Notes on FAIR Package Manager  ## Metadata - Author: [[About]] - Full Title: Notes on FAIR Package Manager - Category: #articles - Document Note: --- tags: - #WordPress - #FAIR - #PackageManagement Author: Kaspars Dambis Source: Kaspars.net Blog Reference: https://kaspars.net/blog/notes-fair-package-manager date created: 2025-08-22 18:00 --- # Title: Notes on FAIR Package Manager ## Table of Contents: - [📝 Summary](#-summary) - [📖 Main Content](#-main-content) - [🗒️ Notes](#️-notes) - [📖 References](#-references) - [🗣️ Paraphrase](#️-paraphrase) - [📰 Newsletter](#-newsletter) - [✅ Action Items](#-action-items) - [🧪 Hypotheses](#-hypotheses) - [📊 Methodology](#-methodology) - [❓ Questions](#-questions) - [🔮 Future Research](#-future-research) - [💡 Implications](#-implications) - [🧠 Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment) - [📊 Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment) - [🌍 DEIB Assessment](#-deib-diversity-equity-inclusion-and-belonging-assessment) - [✅ Logical Validity](#-logical-validity) - [🔍 DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis) - [🔍 SEO Evaluation](#-seo-evaluation) - [🎯 Conclusion](#-conclusion) --- ## 📝 Summary: Kaspars Dambis explores the FAIR Package Manager and its integration with WordPress. While it promises enhanced privacy and decentralization, its current limitation lies in incomplete cryptographic verification of package signatures. Without verifying the full DID (Decentralized Identifier) audit log, WordPress sites remain vulnerable to tampering. FAIR’s design reduces data leakage compared to WordPress.org’s ecosystem but requires significant cryptographic support that shared hosting environments may lack. The post demonstrates how FAIR fetches metadata and plugin details but highlights gaps in verification that must be resolved for full security benefits. --- ## 📖 Main Content: FAIR Package Manager introduces decentralized plugin and theme distribution using DID-based identities. Its potential lies in: - **Security promises**: Verifiable signatures for plugins and themes. - **Implementation gaps**: No current verification of DID chains or signatures within WordPress. - **Technical barriers**: Verification requires multibase decoding, DAG-CBOR parsing, and ECDSA checks — not feasible on all shared hosts. - **Privacy benefits**: Eliminates unnecessary data sharing with WordPress.org infrastructure. - **Practical workflow**: Shows how metadata and repository JSON files define plugins, endpoints, authors, licenses, and downloadable artifacts. ### 🗒️ Notes - **Problem Identified**: - Missing cryptographic verification in WordPress plugin. - Risk of tampering if keys are trusted blindly from plc.directory. - **Technical Requirements**: - DID chain validation back to genesis. - ECDSA signature verification. - CID recomputation. - **Challenges**: - Shared hosting often lacks necessary PHP crypto extensions. - Heavy processing burden placed on end-user sites. - **Benefits of FAIR**: - Decentralized identity (did:plc). - Privacy-first by reducing reporting to central servers. - Flexible metadata structures for plugin details. - **Recommendations**: - FAIR must integrate full DID signature verification before being production-ready. - Consider fallback or lighter cryptographic validation for low-resourced hosting. --- ## 📖 References: - Kaspars Dambis. *Notes on FAIR Package Manager*. https://kaspars.net/blog/notes-fair-package-manager - W3C Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) specification. - WordPress plugin development and cryptography libraries. --- ## 🗣️ Paraphrase: 1. Original: “Verification isn’t trivial either. To check a did:plc identity properly you have to walk the entire chain of signed operations all the way back to the genesis operation.” - Paraphrase: Verifying a did:plc identity requires reviewing the complete signed history, tracing each step back to its original creation event. 2. Original: “Just ‘trusting’ whatever keys come back from plc.directory for each package DID identifier isn’t secure.” - Paraphrase: Simply accepting the keys from plc.directory at face value is unsafe, as without verification, they could be manipulated. --- ## 📰 Newsletter: 🚀 **FAIR Package Manager & WordPress: The Next Frontier?** Kaspars Dambis shared insights on the FAIR Package Manager — a decentralized approach to plugin and theme distribution. While FAIR already strengthens privacy by cutting down unnecessary data flows to WordPress.org, there’s a catch: the current WordPress plugin doesn’t verify signatures. That means site owners can’t yet guarantee a plugin’s authenticity. Verification requires heavy cryptography that most shared hosts don’t support. The promise is big — reduced centralization, stronger security, and DID-backed identity verification — but FAIR needs full signature checks to deliver on its potential. Read more on Kaspars’ blog: [Notes on FAIR Package Manager](https://kaspars.net/blog/notes-fair-package-manager). --- ## ✅ Action Items: - **Professional Relevance**: - Highlights a future-forward open-source package distribution system. - Ties to **open source sustainability and security**, aligning with OSPO goals. - Underscores **educational opportunities** to teach developers cryptography basics and plugin distribution. - Shows **community need** for balancing cutting-edge protocols with practical hosting realities. - **Steps for Advocacy**: - Raise awareness within WordPress training teams about decentralized identities. - Propose workshops or tutorials on integrating DID verification in PHP/WordPress. - Engage in open-source governance discussions about security vs. accessibility trade-offs. - Document community testing experiments to build trust before adoption. --- ## 🧪 Hypotheses: - FAIR adoption in WordPress will only succeed if lightweight verification libraries are created. - Community trust in decentralized package distribution depends on usability and transparency, not only technical guarantees. ### 📊 Methodology: - Run comparative tests of FAIR’s DID verification performance across shared vs. dedicated hosts. - Conduct user studies with plugin authors adopting FAIR. - Analyze risks of man-in-the-middle attacks under current FAIR implementation. ### ❓ Questions: - Can FAIR introduce progressive security modes (basic → full verification)? - How can WordPress lower the barrier for decentralized crypto without alienating shared host users? ### 🔮 Future Research: - Explore integration of native PHP crypto libraries. - Pilot hybrid verification models (centralized fallback + optional decentralized check). - Assess FAIR’s adoption in non-WordPress ecosystems for best practices. ### 💡 Implications: - Improved package integrity for WordPress could set a precedent for open-source ecosystems. - Could influence broader adoption of decentralized identity standards. --- ## 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment: - **Visual**: JSON examples help; diagrams of DID chains would improve clarity. - **Aural**: No audio resources; could add podcast summaries. - **Verbal**: Rich technical detail; could expand storytelling analogies. - **Kinesthetic**: No hands-on; adding sample verification exercises would help. - **Logical**: Strong; step-by-step technical breakdown supports analytical learners. - **Social**: Minimal; linking to community forums/testing groups would support collaboration. - **Solitary**: Encourages reflection on risks but no journaling prompts. - **Naturalistic**: No environmental analogies; could use “ecosystem health” metaphors. --- ## 📊 Accessibility Assessment: - Semantic HTML appears fine, but alt-text for JSON screenshots is missing. - Needs keyboard-navigation examples. - High contrast and resizable text should be confirmed for inclusivity. --- ## 🌍 DEIB (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging) Assessment: - **Strengths**: Neutral, technical tone avoids cultural bias. - **Gaps**: No inclusive metaphors or examples from diverse communities. - **Improvement**: Introduce varied developer contexts (low-resource regions, underfunded hosts). --- ## ✅ Logical Validity: - **Strengths**: Uses sound causal reasoning (lack of DID verification = security gaps). - **Consistency**: Clear evidence from JSON workflows. - **Weakness**: Potenti - Summary: Had a deeper look at the FAIR package manager today. Right now the WordPress integration plugin doesn't verify package signatures. That means WordPress sites can't yet cryptographically confirm that a downloaded plugin or theme really came from the claimed publisher. Verification isn't trivial either. To check a did:plc identity properly you have to walk the... - URL: https://kaspars.net/blog/notes-fair-package-manager Had a deeper look at the [FAIR package manager](https://github.com/fairpm) today. Right now the [WordPress integration plugin](https://github.com/fairpm/fair-plugin) doesn’t verify package signatures. That means WordPress sites can’t yet cryptographically confirm that a downloaded plugin or theme really came from the claimed publisher. Verification isn’t trivial either. To check a [did:plc identity properly](https://web.plc.directory/spec/v0.1/did-plc) you have to walk the entire chain of signed operations all the way back to the genesis operation. That’s where the DID is anchored. That requires some pretty heavy crypto for a WordPress host (where the client plugin is installed): * multibase / base58 decoding * DAG-CBOR + CID recomputation * ECDSA (secp256k1, P-256) signature checks Not every shared host is going to have PHP extensions for all of that. The protocol does elegantly handle key rotation but the burden of verification falls entirely on the consumer. Just “trusting” whatever keys come back from [plc.directory](https://plc.directory) for each package DID identifier isn’t secure. You have to validate the full audit log yourself because otherwise you’re open to tampering. So the standard is promising but until FAIR bakes in real signature checks, WordPress users aren’t getting the security guarantees this model could deliver. The rest of plugin features are really nice for privacy and general data protection — you no longer report all published content to [Ping-o-Matic](https://pingomatic.com) or send [every admin dashboard request to WP-org servers](https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/blob/a8af90bcd1c323cf792c156f355db87767b9f7ab/wp-admin/includes/dashboard.php#L1814). Here is a report of [all external calls made by standard WordPress installs](https://wpelevator.com/guides/replace-wordpress-update-apis). #### How FAIR Works? A plugin author publishes a WordPress plugin with a [PLC:DID identifier](https://web.plc.directory/spec/v0.1/did-plc) `did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz`. The FAIR client plugin fetches the DID JSON metadata from <https://plc.directory/did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz> which returns: ``` { "@context": [ "https://www.w3.org/ns/did/v1", "https://w3id.org/security/multikey/v1", "https://w3id.org/security/suites/secp256k1-2019/v1" ], "id": "did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz", "alsoKnownAs": [], "verificationMethod": [ { "id": "did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz#fairpm", "type": "Multikey", "controller": "did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz", "publicKeyMultibase": "zQ3shjiQmfcvNg5ExJuCcX8Bfzaa77y3yxD9iPMYmeRYbk4Vf" } ], "service": [ { "id": "#fairpm_repo", "type": "FairPackageManagementRepo", "serviceEndpoint": "https://fair.git-updater.com/wp-json/minifair/v1/packages/did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz" } ] } ``` where the key parts are: 1. the public keys defined under `verificationMethod` with `type` equal to `Multikey` and the `id` containing `#fairpm`. 2. the package URL under `serviceEndpoint` with type `FairPackageManagementRepo` and `id` containing `#fairpm_`. In order to ensure that the `publicKeyMultibase` value is actually **a valid public key belonging to the DID**, you need to parse the full [DID activity log](https://web.plc.directory/api/redoc#operation/GetPlcAuditLog) and verify that each operation is signed and derived from the previous one, including the DID itself at the genesis operation. It then fetches the repository endpoint JSON `https://fair.git-updater.com/wp-json/minifair/v1/packages/did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz` with the `Accept: application/json` request header which returns: ``` { "@context": "https:\/\/fair.pm\/ns\/metadata\/v1", "id": "did:plc:deoui6ztyx6paqajconl67rz", "type": "wp-plugin", "name": "Handbook Callout Blocks", "slug": "handbook-callout-blocks", "filename": "handbook-callout-blocks\/handbook.php", "description": "The make.wordpress.org blog has wonderful callout blocks but they seem to be baked in as part of the WP.org Handbook plugin.\nI was able to \u2026", "authors": [ { "name": "WordPress.org, Andy Fragen", "url": "" } ], "license": "GPL-2.0-or-later", "security": [], "keywords": [ "wporg", "handbook", "callout" ], "sections": { "description": "<p>The make.wordpress.org blog has wonderful callout blocks but they seem to be baked in as part of the WP.org <a href=\"https:\/\/meta.trac.wordpress.org\/browser\/sites\/trunk\/wordpress.org\/public_html\/wp-content\/plugins\/handbook\">Handbook plugin<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>I was able to strip out the relevant parts of the Handbook plugin retaining only the callout blocks.<\/p>\n<h3>Special Thanks<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/profiles.wordpress.org\/ipstenu\/\">@Ipstenu<\/a> for her terrific sleuthing skills.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/profiles.wordpress.org\/Clorith\">@Clorith<\/a> for bringing code up to current standards and best practices.<\/li>\n<\/ul>", "changelog": "<p>[unreleased]<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>add support for <code>core\/list<\/code><\/li>\n<li>refactor for current standards and practices courtesy of @Clorith<\/li>\n<li>make editor padding match<\/li>\n<li>load dashicons for non-logged in users<\/li>\n<li>initial release<\/li>\n<li>add composer.json<\/li>\n<\/ul>" }, "releases": [ { "version": "1.0.3", "requires": { "env:php": ">=7.4", "env:wp": ">=5.9" }, "suggests": { "env:wp": ">=6.7.2" }, "provides": [], "artifacts": { "icon": [ { "url": "https:\/\/s.w.org\/plugins\/geopattern-icon\/handbook-callout-blocks.svg", "content-type": "image\/svg+xml", "height": null, "width": null } ], "package": [ { "url": "https:\/\/api.github.com\/repos\/afragen\/handbook-callout-blocks\/releases\/assets\/274184925", "content-type": "application\/octet-stream", "signature": "0ASlDL9quF3C7Cr4M4N1R3-Uh4rlS7FsPys6G5TQ1vhAnCm0L_kaewVpFlmalXZ8wqzraYhI7N_mztkCs2elsw", "checksum": "sha256:b00759bbfe1bcc9a0139336c8bf56da158e681befd871a12c33ebfa65329ab25" } ] } } ] } ``` which is now used to render all the information about the plugin in the WP admin before the installation and during upgrades. The signature of the package ZIP file can now be verified using the public key extracted from the first step., Notes on FAIR Package Manager, About, 01k3c73fwydx4jf29fkwtvgtdh.