Dear people who have recently discovered QR codes,
QR codes can be very useful. They are particularly useful when they are printed out and stuck around the place. Or even on a slide on a presentation so people can access the info on their personal device.
QR codes are NOT useful on a social media post or a website that people access on their own device because if you are looking at it on your phone you cannot scan it with your phone. Just post the bloody link!
@psneeze @urbanfoxe One of the few good things that Google has done recently is to make it very easy to visually search for anything on your screen*, including QR codes.
* Anything on your screen that is not in a streaming video app which does not allow screenshots because streaming platforms want to keep you from easily talking about their programs for some stupid reason.
And when a QR code is printed and stuck up on posters or in presentations *also add a URL* that gets printed below or beside the QR code.
Not all of us have/want QR code scanners.
@project1enigma @DenOfEarth @urbanfoxe @bobjonkman of course, but that means a custom system to shorten urls.
I meant that I encountered several times urls that were meant to be retranscripted and that were over fifty characters.
Yes, the URL printed with a QR code should be short, easy to type, and easily remembered.
But use a short URL on your own domain, like an alias or a redirect. Stay away from third-party URL shorteners; you never know how long they'll exist, or if the expired domain is picked up by a domain squatter your short URL gets redirected to the most profitable spam site.
Honestly, I'm surprised that shorl.com, notlong.com, and ur1.ca still exist.
@TritTriton that's useful thank you!
No one should ever assume their audience will take any extra steps though!
@ShadSterling In its case, it would be unlikely (but not impossible, indeed): its owner is strict with security (no tracking, no JS unless it’s really necessary and just what is needed, every tool he made is coded by and for himself first, local storage only…).
@TritTriton @urbanfoxe if it’s just one guy I wouldn’t expect him to put enough attention into it to stay secure if and when the site becomes a target. It might help to have external monitoring, but if the attackers can identify requests from the monitors they can make sure to respond correctly to those.
But the problem isn’t the security, it’s the targeting; any popular QR code decoder could be leveraged to direct people to scam sites, so if it’s popular they’ll try
if you are looking at it on your phone you cannot scan it with your phone
screenshot → share → Google Lens. for degoogled phones, share to this app instead. for linux phones, this app detects a qr code directly on a screenshot immediately (or you could just pick an image out of downloads). for iphones, idk ask siri or something, i dont have any iphones to try this on.
its the matter of tools really. are you ready for everyone to throw qr codes at you? if your phone has a qr code decoder on it, theres an 80% chance that said decoder can handle a jpeg instead of your camera feed.
@gravitos @urbanfoxe yes, but every time I use this trick I blaming all people, who decided to use QR code without a link. Instead of just clicking to link I forced to:
- switch to main screen / list of opened apps
- open QR code scanner / Google Lens
- Select image and scan it
- And finally return to browser 😭
@urbanfoxe They can be very useful to some. For everyone else, though, human-readable links are probably safer.
wondering if there are scams where e-QR codes are 'hijacked' like printed ones by scammers.
great topic and discussion thank you 🖖🏾
@BeTongLen @urbanfoxe I can well believe it. There are a lot of online "QR creator" sites out there, and I wouldn't be too confident that all of them are quite what they seem.
Anyone can check a QR (or a shortened URL) and see where it goes, so they might seem safe enough. But would anyone notice if it went via a redirect that, at any time in future, changed?
i never use QRs for these reasons. Thank you.
QR codes are also great for scammers...
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