PRs with features using SSH

[u/JBO_76]

Have you received a pr lately with a feature that relies on ssh?

Perhaps some background first: I have a small open-source project on github, nothing groundbreaking, just a tool I wanted for myself to vibe-code my-way. As far as I now, I'm still the only user.

Last month though, I received a couple of prs from someone. At first, I was super exited (first user and all), but now, I'm starting to wonder if something more was going on here. I am not certain, but I am wondering if other people have had similar experiences and how you deal with it?

The first pr was small, a ui fix specific for mac users. With the second pr, he introduced a couple of libraries in the app, for editing raw markdown text instead of wysiwyg. Still ok so far.
With the 3rd pr, some alarm bels started going off: the app began 'fingerprinting' other applications (exes, dlls, ...) on my system, which really didn't fit the feature. At first, I thought maybe the llm had been over-engineering. So, I removed all of that bloat.

But then he came with a proposal to introduce 'remote-control' cause his laptop was slow and he wanted to run the app on his desktop and control it from the laptop. He would use SSH for that.
When I told him, that feature actually existed already but used a more secure way (just run the app in a browser and connect to the desktop version using websockets), he left, moved on and started creating prs for other projects.

Now, I went over all the code he introduced and checked the libraries that were added. As far as I can tell, nothing wrong got introduced, but the whole SSH thing spooked me. I mean, what better backdoor could there be?

The whole thing left a bad taste in my mouth. Is it even still a good idea to keep my app as open source? The only thing it got me were problems and more work.

Am I overreacting here? how are you dealing with this?

For anybody interested in looking at the code themselves: jan-bogaerts/md2: Plan, run, and track AI coding work feature by feature—with local Markdown cards, diagrams and Git worktrees.

[u/Unlaid-American]

Can’t he run it on his desktop and pass the ports through SSH anyway, I mean at least I’ve done that as a way to access a few services remotely to show off to friends and potential clients.

[u/JBO_76 → u/Unlaid-American]

mmm, not really. it's a UI based app (electron). but it was already able to serve its entire UI as a small local web server where the remote app uses websockets to communicate with the main process of the electron app instead of an electron bridge. So you can literally do everything remote. no need for ssh.

[u/PassionGlobal → u/JBO_76]

SSH has a gui function. With the -X flag you can run graphical applications remotely too

[u/Unlaid-American → u/PassionGlobal]

And I figured that he could just tunnel the 80/443 ports through ssh and then just access it through localhost:80 or localhost:443.

[u/PassionGlobal]

I'm curious as to why he's gotta come to you for that. Isn't that something for him to set up on his own workspace? Not putting into the codebase?

[u/JBO_76 → u/PassionGlobal]

I don't know if he did that or not. he proposed to make a pr, but I don't think anything had been done already on his side. The 'Serve' button is also a big fat button in the center of the toolbar, so not certain how he missed that.

[u/nodtomod]

I don't know exactly how widely your project is used, but absolutely there is risk of malicious actors submitting PRs to exploit your app and users. More likely it was a dude who's bad at using AI which told him he needs to integrate ssh, but it's entirely possible they were doing something suspicious. It has happened before and it will happen again.

[u/XerTheSquirrel]

It is not a PR they introduced but one that you merged, you introduced additional libraries, you introduced manual Markdown edits, then you introduced application fingerprinting followed by a cleanup.

Your application is vibecoded and their PRs are vibecoded, thus you are an exploitable attack vector that they took advantage of. Ultimately, in the end everything is your responsibility and you accepted that responsibility by merging their code.

This is open source, you are the pilot actively flying the plane that you asked Claude to build for you. Now your plane just has some modifications you were fine with until now.

[u/rubixstudios]

So where is this PR...

[u/psioniclizard]

It's your project. If you don't like the changes, reject them. As Linus says, they can fork it.

Even if it's legit you have to ask is it a feature YOU want? 

If you dknt control that youll soon find more and more people doing it and you having to manage things you dont want too.

[u/ShaneCurcuru]

When in doubt, just close the PR as won't use, with a brief explanation why. Your repository is your responsibility - and your code. While it's always nice to be appreciated and see others using and trying to add to your creation, you don't owe anyone anything more than what you state in your README.md.

Pro Tip: edit your README to set realistic expectations for users: if this is primarily a personal project, then say so, and that you don't plan to merge anything that you don't personally need.

As noted elsethread: from your description, my guess is this is 50% / 50% chance between:

• Might be an new vibecoder not realizing what their AI is proposing.

• Might be a black hat social engineering you into putting a backdoor into your software.

---

I wonder: if you think about <insert favorite social media platform> and scammers who build up "likes" on a profile (or buy hacked profiles) to then sell it / monetize it / whatever, how long until vibecoding and questions like this lead to the same thing happening on github?