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I want a computer that I own

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Re: I want a computer that I own

#131

Post by Nicksil »

aiisahik wrote: post #105

This is literally something that NEVER crosses the mind of the average consumer. We should have a HackerNews version of "first world problems" and call it "HackerNews Problems". You now have a computer that is 10,000 times faster than one you had 30 yrs ago at half the price. Oh and it fits in your pocket. A lot of time and money went into creating that. Those people need to get paid. And yes you pay for it with some…

Perhaps because most people don't know what we know.

I don't think about my car's airbags all that often because I'm not a mechanic or frequently in contact with sources of the latest airbag news. Two weeks ago I take my car in for some work and the mechanic walks out to me with this puzzled look on his face and asks why I have yet to have my airbags replaced; talks about how dangerous this brand is and goes on about the recall.

Now I'm interested. I had no idea. I've driven my nephews around in this car without any idea of the airbag issue. I've now been made aware and will act accordingly.

Re: I want a computer that I own

#132

Post by autoexec »

sneak wrote: post #29
mo2art wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

on the chance that I might sound naive, how does this supposedly work in regard to judicial review?

The court that reviews the interpretations is itself also classified, just like the interpretations and the verdicts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intellig... Snowden cited this as the reason he came forward. This applies to communications and stored records however, not end user computers.

> Snowden cited this as the reason he came forward.

yep. Once he realized that the NSA was outright lying to congress and the American people had no ability in law to actually know or address the abuses going on leaking the truth was the only way anyone would ever hear about it.

Re: I want a computer that I own

#133

Post by tachyonbeam »

kokx wrote: post #36
eeZah7Ux wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buy a PinePhone. It might very well be more open and trustworthy than some laptops or desktops.

I love the PinePhone. It is an amazing project, and I'm definitely considering buying one. However, it does not solve my main problem. For most scenarios I still need a "normal" smartphone with either iOS or Android. Apps like WhatsApp and banking apps are unfortunately needed for a large part of my daily life. At risk of either socially isolating myself or bringing major inconveniences without having them. All unava…

Maybe a good solution would be to have an android emulator/sandbox running on the PinePhone?

Re: I want a computer that I own

#134

Post by _peeley »

sp332 wrote: post #108
_peeley wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with this so much. It would be so convenient if I could just flash Arch Linux or something onto a modern smartphone and be able to use all the applications and settings and data I use on my desktop, but on my mobile phone. Android is markedly better than iOS when it comes to customization, but it's a far cry from a (real) Linux distribution. I've started getting OS-level push notification ads from Google News…

Notifications are pretty easy to disable though, right?

I have yet to find a satsifactory way to disable them - it's pretty easy to disable notifications from userspace apps like Instagram or Snapchat or whatever, but disabling notifications or altogether uninstalling vendor apps is a huge pain in the ass.

Most advice I've gotten has been flash a custom Android kernel or a de-Googled distro. This would definitely solve my problems, but this removes the ability to install Play Store apps which are a necessity for me. Not to mention that it gives the possibility of bricking my phone, which is way outside my risk tolerance for just getting rid of some annoying ads.

Re: I want a computer that I own

#135

Post by cat_plus_plus »

It's nice to want things, the question is what are you willing to contribute or give up to get them. The author wants to be free of Microsoft and then says he wants something like DOS on x286. Well, DOS was not free of Microsoft. To really be sure corporations and government are not spying on you, you need 100% open source for all software and firmware, if not chip schematics. This means slower hardware and less software, because people don't do as much work for free / on donations vs paychecks paid by copyright royalties and ads (that can be easily stripped from open source). Want to keep your photos if you drop your phone into the lake? Well, then a copy is on someone's servers. Want traffic information in your map app? Someone knows where you have been driving then.

Running desktop/laptop Linux is a relatively minor sacrifice in terms of available software, especially if you consider Wine and Steam emulation. Yet market share is tiny. People do not seem to own a computer enough to do anything about it.

Re: I want a computer that I own

#136

Post by [deleted] »

p2t2p wrote: post #114

I call bs on that article. A guy wants to do nothing and get the stuff for cheap. We'll guess what, even if you get your thing for cheap once you get on the internet you'll be open for all kind of malice and there's ain't anybody but you to deal with it. Get a free hardware or hardware with crippled anti-features, they're plenty of vendors that supply it, slap Linux on it, PGP encrypt your email and use secure chat.…

[deleted]

Re: I want a computer that I own

#137

Post by [deleted] »

m-p-3 wrote: post #99
asymptosis wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the feeling you could be tempted to say more about that. Please elaborate?

Your average desktop/laptop CPU runs a blackbox like Intel AMT or AMD PSP which is basically an always active mini-CPU that runs in the background and is OS-agnostic. If you consider your OS max privilege level as ring 0, this is ring -1. If/when someone manage to conpromise those, they can basically take over your computer, and Intel/AMD doesn't provide any sort of killswitch or physical way of disabling it.

[deleted]

Re: I want a computer that I own

#138

Post by silly-silly »

marshmallow_12 wrote: post #124
m-p-3 wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your average desktop/laptop CPU runs a blackbox like Intel AMT or AMD PSP which is basically an always active mini-CPU that runs in the background and is OS-agnostic. If you consider your OS max privilege level as ring 0, this is ring -1. If/when someone manage to conpromise those, they can basically take over your computer, and Intel/AMD doesn't provide any sort of killswitch or physical way of disabling it.

Tell me more about this. What does this system do, and why can't we do anything about it?

> What does this system do,

It can be used for 'out of band' management of your system, including firmware/bios rollouts and updates. Allows remote hijacking of attached hardware devices. Basically can puppeteer your entire system.

> why can't we do anything about it?

Because there is no ability to update or modify this code. It is only updatable by the hardware vendor as it is encrypted, signed and checked during update.

Re: I want a computer that I own

#140

Post by anw »

fiddlerwoaroof wrote: post #107
autoexec wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also think selecting parts is limited by the fact that there are so few manufacturers. Processors these days mostly come down to AMD or Intel and nothing there is transparent or audit-able. "trusted computing" and backdoors make even your hardware suspect.

There are capable desktop computers with open hardware, down to the silicon: you just have to pay for it. For example, for $4k, you can get this with specs roughly equivalent to a normal developer machine: https://www.raptorcs.com/content/BK1SD1/intro.html

And the cool thing – it looks like there has been some interest[0] in supporting Power for WINE.

[0] https://www.winehq.org/pipermail/wine-devel/2019-February/14...

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