Overcoming the potential downside of TCPA

[bear]

On Tue, 13 Aug 2002, Joseph Ashwood wrote:

>However there is something that is very much worth noting, at least about
>TCPA.
>
>There is nothing stopping a virtualized version being created.
>
>There is nothing that stops say VMWare from synthesizing a system view that
>includes a virtual TCPA component. This makes it possible to (if desired)
>remove all cryptographic protection.

...

The problem with this idea is that TCPA is useless.  For all the *useful*
things you are thinking of, you need TCPA plus an approved key.  The only
way you are going to get an approved key is inside a tamper-resistant chunk
of hardware.  If you should manage to extract the key, then yes, you'll be
able to create that CD.  But the idea is that you, the hardware owner, are
not authorized to extract the information contained in your own hardware.
I find the idea of "owning" something without having the legal right to
open it up and look inside legally dubious at best, but I'm no lawyer....

The idea is that you shouldn't get anywhere without hardware hacking. The
people doing this have decided hardware hacks are acceptable risks because
they only want to protect cheap data -- movies, songs, commercial software,
whatever.  They are sticking to stuff that's not expensive enough to justify
hardware hacks.

However, if this infrastructure does in fact become trusted and somebody
tries to use it to protect more valuable data, God help them.  They'll get
their asses handed to them on a platter.

				Bear


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