PuTTY semi-bug paste-filter-controls

This is a mirror. Follow this link to find the primary PuTTY web site.

summary: Filter out control characters by default when pasting
class: semi-bug: This might or might not be a bug, depending on your precise definition of what a bug is.
difficulty: fun: Just needs tuits, and not many of them.
priority: medium: This should be fixed one day.
fixed-in: 10c910482277cd34119ab1dd0365556513516033 2018-03-12 (0.71)

It's become widespread practice among terminal emulators to filter out most control characters when pasting text from the clipboard to the terminal (e.g., xterm, gnome-terminal), to somewhat reduce the risk of text pasted from an untrusted source having unexpected effects.

PuTTY now does the same as xterm by default; that is, PuTTY filters out control characters other than CR, LF, tab, backspace, and DEL. There's an option to allow control characters (as previously), since they have their uses.

Note that this doesn't, in general, close the loophole when copying text from websites that what ends up in your clipboard may not resemble what it looked like you were selecting; there is still plenty of scope for mischief; see for instance this demonstration. (However, PuTTY does now prevent escaping from bracketed-paste mode, when enabled, as mentioned on that page.)

If you want to comment on this web site, see the Feedback page.

Audit trail for this semi-bug.

(last revision of this bug record was at 2018-03-24 15:36:36 +0000)