UnrealIRCd
More info
- Creator
- Carsten Munk
- Released
- 1999
- Type
- IRC server
- License
- GPL
The IRC server with the most features and the most small networks, and one of the more embarrassing backdoors in open-source history.
Carsten Munk started it in 1999 as a continuation of DreamForge, the server DALnet was running at the time. Where Hybrid was ascetic, Unreal added more or less everything: dozens of channel and user modes, cloaked hostnames, built-in SSL and eventually IRCv3. That made it the default pick for hobby networks.
In November 2009 the source tarball for version 3.2.8.1 on a mirror was swapped for a backdoored copy: any message beginning with AB; was executed as a shell command. Nobody noticed until June 2010. Afterwards the project started signing its releases — a supply chain attack before the term was fashionable.