[n4bz0r]

There is normally a wiki page for every popular program which normally contains an official site URL. That's how I remember where to actually get PuTTY. Wiki can potentially be abused if it's a lesser known software, but, in general, it's a good indicator of legitimacy.

[throwaway198846]

So wikipedia is now part of the supply chain (informally) which means there is another set of people who will try to hijack Wikipedia, as if we didn't had enough, just great.

[jolmg]

You can corroborate multiple trusted sources, especially those with histories. You can check the edit history of the Wikipedia article. Also, if you search "7zip" on HN, the second result with loads of votes and comments is 7-zip.org. Another is searching the Archlinux package repos; you can check the git history of the package build files to see where it's gotten the source from.

[halJordan]

And we're really going to do all the brouhaha for a single dl of an alternative compressor ? And then multiple that work as a best practice for every single interaction on the Internet? No we're not.

[carshodev]

The dl for some programs are often on some subdomain page with like 2 lines of text and 10 dl links for binaries, even for official programs. Its so hard to know whether they are legit or not.

[jolmg]

My point was more along the lines of "there's no need to complain about Wikipedia being hijackable, there are other options", and now you're complaining about having too many options...

You don't need to do everything or anything. They're options. Use your own judgment.

[lyu07282]

I was always impressed by how fast wikipedia editors revert that kind of stuff, so I think it's great advice actually!

[jamespo]

What's your solution? If you search google for 7-zip the official website is the first hit.

[n4bz0r]

Not exactly news, wiki's been used for misinformation quite extensively from what I recall. You can't always be 100% sure with any online source of information, but at least you know there is an extensive community that'll notice if something's fishy rather sooner than later.