What is to prevent school WiFi from one day requiring a Pluton assertion that your Windows PC hasn’t been tampered with before you can join the network? Remote attestation is the true enemy of your freedom. The power of the authoritarian corporatocracy to force you to use only the (entire) systems they control. It's worth reading https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html again just to see how prescient Sta…
> Remote attestation is the true enemy of your freedom. Technology is a tool. What is true however is that under the current way how the economy is structured remote attestation weakens freedoms of individuals mostly. If Facebook was under remote attestation that private information was only used in limited and specific ways and even the NSA can not get to them without breaking the remote attestation, that would be a…
The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
201–210 of 554 posts
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#202Earlier quoted context omitted.
I imagine if the proponents of these systems had their way, they'd add remote attestation to websites too. Imagine your bank's website only loading on a "secure" windows environment, non-rooted android phone or an iphone. Once these chips are in everyone's devices, it would be quite easy to add this stuff technically. And in doing so, break the web on non-approved hardware or software (like linux). Edit: Actually on…
> imagine if the proponents of these systems had their way, they'd add remote attestation to websites too. Imagine your bank's website only loading on a "secure" windows environment, non-rooted android phone or an iphone. Actually, IIUC this is already the case on Android[0]. Some (many? most?) banks/banking apps are rejecting (and/or complaining about) access from rooted phones right now . I can't confirm this perso…
Soon my old 3G dumbphone will be useless as the mobile operator ends the service. People are pushed to newer phones^W surveillance devices and I have to hunt for real 2G phone soon.
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#203Ew. Why are all the chip manufacturers going along with this stupid plan? I want to buy a processor and then own it and have it work in my best interests, not consume electricity and generatie heat enforcing draconian 3rd party DRM policies.
The market (software/system builders) say that locked down platforms like the iPhone are fabulously profitable. Sorry.
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#204Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#205Earlier quoted context omitted.
The capacity for abuse is huge, way beyong the potential benefits. From the USA, we get news of banned book in some states. When I read that, my head goes back to my european history, and I reach the Godwin point very quickly. Those kind of people will abuse such system to prevent things to be shared. It will be used for putting DRM on everything and create a more and more closed web. It will be used by corporations…
In the UK movie screening used to be and probably still is decided at the smallest municipal level of town councils, see The Life of Brian.
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#206Earlier quoted context omitted.
Librem 5 and Pinephone smartphones are general-purpose computers.
Up to the community to prove their have a market value to be kept around and aren't yet another OpenMoko.
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#207Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, lots of Linux devices apply it like that today: You can't use your banking app or consume DRM crippled media on your Android phone if you have root or run a open source Android distribution.
> if you have root Because god forbid you have control of your own PC?
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#208What is to prevent school WiFi from one day requiring a Pluton assertion that your Windows PC hasn’t been tampered with before you can join the network? Remote attestation is the true enemy of your freedom. The power of the authoritarian corporatocracy to force you to use only the (entire) systems they control. It's worth reading https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html again just to see how prescient Sta…
Same with TPM and why it had so many critics. Some people still seem adamant to say that boot viruses are the greatest threat in the 21st century, but the economic interest are far more dangerous for general computing in my opinion. And it isn't even close.
I get the issue with Pluton but TPM is only a dedicated and certified secure key and random number generator that does a better job than CPUs doing it in software, and it's also a secure enclave for storing your encryption keys. Would you rather store the keys in memory where they can be easily grabbed by malicious apps like Mimikatz? Macs had the same feature for years in the T2 chip.
It's the exact system that enables wireless payment and other strong security features on your phone.
So having TPM on PCs and using it for its interested purpose is a boon for everyone's security so I don't see the issue, just FUD.
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#209I'm completely missing how his example of a Word document that can only be opened by approved users on approved hardware within the corporation is supposed to be a bad thing. Honestly, that sounds pretty fantastic. I've been using 3rd party tools/extensions to do this sort of thing in corporate and government environments for years, but having the attestation go all the way down to the hardware level is a big value-a…
Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton
#210Interesting naming. "Microsoft Hell God". Pluto (Greek: Πλούτων Plouton, "giver of wealth", Pluton in French and German) the most common name for the classical ruler of the underworld. Plouton was one of several euphemistic names for Hades, described in the Iliad as the god most hateful to mortals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto_(mythology)