As the person who wrote the fix for this issue (and not the original code), I will just mention that I find this paragraph makes the author sound incredibly entitled:
Shamefully, the inetutils project hasn’t actually released a fixed version of their software (at least at the time of publishing).
The bug was reported on a public mailing list, which is sadly common nowadays [1]. After my workday, during which I was not able to review the report, I wrote a script to confirm the bug was real, since I was seeing way too many slop reports at the time. Then I sent a patch before going to bed [2]. A third party then graciously shared the patch on oss-security [3], which all distributions follow. There is no need to make a new release, which is harder for the distributions than simply applying a small patch.
Perhaps I am just unlucky in my interactions, but I feel like this entitlement is too common among software security people. Note that I see zero return in spending time working on Inetutils, and I find other projects I work on more interesting.
The not-so-silent minority hanging out on HN know that the true heroes are those who take the time and put in the effort, and then put even more effort to reply and post about it here.
It's an unfortunate statement. And it does feel like it discredits you and the heroic efforts of those like you.
But this is probably forgiven as just sensationalism in writing, which is all too common. Not to excuse the author, but these types of writeups tend to drift into name calling and finger pointing a little too soon.
"Shamefully" is definitely the wrong word here, for sure.
Perhaps I am just unlucky in my interactions, but I feel like this entitlement is too common among software security people. Note that I see zero return in spending time working on Inetutils, and I find other projects I work on more interesting.
[1] https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-inetutils/2026-03/msg... [2] https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-inetutils/2026-03/msg... [3] https://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2026/03/12/4
Thanks to all of our heroes, op included.
But this is probably forgiven as just sensationalism in writing, which is all too common. Not to excuse the author, but these types of writeups tend to drift into name calling and finger pointing a little too soon.
"Shamefully" is definitely the wrong word here, for sure.
Why should we forgive sensationalism in writing at all?