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The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

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Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#431

Post by ajross »

registeredcorn wrote: post #380
ajross wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the OSS community [...] never managed to produce software that regular non-tech-geeks want to use That's true, barely, only if you equate "software" with "things that draw stuff presented on a display to a user". Regular non-tech-geeks are using open source software (in the real sense, meaning instructions given to a computer to make it do something) pervasively, everywhere, every day, on all their devices (yes, ev…

You're correct, of course. I think the point that was being made was more about people actively choosing to use open source. If you were to approach a non-tech person and ask them how many open source apps they use on a daily basis, they would probably say "none", even if it's not the case.

I'll point out that you're still doing the thing where you equate "software" with "apps".

But even so, that doesn't seem informative. Ask any user how many "Qualcomm apps" they use, or "Meta apps", or "Intel apps". No one knows where this stuff comes from. They buy a phone with a label on the box and then download stuff from an app store.

That's not a statement about how the software is produced, it's just how the market presents products to consumers. People don't know where the gas that goes into their cars comes from either, but that's not an argument that petroleum distillation technology is a failure.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#432

Post by reedjosh »

dx034 wrote: post #241
ftyhbhyjnjk wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you can install on YOUR pc will be at the sole mercy of microsoft/or maybe someone else.... That's the cusp of it. Not that it can be used for good, but that it sets the way for heavy misuse by large corporations. Wait a few years. Smaller companies won't even be allowed to order high end cpu's. You'll be at 100% mercy of these corporations. If after 2 years they decide to brick your pc, they'll just do it. You…

Secure chips like this are already in all devices but PCs. And in none of these areas has any of that happened. Quite the opposite, Apple got a fine when they slowed down older devices to save battery (at least what they said). So the government will clearly help out here. And none of these companies has an incentives to stop sales to smaller companies, they make a lot of money with those.

> So the government will clearly help out here.

The government is probably part of the driving factor in building this system.

The government probably doesn't want Wikileaks type material to be rendered. There are _so_ many ways the government likely wants to abuse this.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#433

Post by _23sd »

reedjosh wrote: post #424
_23sd wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to use the OS to ban a book or program or whatever, you don't need fancy hardware features, just a database of hashes pushed down via a software update. Apple wanted to do a version of this for CSAM images, it only didn't happen because they chose to tell users about it and got massive backlash. The implication that governments need more powerful DRM features to do something similar just obscures the fact…

But at least you could load your own OS. Chip manufacturers could even decide that nothing good happens on open source operating systems, so you're now only allowed to run Mac or Windows operating systems. The point is really that they're taking full ownership of the chips from you.

They could, but not with the new Pluton stuff. That would be enforced with secure boot, which has been around for a while already. Again, the capabilities already exist. The barrier for a would-be censor is political not technological.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#434

Post by howinteresting »

sdlfakjslkdjfs wrote: post #423
axblount wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

OK then you agree that Amazon taking down Irreversible Damage was wrong, and that it should also be in every school library, or it's obviously a sign that the Left is going to ban books everywhere? Removing something from a curriculum is not the same as banning it. There are many more books that are not in school libraries than there are books that are in them.

No post body was provided.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#435

Post by cjbgkagh »

tomc1985 wrote: post #422
cjbgkagh wrote: post #412

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If smart people were smarter they’d open their wallets and support the things they like. Instead the reaction is often, why would I pay so much for something that I could build myself. So the real market is for the very smart people and that’s an even smaller minority. I built super advanced tech but was intentionally screwed over by my large corporate customers, just because they could, so I quit the industry and th…

I'm not convinced this is about smartness, so much as an ability and willingness for people to learn. Learning is hard, it makes people uncomfortable, sadly. Which means that the easy road is to stoop to their level, which is what we're seeing. It sucks that you got screwed by large corporations, and I don't know the story, but that sounds more like standard business fuckery than "software for smart people"?

I used to think exactly that. That those who were incapable of learning were simply just lazy. I eventually saw enough evidence to be convinced that raw intelligence is basically almost entirely genetic.

Certainly the businesses were not as smart as they thought they were, which is a common problem. But they indeed have very hard valuable problems and basically everyone involved was much smarter than the average person. Just not smart enough to know their own limitations and accept outside help.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#436

Post by Bloating »

merlincorey wrote: post #425
axblount wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

As a bit of an Anarcho-Libertarian who is often in the middle of these conversations from either side, I would imagine part of the problem is your framing of this issue as if it is only coming from one direction, when there is plenty of evidence that both sides are into things like banning books[0] it's just a question of which books they want banned. [0] When It Comes to Banning Books, Both Right and Left Are Guilty…

Hypocrisy makes good news

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#437

Post by fariszr »

raxxorraxor wrote: post #390
_23sd wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to use the OS to ban a book or program or whatever, you don't need fancy hardware features, just a database of hashes pushed down via a software update. Apple wanted to do a version of this for CSAM images, it only didn't happen because they chose to tell users about it and got massive backlash. The implication that governments need more powerful DRM features to do something similar just obscures the fact…

The EU just mandated chats to be scanned for content. Of course just for CSAM just as the meta data collection is only used for terrorism. Problem is that the latter is also used for parking tickets. They really try to hit the definition of a totalitarian state by the letter.

The law has yet to be passed. And its facing immense backlash, even from governments like Germany.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#438

Post by _23sd »

reedjosh wrote: post #427
_23sd wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microsoft doesn't need an "untamperable" kernel to force spying on users. Windows 10/11 has horrible invasive telemetry that can't be disabled, but no one has figured out how to modify the OS and strip it out, all the "solutions" involve temporarily disabling services or blocking network traffic. Is there actually some new capability here that points to future surveillance and censorship, or are you just fitting ever…

But you can install your own OS. You can't disable this tool via another OS. Particularly now that heterogeneous computing is making it big, video decoding can easily just be made not to work unless this tech stack okays it--regardless of the OS. This chip could all out disable other operating systems if they don't provide the spyware telemetry that Microsoft requires.

By "this tool" do you just mean the Pluton system in general or some specific thing? The attestation stuff is a software feature that would be disabled by booting another OS that doesn't support it. It needs the Pluton hardware to be possible, but the software side is in the OS not hardcoded on the chip.

Disabling other operating systems would be done by the BIOS if manufacturers locked down the configuration of existing secure boot functionality, doesn't need any new features.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#439

Post by api »

tomc1985 wrote: post #375
api wrote: post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason the OSS community has had no impact is that it's never managed to produce software that regular non-tech-geeks want to use. The reason it's never managed to do that is lack of an economic model to finance the incredible amount of work required to make software usable by normal people. I've been saying this ad nauseum forever and I'm not the only one. A related problem is that the OSS world is mostly tech e…

This atrocious attitude is absolutely why software is such a hellscape of shitty UI and lack of features. Normies should be eating our table scraps, not dictating how the software is written. Normies learned how to drive a car. They can learn how to properly compute. And if they don't like the tech, they don't have to use the tech. OSS is the last bastion of computing for people who know/like computing, because the a…

Driving a car is far, far easier than administrating a Linux system (beyond a stock distro install that is working properly). The latter requires a ton of deep complex knowledge. It's more like rebuilding an engine than driving.

Re: The Dangers of Microsoft Pluton

#440

Post by Gh0stRAT »

POPOSYS wrote: post #79
Gh0stRAT wrote: post #46

I'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…

What tools are you using today to realize this scenario? Thanks!

The plugin my current employer uses is so well integrated that I don't even know its name. (I suspect it may be developed internally)

At a past job, we used Entrust [0] and I'm aware of Virtru [1] as well.

Edit: I forgot about Sharepoint, which also sort-of fills the ACL document-sharing niche. (though I'm less certain about whether it uses encryption to enforce its access policies)

[0] https://www.entrust.com/ [1] https://www.virtru.com/

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