full-disk subversion standards released

[Thor Lancelot Simon]

On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 01:22:37PM -0800, John Gilmore wrote:
>
> If it comes from the "Trusted Computing Group", you can pretty much
> assume that it will make your computer *less* trustworthy.  Their idea
> of a trusted computer is one that random unrelated third parties can
> trust to subvert the will of the computer's owner.

People have funny notions of "ownership", don't they?

It's very clear to me that I don't own my desktop machine at my office;
my employer does.  But even if TCG were to punch out a useful, reasonable
standard (which I do not think they have done in any case so far), the
policy problem of how to ensure that my desktop machine's actual owner
could enforce its ownership of that machine against me, while the retailer
who sold me my desktop machine at home -- which I do own -- or for that
matter the U.S. Government, can't enforce _its_ "ownership" of my own
machine against me; that's a real problem, and solutions to it are useful.

Given such solutions, frameworks like what TCG is chartered to build are
in fact good and useful.  I don't think it's right to blame the tool (or
the implementation details of a particular instance of a particular kind
of tool) for the idiot carpenter.

Thor

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