Good point. It opens a SSH tunnel from Pinggy server to your localhost, such that the pinggy server can connect to only the port of your localhost that you specify in the command. The ssh port forwarding command is a standard one and your ssh client ensures that the access is restricted to the port you are specifically exposing.
In other words, you are trusting your own system and your ssh client installation for security, which is more trustworthy than a random executable app downloaded from the internet.
We will include an explanation in the next version of our landing page. Appreciate your feedback!
What are the implications of SSHing into some random server? Could you also add some instructions on the kind of precautions one should take before ssh into pinggy
The implication of the ssh port forwarding command is that pinggy is able to connect to the port you are specifying. For example 8000. Then Pinggy and through pinggy anyone who visits the public URL can connect to port 8000 (through HTTP requests).
On the bright side, at least the part you're running is off-the-shelf parts whose implications you can more or less figure out by consulting the man page. Other services in this space are trying to convince you to run their own binary blobs.
In other words, you are trusting your own system and your ssh client installation for security, which is more trustworthy than a random executable app downloaded from the internet.
We will include an explanation in the next version of our landing page. Appreciate your feedback!