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It's a reasonable thing to worry about. Bad actors exist. IP is valuable. Computers are insecure. People are lazy. You have to be careful out there.

> I don't trust new developers to make that determination.

Ignoring this issue is a sign of professional immaturity. Recommend you view it as an opportunity to educate the younger members of your team. Show them the power of a solid CLI toolbox that respects your privacy while delivering solid performance.

Still, you shouldn't be dogmatic about it. Webapp tools can be useful for understanding a new programming language or API. Just be judicious.




I agree 100%, perhaps I could have phrased that better. I try to use it as a teachable moment: "Hey, instead of using base64decode.org did you know you could use atob and btoa in a web inspector?"

Security-related scanners are a tough one though. Free XSS scanners, free TLS cert checkers: The best intentions can result in unintended disclosure. Developers have it constantly beaten into their head "Security! Security! Security!" and are often given nothing more than an OWASP cheat-sheet, so I can totally understand and empathize with the thought process that leads someone to plug a company URL into a free web-hosted XSS scanner.




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