RIP FTP

[TheMarsMartian]

Firefox and Google have recently stated that they are going to start phasing out FTP. This technology has formed the internet when it was created 40 years ago and still does today. It's really sad to see it go. They are phasing it out due to the security of HTTP and other things. 

Quote

The writing is on the wall for FTP (File Transfer Protocol). According to a report in Beeping Computer, the developer communities working on Firefox and Chrome browsers are both keen to phase out support for the protocol– 40 years’ honorable service should, perhaps, be rewarded with a retirement.

1

 

https://techhq.com/2018/12/are-we-finally-saying-goodbye-to-ftp/

[RejZoR]

If it worked for 40 years, maybe it's just that good it shouldn't be retired. Usually features that are crap are upgraded or replaced quickly. Let that sink in...

[vorticalbox]

50 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

If it worked for 40 years, maybe it's just that good it shouldn't be retired. Usually features that are crap are upgraded or replaced quickly. Let that sink in...

Ftp and sftp aren't actually going anywhere just support from the browser.

 

Lots of places use ftp to upload files to servers. It'll be around for a while yet.

[Derangel]

53 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

If it worked for 40 years, maybe it's just that good it shouldn't be retired. Usually features that are crap are upgraded or replaced quickly. Let that sink in...

 

FTP is an incredibly insecure protocol. Removing browser support is a good security move. Folks that need normal FTP for whatever reasons will still be able to use it with any number of programs.

[RejZoR]

I don't want 30 different programs... I hope read commands will stay so you can still at least download stuff from FTP's because if they remove even that, it's gonna suck if you use FTP repositories regularly and you don't want bloody extra programs for what browser could do just fine.

[Master Disaster]

1 hour ago, RejZoR said:

If it worked for 40 years, maybe it's just that good it shouldn't be retired. Usually features that are crap are upgraded or replaced quickly. Let that sink in...

A large part of that is due to Windows having no alternative. Linux devs developed file transfer over SSH a long time ago but since Windows is the dominant OS for home users it didn't gain much traction as Linux servers had to support FTP for the Windows based customers anyway.

 

SFTP is pretty secure though, isn't it?

[williamcll]

Who still uses FTP on a browser these days? I thought everyone uses a file explorer.

[brwainer]

2 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

SFTP is pretty secure though, isn't it?

SFTP is SSH File Transfer Protocol, it is using SSH to do all the things FTP can do, but other than the feature set has no relation to FTP.

FTPS is File Transfer Protocol Secure, it is regular FTP but with SSL/TLS added on top, in basically the same manner as HTTP vs HTTPS.

 

SFTP is as secure as SSH, specifcally the version and type of SSH the server and client are running. There are many implementations of SSH, and often discovered security issues only apply to a certain subset of these, not to the protocol in general. If a bug is found in OpenSSH, that will affect any SFTP servers that use this as their base implementation. Also normally most non-Windows systems just provide SFTP from their regular SSH server software, because it is barely any extra code to support.

 

FTPS is harder to pin down the security status of, because instead of each server being based on a common SSH library, basically each FTPS server available is its own complete implementation of the protocol. The only thing an FTPS server might use a library for is the SSL/TLS encryption. It is more common to find bugs in FTPS servers that affect just that one software.

[yian88]

13 hours ago, Master Disaster said:

A large part of that is due to Windows having no alternative. Linux devs developed file transfer over SSH a long time ago but since Windows is the dominant OS for home users it didn't gain much traction as Linux servers had to support FTP for the Windows based customers anyway.

 

SFTP is pretty secure though, isn't it?

I did say this in a windows thread, but windows as an OS is GARBAGE software. Old, bloated, outdated and is becoming less and less stable with time.

[Franck]

56 minutes ago, yian88 said:

outdated and is becoming less and less stable with time.

Where the hell you got those stat from ? or are you a BSD/Linux hardcore fanboy ?

[porina]

5 hours ago, Derangel said:

FTP is an incredibly insecure protocol. Removing browser support is a good security move. Folks that need normal FTP for whatever reasons will still be able to use it with any number of programs.

Is it any more unsecure than http (non-s)? The only maybe danger point is if you have to log into a site for a transfer, but the transfer being in the open in itself doesn't seem any worse.

 

 

Turning the question around a bit, when was the last time people here used ftp for anything? I can't remember the last time I had to use it. It might have been to transfer a large file at work, before dropbox or similar existed. 

[Syntaxvgm]

Many places I used to dl from used regular FTP to server public files, no security really needed. The only reason it has stopped is some companies block ftp, meaning it's not quite accessible to everyone.

[kuhnertdm]

Yeah no, this is like saying that the PDF file format is dead because Chrome stops supplying a built-in PDF reader.

 

FTP will still continue to be essential for its specific use cases, for which people will continue to use things like Filezilla.

[SupremeGOAT]

well i use FTP to transfer CIAs to my FBI folder directly from my PC to FTPD.

 

If you know what the above sentence means then shame on you!

[kuhnertdm]

13 minutes ago, SupremeGOAT said:

well i use FTP to transfer CIAs to my FBI folder directly from my PC to FTPD.

 

If you know what the above sentence means then shame on you!

I'd say it probably means you're taking the piss.

[Franck]

1 hour ago, porina said:

Turning the question around a bit, when was the last time people here used ftp for anything? I can't remember the last time I had to use it. It might have been to transfer a large file at work, before dropbox or similar existed. 

I used FTP daily for file transfer and easy sharing over the world. couple thousand of files per days actually. People don't actually "go" on the FTP but the many different software uses that to download or upload new files.

 

I would say about 80% of industrial manufacturers i deal with have their manuals or operator manual on FTP, when they don't they are over HTTP. that's a couple hundreds of manufacturer. When data is not crazy critical the convenience and ease of use is soo superior to anything. Try to manage group policy access on a drop box, you will cry lol.

[FPSwithaWacomTablet]

Don't think I really touched FTP until I left highschool. Even so, my school recommends SFTP with either FileZilla, or Bitvise SSH since it is an easier Windows habit to acquire (anecdotally speaking) when remotely accessing files from one's student account.