Kill-switch to me sounds like something pressed in emergency. Use cases cited here should be called 'hardware switches'
Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
41–50 of 82 posts
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
> EDIT: They use i5 and i7 processors, which IIRC use black-box Intel microcode... Also, i wonder if they support Libreboot? My apologies if it turns out i cannot read. Otherwise they look quite nice. I'm excited to see more "alternatives" in the "free as in liberty" laptop space. They are going to use coreboot, which is free but includes some binary blobs from Intel. I don't think you can boot any modern x86 without…
AFAIK the microcode updates aren't mandatory, you can use your computer without them and use the stock microcode (though that's also proprietary).
depends on the type of issue these updates fix. Some Via Nano CPUs came with microcode that hung the CPU on power state transitions.
If you don't intend to run the CPU at 100% all the time, you want to install those updates.
Similar issues (usually more subtle) exist for other CPUs
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
Devices that function when the power has been disconnected would be wonderful energy-saving devices.
These are signal pins, not power pins. The device is still receiving power when the switch is "off", all the switch does is provide a signal to the pins that tell it to disable itself.
Also signal input can in certain cases power devices[1].
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#44That's great! I would definitely buy a Purism laptop - however I need additionally a trackpoint a great keyboard and an excellent matte screen.
The trackpoint should be with three physical buttons and would be great if it comes without a trackpad - but at least an option to disable the trackpad should be there.
The keyboard should NOT have any separate number block like most of 15" laptops have today. Would be great if there would be as well an option to order the keyboard without any labels on the keys.
The trackpoint and keyboard requirements could be options upon purchase. I understand that I am part of a minority. The thing is, I feel helpless without a trackpoint. Mouse and trackpads are no options. And Lenovo makes me desperate.
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#45Earlier quoted context omitted.
> i would be in favour of a separate Bluetooth and Wifi kill switch. that's what I thought as well. About the microcode, this won't be fixed. But see the weekly updates on their blog[1] that states progress they make with the coreboot developers. Hopefully they can free the number one problem with intel chips[2] which is the Management Engine firmware. [1] https://puri.sm/posts/weekly-update-on-librem-production-201.…
Assuming they're running Intel Wireless chips (which is very likely), this is impossible because they are run on the same antennas by the same chip. You can disable this in software by passing "bt_coex_active=N" to the iwlwifi kernel module, but of course, who knows if that's actually sufficient. I'm pretty sure the situation with other vendors is similar or worse. Big vendors like Broadcom have terrible open source…
They definitely do not use Intel Wireless chips.
In reply to sibling poster about dip switches, it looks like there are little wires running inside the case from the four separate connections to the two DPDT switches, i.e., if you want to find a DIP switch and mount it to your laptop, the 4 wires are easily hackable.
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#46That's great! I would definitely buy a Purism laptop - however I need additionally a trackpoint a great keyboard and an excellent matte screen. The trackpoint should be with three physical buttons and would be great if it comes without a trackpad - but at least an option to disable the trackpad should be there. The keyboard should NOT have any separate number block like most of 15" laptops have today. Would be great…
Just to add (instead of editing above): I think a lot of IBM employees would as well buy Purism laptops if they had a trackpoints. There are thousands of people that are used to ThinkPads and now IBM announced to purchase from Apple [1].
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#47Ok, maybe I've been doing too much hardware development and more tinkering than the average guy, but this part here, to me, sounds way overblown: > As you can see, it is not a trivial matter to > manufacture these HKSes. A lot of research and > hard work went into the effort. I mean, compared to all the other things one has to get right to design a laptop computer, switching these few signals is indeed very, very tri…
Pardon a very naive question - wouldn't something as crude as cutting ground connection to the WiFi card/board do the trick?
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
Doubly so considering the base model starts at $1,650 for specs that are hardly top of the line. I really wonder who the target market for this is.
People who care about their security? Lawyers, activists, crooks are 3 easy examples.
You seem to have repeated the same example twice.
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#49The problem of malware being remotely added to devices like routers and hard drive firmware can be stopped utterly by having a hard switch (or jumper) that disables the "write to flash" signal.
This is a great point!
And the ME (Management Engine [1]) rears its ugly head. Even Google Chromebooks with a "write protect screw" do not actually wire the write protect screw to the hardware "disable writes" signal on the flash.
And it's because the ME is continuously writing stuff to its region of the flash and the ME cannot be disabled. Such a security fail!
Assuming these guys succeed the ME ceases to become a problem and the SPI chip can finally be write protected.
There are rumors of "back doors" that would let an attacker bypass the "disable writes" signal, but that can be countered by using a large number of manufacturers when sourcing your flash chips. Hint: SPI flash chips can be had from many places.
While it is still possible that some of the chips will have a back door, either the back door will be too hard to create a viable attack for, or users can verify the contents of their flash. (SPI flash chips are too simple to run their own cloaking algorithm.)
Users can take defensive measures if a widespread attack is detected. Defensive measures might include finding out which manufacturer produces vulnerable chips. By avoiding a flash chip "monoculture" it would apply the collective power of the internet to preventing a flash back door, thus making the write protect line an effective security measure.
Re: Hard, Not Soft, Kill Switches
#50That's great! I would definitely buy a Purism laptop - however I need additionally a trackpoint a great keyboard and an excellent matte screen. The trackpoint should be with three physical buttons and would be great if it comes without a trackpad - but at least an option to disable the trackpad should be there. The keyboard should NOT have any separate number block like most of 15" laptops have today. Would be great…
Just to add (instead of editing above): I think a lot of IBM employees would as well buy Purism laptops if they had a trackpoints. There are thousands of people that are used to ThinkPads and now IBM announced to purchase from Apple [1]. [1]: http://9to5mac.com/2015/05/28/apple-ibm-macs-pc/
IBM offer ThinkPads or Macbooks, so people who still want the trackpoint get it. I barely ever see anyone using it though. So long as you don't get a W540 the touchpad is much easier to use (I have a W540 and its touchpad is so bad it makes me want to cry).