I’m also on Mastodon
Goodacre catalogues this and related scenarios in a 37-page risk assessment prepared for CISOs evaluating Intel vPro hardware connected to corporate networks. Its conclusion is blunt: connecting an untouched-ME device to corporate resources “exposes the organization to a class of compromise that defeats the host security stack in its entirety.”
I hear a lot of concern about backdoors in Chinese hardware but this is just dystopian.
Kimberly Benza, director of executive operations for the Trump Organization, says:
“Mr Young’s [the developer] attempt to blame certain world events for our termination of the agreement is merely a ploy to distract from his own defaults and failures.”
Sounds like it’s not just the brand that’s toxic.
So wait a moment. How can the browser even check if play services are installed? And scanning a QR code is just accessing the camera, what does that have to do with Play Services?
What is the possibility of that leading to hyperinflation?
Update: shots fired! Apparently Iran has hit a US ship with two missiles.
This might get interesting. If the Ukraine was able to pretty much win the war at sea without a navy using drones, we will see how much of a nuisance Iran can be.
Don’t overstretch my analogy like that. How about this:
Google has standardized The Restaurant. The kitchens all have the same tools and ingredients and are open to anyone. Seating and billing is standardized, and you can easily order and pay at your table, and the food is delivered straight to you via pneumatic tubes and nicely packaged. The food might be expensive or cheap, tasty or revolting, but the experience is always the same.
There are a lot of hobby cooks that like to cook in the Google restaurants. If you want to eat their food, you might have to pick it up straight at the kitchen, or nicely ask the hobby waiters. The cooks have been there for years and whipping up nice creations - mostly for free, beacause the ingredients and tools were free, and they really like to cook. Because the food is so good, some people tip the cooks or waiters directly.
Now Google introduced a new rule: everyone has to use their billing and pneumatic delivery system, citing improved food safety. The hobby cooks and waiters are infuriated, and even some of their customers, and they demand that everyone can still come to the kitchen or the waiters. But Google just says: look, my restaurant, my rules. If you don’t like it go make your own.
No, it wasn’t ever. It always belonged to Google who benevolently open sourced parts of it and retains control.
Safetynet and PlayIntegrity are under Google’s control. The PlayStore is Google’s. All of the APIs are Google’s! Hardware blobs are closed and belong to the manufacturer.
Just because some of the stuff shows up on GitHub doesn’t make it an open platform.
The megacorps can do anything they want with their product. The chef can change the menu anytime and he can refuse you service - it’s his restaurant. Our problem is that it’s a duopoly and there’s nowhere else to go.
The only way out is open standards and platforms, enabling true competition.
Last weekend in Germany the spot market for electric hit a record negative price. Yup, electricity was so abundant you could get paid €0.40/kWh.
If the only tool you have is a hammer…
Some of your bills in your pocket may come from the vendor A, some may come from an ATM. So the bank knows some of the bills you got.
Vendor B might go shopping somewhere, or deposit his cash in a bank. Or put it in a sorting machine that scans the serial numbers.
You pay B with some bills from A and some bills from the ATM. And now the bank can connect all three dots. The transactions aren’t completely transparent, but aren’t truly anonymous anymore.
Cash is not anonymous. The serial numbers are being used for tracking.
You have to pick between two systems to ally with.
One is xenophobic, imperialistic, corrupt, harasses its neighbors, sees itself as the best country on earth, has zero regard for human rights and plans long-term.
The other is xenophobic, imperialistic, corrupt, harasses its neighbors and allies, sees itself as the best country on earth, has zero regard for human rights and does the fuck it wants.
Choose wisely.
I think you’re attributing a lot more to malice what can can more easily be just greed and stupidity.