MS Palladium protects IT vendors, not you (READ!!)

This is bad this is very bad! This is having big brother in your CPU! How about a complete boycott on all hardware!? We'll see how far this will last! Watch the computer industries collapse! ... I got better idea, BOYCOTT WINDOWS!
Since MS WIndows seems to be the main part in all of this.

read it it's scary very scary! MS wants complete control of your computer! And sooner or later you will have to pay a monthly fee to use it with a MS OS.

"MS Palladium protects IT vendors, not you - paper
By John Lettice
Posted: 06/28/2002 at 05:27 EST


Ross Anderson of Cambridge University has published a lengthy and informative paper/FAQ on Palladium, the Trusted Computing Platform Alliance (TCPA), their relationship and their implications. His take is that Microsoft's Palladium, soft-announced by the company earlier this week, will be built on TCPA hardware, adding some extra features as it goes along. Some of these features, he notes, will the there in order to make the package look more attractive, while some of the components of Palladium are already shipping in Xbox and WinXP.

TCPA itself provides for a monitoring component to be included in future PCs. In phase one Anderson expects it to be an add-on chip on the motherboard, but further down the line it will be in the CPU. It's more crackable as an add-on, as you could conceivably get around it by monitoring bus traffic, but once it's in the CPU this becomes a lot harder, and he speculates about the likely effects in the event of TCPA/Palladium being to all intents and purposes uncrackable.

Aside from providing the music business with workable DRM, it would also allow software companies to lock in their users. The more Palladium/TCPA-enabled apps there are, the more this will be the case, and it will also have the tendency to favour existing players while locking out new entrants.

Anderson refers to the chip as the "Fritz" chip, after senator Fritz Hollings who has been "working tirelessly" to make TCPA compulsory. On boot, Fritz "checks that the boot ROM is as expected, executes it, measures the state of the machine; then checks the first part of the operating system, loads and executes it, checks the state of the machine; and so on. The trust boundary, of hardware and software considered to be known and verified, is steadily expanded. A table is maintained of the hardware (audio card, video card etc) and the software (O/S, drivers, etc); if there are significant changes, the machine must be re- certified. The result is a PC booted into a known state with an approved combination of hardware and software. Control is then handed over to enforcement software in the operating system - this is presumably Palladium if your operating system in Windows."

Note the similarities here to what Xbox is doing already.

"Once the machine is in this state, Fritz can certify it to third parties: for example, he will do an authentication protocol with Disney to prove that his machine is a suitable recipient of 'Snow White'. The Disney server then sends encrypted data, with a key that Fritz will use to unseal it. Fritz makes the key available only so long as the environment remains 'trustworthy'. For this purpose, 'trustworthy' means that the media player application won't make any unauthorised copies of content."

That's an example of the sort of procedure you'd encounter when the system is applied to the entertainment business. However, TCPA-enabled applications will likely have their security policies administered by remote servers, and this has other implications. What you're allowed to read could be censored for reasons other than copyright, so for example the scientologists might "convince a court that a certain document should be banned [and] get an order against a policy server." So to what extent could unpalatable and leaked documents be banned or disappeared?

It will be possible to turn TCPA off, but if it achieves critical mass then this will mean you don't have access to TCPA-enabled applications, which may isolate you a tad. "If the applications that use TCPA / Palladium are more attractive to the majority of people, you may end up simply having to use them - just as many people have to use Microsoft Word because all their friends and colleagues send them documents in Microsoft Word."

Anderson elaborates this, based on how this control has been used in the past:

"TCPA appears designed to maximise the effect, and thus the economic power, of such plays. Given Microsoft's record of competitive strategic plays, I expect that Palladium will support them. So if you control a TCPA-enabled application, then your policy server can enforce your choice of rules about which other applications will be allowed to use the files your code creates. These files can be protected using strong cryptography, with keys controlled by the Fritz chips on everybody's machines. What this means is that a successful TCPA-enabled application will be worth much more money to the software company that controls it, as they can rent out access to their interfaces for whatever the market will bear. So there will be huge pressures on software developers to enable their applications for TCPA; and if Palladium is the first operating system to support TCPA, this will give it a competitive advantage over GNU/Linux and MacOS with the developer community."

The most significant beneficiaries, he argues, will not be the content industries, but the incumbents in the IT business. "I expect the most significant economic effect will be to strengthen the position of incumbents in information goods and services markets at the expense of new entrants. This may mean a rise in the market cap of firms like Intel, Microsoft and IBM - but at the expense of innovation and growth generally. The majority of the innovations that spur economic growth are not anticipated by the manufacturers of the platforms on which they are based; and technological change in the IT goods and services markets is usually cumulative. Giving incumbents new ways to make life harder for people trying to develop novel uses for their products will create all sorts of traps and perverse incentives."

TCPA could also, as argued here the other day, undermine the GPL. Modified code would still be covered under the GPL, but " it will not make full use of the TCPA features unless you have it signed, and have a certificate that enables you to use the TCPA Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). That is what will cost you money (if not at first, then eventually).

"Even if a philanthropist does a not-for-profit secure linux, the resulting product would not really be a GPL version of a TCPA operating system, but a proprietary operating system that the philanthropist could give away free. (There are still issues about who would pay for use of the PKI that hands out user certs.)"

"People believed that the GPL made it impossible for a company to come along and steal code that was the result of community effort. That may have been the case so long as the processor was open, and anyone could access supervisor mode. But TCPA changes that. Once the majority of PCs on the market are TCPA-enabled, the GPL won't work as intended."

He concludes: "TCPA and Palladium do not so much provide security for the user, but for the PC vendor, the software supplier, and the content industry. They do not add value for the user. Rather, they destroy it, by constraining what you can do with your PC - in order to enable application and service vendors to extract more money from you."

You have been warned. The full document, which you should read several times a week until further notice, is available here. ®"
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq.html

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?id=9933" target="_new"> My Rig </A>

Read the faq then ...
<A HREF="http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq.html" target="_new">http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq.html</A>

To sum it up it's about invasion of your rights.

to read how it works read below. it's in the FAQ:
"4. How does it work?

TCPA provides for a monitoring component to be mounted in future PCs. The likely implementation in the first phase of TCPA is a `Fritz' chip - a smartcard chip or dongle soldered to the motherboard.

When you boot up your PC, Fritz takes charge. He checks that the boot ROM is as expected, executes it, measures the state of the machine; then checks the first part of the operating system, loads and executes it, checks the state of the machine; and so on. The trust boundary, of hardware and software considered to be known and verified, is steadily expanded. A table is maintained of the hardware (audio card, video card etc) and the software (O/S, drivers, etc); if there are significant changes, the machine must be re-certified. The result is a PC booted into a known state with an approved combination of hardware and software. Control is then handed over to enforcement software in the operating system - this is presumably Palladium if your operating system in Windows.

Once the machine is in this state, Fritz can certify it to third parties: for example, he will do an authentication protocol with Disney to prove that his machine is a suitable recipient of `Snow White'. The Disney server then sends encrypted data, with a key that Fritz will use to unseal it. Fritz makes the key available only so long as the environment remains `trustworthy'. For this purpose, `trustworthy' means that the media player application won't make any unauthorised copies of content."

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if it's on the cpu it makes it much more difficult to crack. That would be like hacking into L2 cache and gutting that out. But now you got a problem as more software titles support this evil TCPA or whatever it is the less software you have at your disposal. Making your computer virtually useless.

The people have the power. The people decide on what is popular and what goes and what stays. Only you and i and the rest of you can make a difference. The way to talk to companies is with money. Thats all they care about; money.

Simply boycott computers. Instead of buying a new motherboard or a new cpu or whatever save it up for a 55 inch HDTV. Or a new car stereo. What about that jersey you always wanted but it's 149.95. Boycott anything with the MS logo or anything that uses the TCPA. learn and understand what it is. Spread it around and make it known.

This is very evil.

Boycotting and spreading information is a powerful tool.

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?id=9933" target="_new"> My Rig </A>

This is very, very stupid. When will IT vendors realise they are sh*tting in their own nests? I already boycott Windows, and with the new license schemes being enforced now, many organisations are looking to other alternatives too. If hardware vendors get onboard with this sort of thing, it will only inspire the same reaction. We - their customers(!) - will find other alternatives.

Sounds like a good reason to support sources that support you. I won't start a free software rant here, but I guess it's implied :-) It might even be a good reason to support initiatives like OpenCores.org and other free hardware projects.

Having said that, it shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone that this happens. MS owns (0wnz?) at least a part of most major ISPs around much of the world and has been setting this up for a while now. The majority of punters don't know any different - to them, Windows IS the computer/internet/email. It's gonna be a hard thing to stop.

edit: While I'm at it, this was posted on bsdvault today - <A HREF="http://bsdvault.net/article.php?sid=527&mode=&order=0" target="_new">http://bsdvault.net/article.php?sid=527&mode=&order=0</A>

It's about a significant change to the EUL for Windows Media Player.

" * Digital Rights Management (Security). You agree that in order to protect the integrity of content and software protected by digital rights management ("Secure Content" ), Microsoft may provide security related updates to the OS Components that will be automatically downloaded onto your computer. These security related updates may disable your ability to copy and/or play Secure Content and use other software on your computer. If we provide such a security update, we will use reasonable efforts to post notices on a web site explaining the update. "

Thanks to <A HREF="http://www.slashdot.org" target="_new">slashdot</A> for the link.

MS 0wnz j00.

<i>Do I look like I care?</i><P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by poorboy on 06/30/02 09:05 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

these people are so full of sh**, im talkin about the microsoft interview... if this palladick thing comes through, my guess would be to use linux or MACs...hehe

real philosophy of life: "do onto others what you dont want them do onto you"

I might be the only "fool" out there right now to actually see some benefits of this.

Although it is scary, and does seem to portray a dark side to most people, I have to admit that if this thing can eliminate or help destroy the hackers, thiefs and virus makers from doing anymore malice at us, I am fully for it. I am sick of the current net world becoming more and more open, vulnerable. So I am partly in favor of this project, just that I will keep a huge eye open with skepticism.

Remember, and this applies ALWAYS, to ANYTHING as my teacher told me once: Everything has an advantage AND disadvantage. You will never see one without the other.

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

ie: like someone who buys AOL ??

no insult to anyone here who is a happy AOL user but my experiance with the service is terrible, its slow, you are forced to use their browser... Ports for gaming appear throttled and pings are terrible !

Yet here in the UK they have a huge user base through their constant advertising that promissessuch things as more information ??


Sorry thats my AOL rant over...

Tim

ps: this is all very worring, yet I agree that a boycott would just no be viable...

I can call you Betty, and Betty when you call me... You can call me Al

I'd like to add I am playing the devil's advocate here on a partial advocation, and probably might be going to counter this whole forum, so *swoop*, I'm putting on my war suit and getting ready!

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

Because Intel and AMD are behind it also. But MS is the primary source of this rediculous idea they have. People will never buy into it IF they know what it is!

<A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?id=9933" target="_new"> My Rig </A>

hardware companies kill to have their stuff "MS certified". you don't follow our rules, well we don't give you our backing and we'll see who wants your hardware.

masturbation is the first step towards self-awareness.

Ok maybe not stop viruses but I recall strictly that the way it works is to put files encrypted so that viruses cannot alter. Whether that prevents or not, depends on how they meant it, so you too cannot say it WON'T.
I know Hackers find ways to hack all the time, I know it took 3 months to decode a 128-bit encrypted file. But the point is that this goes deep to HARDWARE encryption, and I don't think hackers will go as far as modify fab layout on a core, and in fact alter the codes so they can use it to their own advantage. Think about it, who can actually modify at home their own silicon, which has paths 0.13 microns small?

As for my hate for open stuff, I didn't say I am against Kazaa. I said I am against hackers and those who really do intrude my comp usage. Spyware to me won't bother me IF it does not ruin my computer, slow it down, crash it or whatever. I am not with spyware, I am against it, but I not annoyed so far because I don't have any that intrude my usage.

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

actually from what I read they will be able to delete files remotely from your computer, (this will have to get through the individual countries, access to your pc).

Also they will be able to lock word files so they can only be read in microsoft word. This means that everyone will have to own a copy of microsoft office. Therefore becoming more monopoly like, the governments in many countries may have a problem with this. Also I ould like to see them delete my mp3's off the cd's i wrote them too :-p.

Also they talk about copy protection, all I need is a tape and an analogue connection to my computer haha, i have copied it, the input back into computer and name file differently, haha they can never stop me, I would just like to see them try!!!

Quote from Microsoft's website concerning Palladium:

Memory in Palladium PCs will only run "trusted" code. So who decides what is trusted? Microsoft? Vendors? Does this mean non-palladium software cant be executed on my own machine?
This crap smells like a back-door means to get DRM hard-wired. Even if this crap goes hardware. Some College EE major will figure out a way around it, and sell mod chips for $5 a pop.
Problem is that RIAA has a lobby.. the average computer user doesnt, and probably doesnt even care. BTW. I loved the flowery language the MS website used to describe this technology. They are feeding us a poisoned apple. It looks good on the outside (prevent hackers etc) but once bitten, its bad news.

Benchmarks are like sex, everybody loves doing it, everybody thinks they are good at it.

Heheh, some kind of curfew modes...

Well I still stand that some good might come out of it, but I too cannot hold myself under the Microsoft belief, so I will wait and remain skeptical like all of you, until further plans and details are revealed. For all we know it could turn out something WE needed, as it could turn out like you describe, so the point is that you shouldn't go panicking as I shouldn't go advertising it.

As for thiefs, ever heard of laptop theft? Now that I think of it, they should make a game called Grand Theft Laptop! Wait a minute, GTL, GTL+, AGTL+...Intel bus, OMG!

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

Wow, for the first time, I agree with Spuddy here!

But you do raise a good point about the attitude of the Joe Q. Pubic...

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You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

Oh for crying out loud nobody is gonna control your files! That would be a full invasion! Would someone from Public Services actually enter your house with no authorization and start taking your files? Not really!

I don't know why you guys overdramatized the use of this security plan!

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!

I was responding to the fact some people are thinking as if they will any time be able to take anything from your files or control/delete them!
I mean come on, this is way too far!

BTW yes, all North America has fallen under FOX TV's programming!

--
You are about to witness crazy, mindless, eye-gagging, naive programming, welcome to FOX!