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Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

github.com

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Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#11

Post by aenis »

Garmin recently did something similar, resorting to tls fingerprinting to prevent unofficial logins to their api (via the popular garth library).

They lost a lifetime customer in me - i think i have spent close to 20k on garmin gear between my wife and myself, watches, gps devices for cars, boats, and hiking gear. If they refuse to give me access to my data, i will (a) lobby for laws to be passed to make this mandatory (b) absolutely never ever buy anything garmin until i see a reversal of this policy and an apology.

More broadly though, its yet another service that blocks API access. No doubt this is caused by proliferation of amateurs armed with agentic tools building nice, personalized frontends for themselves. Companies seem to absolutely hate it when people dont go through their shitty websites with dark patterns, misleading search results and analytics.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#12

Post by calgoo »

SuddsMcDuff wrote: post #8
holoduke wrote: post #4

I recently saw a group of automakers together during an event. The contrast between Chinese and Germans was bizare. The group of german automakers were older men in black suits all wearing badge with titles like Senior Executive Sales blablabla. Whereas the Chinese were all young people wearing causual clothing and much more engineering minded. No wonder why european auto makers are doing so badly. They forgot to ple…

This could equally illustrate the difference between long established multi national companies with an overbearing corporate culture vs young upstart companies with a dynamic startup culture.

Yea is there not a saying about when the suits and bean counters take over a company the culture dies?

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#13

Post by 5701652400 »

pojntfx wrote: post #5

There needs to be a law that makes remote attestation - no matter who provides the root certificates, Google/Apple/GrapheneOS - illegal. There is only one use for this technology right now, and it is to prevent people from doing what they want to do with the devices they own, while also making interoperability cryptographically impossible. This is anti-competitive and should simply be illegal.

what you really looking for is API-free services/products. so it works without cloud at all.

or products/companies that explicitly expose API access to their products.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#14

Post by worthless-trash »

5701652400 wrote: post #10
pojntfx wrote: post #5

There needs to be a law that makes remote attestation - no matter who provides the root certificates, Google/Apple/GrapheneOS - illegal. There is only one use for this technology right now, and it is to prevent people from doing what they want to do with the devices they own, while also making interoperability cryptographically impossible. This is anti-competitive and should simply be illegal.

[flagged]

I wonder if companies can T&C their way out of any problem.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#15

Post by 5701652400 »

worthless-trash wrote: post #14
5701652400 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

I wonder if companies can T&C their way out of any problem.

pretty much. correct me if I am wrong, but these T&C treated like "local" laws (in respect to interaction of client and business within their interaction) within most jurisdictions by courts.

so even if T&C does not make sense, usually courts are in favour of enforcing them.

unless some severe contradiction with constitution or alike, or serious harm to people or something, they would throw away T&C in cases. but AFAIK that is rare.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#16

Post by wiseowise »

5701652400 wrote: post #10
pojntfx wrote: post #5

There needs to be a law that makes remote attestation - no matter who provides the root certificates, Google/Apple/GrapheneOS - illegal. There is only one use for this technology right now, and it is to prevent people from doing what they want to do with the devices they own, while also making interoperability cryptographically impossible. This is anti-competitive and should simply be illegal.

[flagged]

*Smuggly* Huh, don’t like it? Just vote with your wallet and buy a car with better TC. Or build your own?

Caught one in the wild!

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48320351

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#17

Post by vladvasiliu »

5701652400 wrote: post #7

[flagged]

> if you don't like that car/company, don't buy their product. buy competitors. that will show them much better.

I'm all for voting with my wallet, but it gets exhausting trying to be a few steps ahead. And then nothing guarantees that there won't be a rug pull once you bought the car.

> or petition to government to put pressure on them

Right. Not sure why you have to mention it, since everybody knows this works oh so well.

The problem is that all these T&Cs are just pages upon pages of legalese that not only nobody understands or even reads, but that also aren't exactly advertised before buying. "Buy our smart widget! It only works with its own app, and we'll only support it for a ridiculously short time! Please don't upgrade your phone, or it will stop working!"

Of course governments should do something about it, but even here in the EU, they don't seem too bothered. Hell, even people seem generally fine with it, judging by the number of crappy widgets they buy.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#18

Post by haritha-j »

vincnetas wrote: post #3

This comment has really nice translation of corpo-speek to human language : https://github.com/robinostlund/homeassistant-volkswagencarn... Why are they shooting them selves in the feet? Is this really a tangible income stream? Is it really increasing security?

> Why are they shooting them selves in the feet?

Because people will still buy their cars. The average Joe has very little regard for their privacy. We've been trained to be numb.

> Is this really a tangible income stream?

Yep.

> Is it really increasing security?

Nope.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#19

Post by 5701652400 »

vladvasiliu wrote: post #17
5701652400 wrote: post #7

[flagged]

> if you don't like that car/company, don't buy their product. buy competitors. that will show them much better. I'm all for voting with my wallet, but it gets exhausting trying to be a few steps ahead. And then nothing guarantees that there won't be a rug pull once you bought the car. > or petition to government to put pressure on them Right. Not sure why you have to mention it, since everybody knows this works oh s…

true. on both accounts.

Re: Volkswagen blocks Home Assistant by requiring client assertion

#20

Post by wiseowise »

vincnetas wrote: post #3

This comment has really nice translation of corpo-speek to human language : https://github.com/robinostlund/homeassistant-volkswagencarn... Why are they shooting them selves in the feet? Is this really a tangible income stream? Is it really increasing security?

> Why are they shooting them selves in the feet?

They don’t. Majority of users don’t care, and some middle manager shmuck, working on MySkoda, can report how “we” prevented a huge security risk and funneled valuable ~~cattle~~ user data where it belongs.

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