fix: validate external URLs before opening

[AboMeezO]

Summary

• Restrict external URL opening to http:, https:, and mailto: URLs.
• Reuse the same validation for renderer IPC requests and window-open events.

Problem

Renderer-provided URLs were passed directly to Electron shell.openExternal, allowing unsafe or unintended schemes to reach the host OS.

Solution

Added a centralized main-process URL validator and reject malformed or unknown-scheme URLs before calling shell.openExternal.

Verification

• npm run typecheck
• npm run lint
• npm run build:web

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Bug Fixes
  • External URL validation has been implemented across the application. Only HTTP, HTTPS, and mailto protocols are permitted when opening external links. Requests using other URL schemes are blocked and logged. Malformed or unsupported URLs cannot be processed or executed. This ensures safer handling of all external link operations.

[coderabbitai]

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ℹ️ Review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: defaults

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Pro

Run ID: 94aa8d68-f1d2-4846-a9d2-d4fab59f4ed2

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between e056044 and bd7993b.

📒 Files selected for processing (2)

• electron/main.js
• src/pages/settings/AboutSection.jsx

📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

This PR adds URL validation to prevent unsafe external links from being opened in the Electron application. A validateExternalUrl function with a protocol allowlist is introduced and integrated into both the IPC handler and window navigation handler, blocking disallowed URLs before they reach shell.openExternal.

Changes

External URL Validation

Layer / File(s)	Summary
URL validator definition electron/ipc/handlers.js	validateExternalUrl function validates URLs against a protocol allowlist (http:, https:, mailto:) and returns null for invalid or disallowed inputs.
IPC handler validation electron/ipc/handlers.js	The app:openExternal IPC handler now validates URLs via validateExternalUrl, logging a warning and returning false for unsafe URLs before calling shell.openExternal.
Window navigation validation electron/main.js	Imports validateExternalUrl and updates setWindowOpenHandler to validate requested URLs, blocking unsafe ones while allowing safe URLs to open externally.

Sequence Diagram

sequenceDiagram
  participant IPC as IPC Handler
  participant WinNav as Window Navigation
  participant Validator as validateExternalUrl
  participant Shell as shell.openExternal
  
  IPC->>Validator: validate url
  alt URL is safe
    Validator-->>IPC: return validated URL
    IPC->>Shell: openExternal(url)
  else URL is unsafe
    Validator-->>IPC: return null
    IPC-->>IPC: log warning, return false
  end
  
  WinNav->>Validator: validate url
  alt URL is safe
    Validator-->>WinNav: return validated URL
    WinNav->>Shell: openExternal(url)
  else URL is unsafe
    Validator-->>WinNav: return null
    WinNav-->>WinNav: log warning, deny open
  end

Loading

Estimated code review effort

🎯 2 (Simple) | ⏱️ ~10 minutes

Poem

🐰 A validator stands guard at the gate,
Checking each URL, making it safe,
IPC and windows both bow to the rules—
Only the protocol-blessed URLs escape! ✨

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 4 | ❌ 1

❌ Failed checks (1 warning)

Check name	Status	Explanation	Resolution
Docstring Coverage	⚠️ Warning	Docstring coverage is 0.00% which is insufficient. The required threshold is 80.00%.	Write docstrings for the functions missing them to satisfy the coverage threshold.

✅ Passed checks (4 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check	✅ Passed	Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check	✅ Passed	The title 'fix: validate external URLs before opening' directly describes the main change—adding URL validation before opening external links. It accurately reflects the primary security improvement across both IPC handlers and window-open events.
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.

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✨ Finishing Touches

🧪 Generate unit tests (beta)

• Create PR with unit tests
• Commit unit tests in branch fix/open-external-url-validation

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[coderabbitai]

Actionable comments posted: 1

🤖 Prompt for all review comments with AI agents

Verify each finding against current code. Fix only still-valid issues, skip the
rest with a brief reason, keep changes minimal, and validate.

Inline comments:
In `@electron/main.js`:
- Around line 170-178: The setWindowOpenHandler callback currently calls
shell.openExternal(safeUrl) without handling its returned Promise; update the
handler in mainWindow.webContents.setWindowOpenHandler so that when
validateExternalUrl(url) returns a safeUrl you call
shell.openExternal(safeUrl).catch(err => logger.error(...)) (or equivalent) to
swallow/log errors and avoid unhandled promise rejections; keep the existing
deny return and log the error with context (include the URL and error) in the
catch callback.

🪄 Autofix (Beta)

Fix all unresolved CodeRabbit comments on this PR:

• Push a commit to this branch (recommended)
• Create a new PR with the fixes

---

ℹ️ Review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: defaults

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Pro

Run ID: 14303baa-8231-4fdb-b798-0d6f54183696

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 1c12e3c and e056044.

📒 Files selected for processing (2)

• electron/ipc/handlers.js
• electron/main.js