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Hacker News
Waiting for when one can't boot Windows without running snitch software which analyzes everything you do first to ensure you aren't a pedophile then that you aren't a terrorist then that aren't disloyal or un-American.
You won't be able to send email or bank if you aren't running the snitch or any configuration where you could defeat it.
Hell in a boring dystopia run by adults this could theoretically be a good thing! Never miss the next obvious school shooter!
Then look at who actually runs our country.
by michaelmrose
This is an incredibly nice technology that absolutely will be used to prevent you from using your computer as you wish.
by egorfine
>But what about attacks after boot? That’s your EDR’s problem. Trusted boot provides the bedrock to build a bunch of other primitives on top of. Including cryptographic proof your EDR is installed and running (at boot), immutable filesystems (verified at boot), signed upgrades, confidential computing, etc. Without it you can’t trust your hosts themselves and can’t make further security guarantees. Houses built on sand and all that.
Good take - remote attestation doesn't solve all problems on its own but it is a very powerful tool in the platform security toolbox (and very cool "to boot" :P)
We use SPIFFE/SPIRE at work. It works well for our use case, remote embedded workflows that need to phone home. It's very exacting: everything must be exactly right for the attestation to succeed. So it takes extra effort when you commit to that path.
by imglorp
The German Healthcare System is moving to the TelematikInfrastruktur 2.0, which has foundations in Zero Trust security, which includes also remote attestation and proof with TPM.
I had made a dummy client as example and I must say that on development perspectives, it is wild.
There are some Go libraries, which support only RSA instead of EC for TPM Keys, on the C++ side you get most of results in Windows through the CryptoProvider, on Linux and Mac exists own OS solutions/access.
Implementing it isn't trivial at all, otherwise you would already seen (not vibe-coded) open source implementions spawning on GitHub.
by madduci
It's a nice idea, but I wouldn't design any system on the assumption that a TPM needs to stay secure for the system to be safe. There's been so many exploits. We can consider the iphone as an R & D platform for doing blackbox computations. In that nothing is allowed to run that Apple doesn't want. Protecting that is apples bread and butter and they care about it enough to value critical exploits in the millions. Yet people still find them all the time. I feel like if a company that invests millions in the concept can't make it secure then the concept probably isn't that great.
by Uptrenda
GrapheneOS has an implementation of this with their Auditor app. You can use their service or you can use another Android. No freedom lost, just security gained.
There's also Android's hardware attestation API which apps can use to verify integrity in a more secure and privacy-respecting way than Google Play Integrity. An increasing number of apps are officially supporting GrapheneOS through this, and that number will only grow as GrapheneOS gains users.
https://grapheneos.org/articles/attestation-compatibility-gu...
by Cider9986
It would be a nice addition if big tech didn't abuse this to shove user-hostile software into devices which the user has paid for (like smartphones).. thanks to this attitude, whenever I see "remote attestation" I associate this with "hostile"..
> Using a TPM, we can remotely, cryptographically prove a couple of things:
Unless there are exploits..
by zb3
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- Hacker News
- Waiting for when one can't boot Windows without running snitch software which analyzes everything you do first to ensure you aren't a pedophile then that you aren't a terrorist then that aren't disloyal or un-American.
You won't be able to send email or bank if you aren't running the snitch or any configuration where you could defeat it.
Hell in a boring dystopia run by adults this could theoretically be a good thing! Never miss the next obvious school shooter!
Then look at who actually runs our country.
by michaelmrose - This is an incredibly nice technology that absolutely will be used to prevent you from using your computer as you wish.by egorfine
- >But what about attacks after boot? That’s your EDR’s problem. Trusted boot provides the bedrock to build a bunch of other primitives on top of. Including cryptographic proof your EDR is installed and running (at boot), immutable filesystems (verified at boot), signed upgrades, confidential computing, etc. Without it you can’t trust your hosts themselves and can’t make further security guarantees. Houses built on sand and all that.
Good take - remote attestation doesn't solve all problems on its own but it is a very powerful tool in the platform security toolbox (and very cool "to boot" :P)
- We use SPIFFE/SPIRE at work. It works well for our use case, remote embedded workflows that need to phone home. It's very exacting: everything must be exactly right for the attestation to succeed. So it takes extra effort when you commit to that path.by imglorp
- The German Healthcare System is moving to the TelematikInfrastruktur 2.0, which has foundations in Zero Trust security, which includes also remote attestation and proof with TPM.
I had made a dummy client as example and I must say that on development perspectives, it is wild.
There are some Go libraries, which support only RSA instead of EC for TPM Keys, on the C++ side you get most of results in Windows through the CryptoProvider, on Linux and Mac exists own OS solutions/access.
Implementing it isn't trivial at all, otherwise you would already seen (not vibe-coded) open source implementions spawning on GitHub.
by madduci - It's a nice idea, but I wouldn't design any system on the assumption that a TPM needs to stay secure for the system to be safe. There's been so many exploits. We can consider the iphone as an R & D platform for doing blackbox computations. In that nothing is allowed to run that Apple doesn't want. Protecting that is apples bread and butter and they care about it enough to value critical exploits in the millions. Yet people still find them all the time. I feel like if a company that invests millions in the concept can't make it secure then the concept probably isn't that great.by Uptrenda
- GrapheneOS has an implementation of this with their Auditor app. You can use their service or you can use another Android. No freedom lost, just security gained.
There's also Android's hardware attestation API which apps can use to verify integrity in a more secure and privacy-respecting way than Google Play Integrity. An increasing number of apps are officially supporting GrapheneOS through this, and that number will only grow as GrapheneOS gains users.
https://grapheneos.org/articles/attestation-compatibility-gu...
by Cider9986 - It would be a nice addition if big tech didn't abuse this to shove user-hostile software into devices which the user has paid for (like smartphones).. thanks to this attitude, whenever I see "remote attestation" I associate this with "hostile"..
> Using a TPM, we can remotely, cryptographically prove a couple of things:
Unless there are exploits..
by zb3