It’s the GUI software manager, I think the LM developers should get a pass at curating selections for users who wouldn’t know any better.

I personally think they can make it a total non-issue if they put in “some unverified results hidden, see settings to change”.

I actually agree with Linux Mint’s decision. You can not trust any random upload. Either it’s an official/verified upload, or it shouldn’t be there at all (or it should be a separate app for those who want it). That’s why in my system, I only install from the official debian repos and not the community ones. I just don’t trust random anonymous uploaders.

I’m fine with this, particularly since you can just tick the box and still access them. Linux Mint is such a good gateway for new Linux users, it makes sense to hide unverified flatpaks until they understand the risks. Plenty of people (perhaps myself included) won’t ever need to worry about unverified flatpacks if their needs are simple and they don’t add much beyond the standard software.

This is a fair default and warning to the user.

Examples of unverified apps:

• Inkscape
• Blender
• darktable
• Godot Engine
• VLC
• Spotify
• Steam
• RPCS3
• Flameshot
• Snes9x
• SuperTuxKart
• Vim and Neovim

… these would be hidden by default. Is any of these applications dangerous or a security risk to the system / user?

Linux Mint:

Unverified Flatpaks represent a huge security risk.

I personally don’t like this. This is not really true and in worse case even misleading and giving a false sense of security. If an app represents a huge security risk, why in the first place is it allowed in the repository? Unverified does not mean its a security risk, this is their interpretation of it. Unverified simply means, it is not verified by the original author.

Create a fork of an app and verify your website with the fork in Flatpak. The system is already broken. Another point is, that lot of unverified apps are just normal apps, as this is the way applications are handled in Linux. We have the right to create alternative versions of the programs and the verification badge will show that. There is no point in hiding alternatives. By doing so, it undermines a reason why we use GPL and Open Source. And what about apps where the original author does not care, but was brought to Flatpak by a community member?

Flathub:

It’s similar failure to what Flathub does on their site too, but for another thing.

Potentially unsafe: Full file system read/write access; Can access some specific files

Even though LibreOffice is verified, it is marked as potentially unsafe application on Flathub.

A new preferences dialog has been added to Software Manager that has, among other options, a toggle to show unverified Flatpaks — but the distro makes clear this is “not recommended”

This is a great start, but tbh, I’m not fully sold on “verified” flathub apps. Verification requires a token to be placed into a source repo or a website, but there appears to be nothing on actually verifying that the source/site are the original creators. So, for example, if someone packaged a malicious version of librefox and established it under io.github.librewolf-community instead of the canonical io.gitlab.librewolf-community, I’m concerned it’ll still show as verified (though quickly removed). The process can be read about here.

It kind of makes sense except the vast majority of software in all distros is not being packaged by the developers, its being packaged by volunteers in the relevant project. Most software is being used on trust that it is built off the original code and not interfered with.

Its very difficult for any distros to actually audit all the code of the software they are distributing. I imagine most time is spent making sure the packages work and don’t conflict with each other.

The verified tick is good in flatpaks but the “hide anything not verified” seems a little over the top to me. A warning is good but most software is used under trust in Linux - if you’re not building it yourself you don’t know you’re getting unadulterated software. And does this apply to all the shared libraries on flathub? Will thebwarn you if your software is using shared libraries that ate not verified?

And while Flatpak is a potential vector to a lot of machines if abused, it is also a sandboxed environment unlike the vast majority of software that comes from distros own repos.

Also given the nature of Flatpaks, any distros could host its own flatpaks but everyone seems to use flathub. If they’re not going to take on the responsibility of maintaining flathub and its software then their probably needs to be some way of “verifying” packages not coming directly from the developers. Otherwise users may lose put on the benefits of a shared distros agnostic library of software.

I get why mint are doing this but i think its a bit of a false reassurance. Although from mints point of view they would be able to take direct responsibility for the software they distribute in their own repos (as much as you can in a warrentyless “use as your own risk” system)

Have a look at my flatpak repo list with instructions on that

The question is, do they change the remote or just hide the apps?

I currently use 2 flathub remotes, the verified (named flathub-v) and the unfiltered one. When installing from CLI I can see if it is verified (2 possible remotes show up). I hope COSMIC store and KDE Discover will show the verification check soon.

I use nearly only verified Flatpaks (a list of recommended ones is here, will soon update)

But a few popular ones are not, like VLC (developers dont know Flatpak, should get an introduction by the current maintainer), Inkscape, Spotify, Steam, Bitwarden, Signal, Torbrowser launcher, Blender, Calibre, and more (excluding Chromium Browsers, use the native versions for security reasons) are all missing.

Important things to consider:

• distro packages are nearly always unverified i.e. maintained by distro packagers instead of upstream
• spotify flatpak is not verified, but the flatpak is securely packaged. Mint has a deb repo, and that proprietary piece of malware could do whatever they like with your entire system
• flatpaks are very often more secure, at least they have some security mechanism that can be easily manually hardened. Unlike firejail or bubblejail, which are very complex.

Since the user can select to show unverified software I’m very much in favor of this. As long as it’s still very visible that a package is unverified after you changed the setting. With security being one of the main selling points of Flatpaks, there should be a clear distinction between verified and unverified packages, and the goal should be that all packages should be verified.

Too bad they go the Ubuntu route now.