Live data from Hacker News

Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

grapheneos.social

651–660 of 799 posts

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#651
post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

but what if the alternatives are fundamentally worse ? Turns out centralization has a lot of advantages. I think it's an error to demand the alternatives be as good-- that might not even always be possible. But even if they're less good they're usually still better than anything we could have imagined decades ago-- they're good enough to use. And that should be enough because we shouldn't consider handing control of…

Let's dig into what makes them worse, and see what we can do about it. I think the main struggle is moderation. Moderation requires a hierarchy, which is much more compatible with a centralized model. I'm thinking that curation would be a good alternative. Rather than authoritatively silencing unwanted content, just categorize it well enough for users to filter what they want.

I agree with you, but many people have yet to understand that content they disagree with will continue to exist, no matter what, and central gatekeepers are not helpful in eliminating that content.

The fucking “nazi bar” analogy has ruined an entire generation. You would think after centuries of trying to stamp out competing ideas, humans would finally come to terms with the fact that it cannot be done.

Small curated groups are the only way to enforce ideological orthodoxy. You cannot force it on the public, nor can you punish the public for holding bad ideas without creating blowback and resistance.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#652

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TFA is authored by the developers of an alternative operating system that can be freely installed on every Google phone since Pixel 6.

....and this is only Google phones solely because NONE of the alternatives meet the team's stringent security requirements.

The requirements are not particularly stringent. It is more an embarrassing show from the rest of the Android OEMs that they don't meet basic standards like timely security updates and a decent support period.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#653
post #304

It seems to me that comments here are reading this as saying attestation is bad, when the real argument is that attestation should explicitly provide a path of inclusion for non-Apple and Google providers. The headline seems to make the statement that Apple and Google are evil and doing this for monopoly lock-in, and GrapheneOS, a competitor, will stand for the people against that. But given their final counterpoint…

They have commented elsewhere that any inclusion/exclusion criteria (if at all) should be transparent and collaboratively decided rather than arbitrary, monopolised or ineffectual/deceptive. They mention several times that people should not be excluded from web services for browser/OS choice.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#654

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the thing I'm talking about is not a person Countries, companies, religions; hell, planets and galaxies–none of these are sapient. Yet we capitalise them. I'll go out into the deep end for a second with a hypothesis: I think we capitalise because it makes printed text easier to scan. The words you need to spend more time on are capitalised because they aren't ones you can just roll through. This is also why the nut…

You clearly speak only one language.

What is your opinion on Japanese who use カタカナ for emphasis or style

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#655

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>See kernel level anticheat nonsense. This nonsense mainly exists only because the operating system is unable to attest that it the app is secure and the right app is what is running. >It's their computer, it should run whatever software they want. I agree, but companies shouldn't be forced to match cheaters with legitimate players. Cheaters just can't secretly be cheating.

The problem is not that the OS can’t attest the app is secure. The problem with cheating is that the game servers cannot attest the client is genuine in all aspects that matter: non-modified client, running in an environment where there is no inspection of its memory for map hacks, aim bots, and more. The only way to do that is a remote attestation of the entire chain: hardware, locked down OS, app. (If the OS isn’t…

The solution to cheating is what we used to have: moderated, privately owned servers, and invite-only servers.

Let the cheaters join the cheat-friendly servers or the foolishly unmoderated servers.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#657
post #528

The superhuman efforts that folks on HN make to find technical workarounds and solutions is wonderful to see, but we must realize that this is not a technical problem. It's a social and legislative one. It can't be fought on technical grounds. The push back has to be via putting pressure on politicians by making regular people more aware. Right now, the vast majority of users are being bombarded with a one sided narr…

> In my experience, once the issue is framed as 'Google will decide what you can do with your phone' every single person is immediately outraged.

I've had a lengthy debate about this (in the context of right-to-repair) with a friend of mine who's outside tech and he genuinely held (still holds?) the opinion that the manufacturer has the "right" to decide how their products are used. I'm willing to bet that this is a common viewpoint of people outside the tech sphere, they just want a device that "works", which for them is essentially just "I can use apps from the App store".

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#658

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let them know. Write a letter to the CEO. I think you're naively presuming the issue is simple and easy to address with a letter. Regardless of your bank, payment systems such as Visa and Mastercard have blocked transactions involving mainstream online stores such as Steam because they unilaterally deemed some games to be problematic. You cannot fix this problem with an email.

These are two unrelated problems. One is "payment systems use imperfect heuristics in their own operations to fulfil their regulatory obligations." The problem I was referring to is "banks push 2FA onto end users but are unwilling to give them alternatives that don't involve meddling with the user's own most private and expensive device." The latter is absolutely a thing where customers can (and should IMO) push back…

> These are two unrelated problems. One is "payment systems use imperfect heuristics in their own operations to fulfil their regulatory obligations."

No, they are not. You have people reliant on this software infrastructure for very basic aspects of their life such using their own money to buying whatever they feel like buying, and you have people being deprived of their rights because operators of said infrastructure actively prevent and deny their rights to do so. This has nothing to do with heuristics, and everything to do with granting people the power to dictate what you may or may not do with the things you own.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#659
post #528

The superhuman efforts that folks on HN make to find technical workarounds and solutions is wonderful to see, but we must realize that this is not a technical problem. It's a social and legislative one. It can't be fought on technical grounds. The push back has to be via putting pressure on politicians by making regular people more aware. Right now, the vast majority of users are being bombarded with a one sided narr…

> In my experience, once the issue is framed as 'Google will decide what you can do with your phone' every single person is immediately outraged. I've had a lengthy debate about this (in the context of right-to-repair) with a friend of mine who's outside tech and he genuinely held (still holds?) the opinion that the manufacturer has the "right" to decide how their products are used. I'm willing to bet that this is a…

> 'm willing to bet that this is a common viewpoint of people outside the tech sphere, they just want a device that "works", which for them is essentially just "I can use apps from the App store".

Perhaps some people were just conditioned to believe that these shackles are forced upon them for their own good, because only bad people would ever want to take them off.

Re: Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler

#660

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea agree. I reeeeally dont get why Google or Apple have good reputation at all.

Google (before the sell-off) promoted a morality in 'don't be evil' that was a stark contrast to other tech firms. The adverts they carried were minimal. Their "free" stuff was top of the line, better than people were getting from paid services. Apple (under Jobs) sold themselves as counter-culture, they used popstars (unironically), and design, to sell the idea that if you were your own person, or followed fashion,…

The writing was on the wall for "don't be evil" when Google started the process of acquiring the much reviled DoubleClick back in 2007, nearly 20 years ago at this point. That's longer than most people reading this have been in the tech industry; a generation has never seen Google be anything other than increasingly extractive and monopolistic.
Post reply on HN