's administrators.

I'm not sure how to check if something is listening on port 113 for
ident on NetBSD, but try sockstat.

Also, you should quit freenode and move to Libera.Chat. freenode was
taken over, and almost every channel there and most of the original
staff moved to Libera.

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coacx · 2023-03-07 00:28

Thank you for your quick reply. An identd is running there.

    sockstat -p 113
    USER     COMMAND    PID   FD PROTO  LOCAL ADDRESS         FOREIGN
ADDRESS
    root     inetd      19823 11 tcp    *.ident

I will check with the admins again.

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skizzerz1 · 2023-03-07 00:39

If this is a shared shell service, the admins will likely not allow
you to arbitrarily modify your ident reply, as it would defeat the
purpose of identd as a way to identify which user initiated a
particular connection. If abuse comes from these services, IRC
networks can target bans at the ident@ip of the abuser if the opers
feel like they can trust the ident response (thus ensuring that other
users using the service aren't impacted by the ban). However, if the
ident response is easily spoofed by the user, then it is more likely
the entire service will be banned if abuse is detected, which is a
scenario the service admins are likely keen on avoiding.

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coacx · 2023-03-07 01:37

Hi, this is exactly the reasoning that another user has since shared
with me.
Thanks for explaining it to me as well. Sure it will help other people
who have the same problem.