Any possible danger?

jpower3

I am not a computer expert, nor a coder, and not particularly knowledgeable about such things and I love Zotero (having used it throughout college and now in grad school). However it has occurred to me that it could be a clever front for some sore of spy program to steal important information. Is this at all possible?

DWL-SDCA

Almost anything is possible but your concern is no more likely than any other program being compromised. Zotero is more than 10 years old. The program is very widely used. There have been no reports of Zotero being used to spy on anyone.

Like any software that interacts with websites, when you use Zotero to download files, if a file contains malware, Zotero will copy the file. Your protection against that malware is your operating system and any security software on your machine.

I've used Zotero for a decade. My work requires visiting both well-known and very obscure book and journal publisher websites and downloading many hundreds of files each day. I download technical documents from agencies and organizations throughout the world. (I use Zotero primarily as a MODS translator instead of its intended use as a research and writing tool.) I doubt if anyone consistently downloads more metadata or files via Zotero than I do -- more than 10000/week, every week. All without any Zotero-related problems.

That said, if you are employed in a setting where there are tight controls on the security of highly confidential files, you may want to ask specific questions about those issues.

bwiernik

The code for Zotero is open and very transparent. It doesn’t do anything malicious. Zotero also values your privacy as a core principle of the software and collects much less data on what you are doing with it compared to other software.