Can you trust your computer?

[Wiley50]

http://www.opednews.com/maxwrite/linkframe.php?linkid=40350

Who should your computer take its orders from? Most people think their computers should obey them, not obey someone else. With a plan they call "trusted computing," large media corporations (including the movie companies and record companies), together with computer companies such as Microsoft and Intel, are planning to make your computer obey them instead of you. Proprietary programs have included malicious features before, but this plan would make it universal.
Proprietary
software means, fundamentally, that you don't control what it does; you can't study the source code, or change it. It's not surprising that clever businessmen find ways to use their control to put you at a disadvantage. Microsoft has done this several times: one version of Windows was designed to report to Microsoft all the software on your hard disk; a recent "security" upgrade in Windows Media Player required users to agree to new restrictions. But Microsoft is not alone: the KaZaa music-sharing software is designed so that KaZaa's business partner can rent out the use of your computer to their clients. These malicious features are often secret, but even once you know about them it is hard to remove them, since you don't have the source code.
In the past, these were isolated incidents. "Trusted computing" would make it pervasive. "Treacherous computing" is a more appropriate name, because the plan is designed to make sure your computer will systematically disobey you. In fact, it is designed to stop your computer from functioning as a general-purpose computer. Every operation may require explicit permission.
The technical idea underlying treacherous computing is that the computer includes a digital encryption and signature device, and the keys are kept secret from you. (Microsoft's version of this is called "palladium.") Proprietary programs will use this device to control which other programs you can run, which documents or data you can access, and what programs you can pass them to. These programs will continually download new authorization rules through the Internet, and impose those rules automatically on your work. If you don't allow your computer to obtain the new rules periodically from the Internet, some capabilities will automatically cease to function.

snip

There are proposals already for U.S. laws that would require all computers to support treacherous computing, and to prohibit connecting old computers to the Internet. The CBDTPA (we call it the Consume But Don't Try Programming Act) is one of them. But even if they don't legally force you to switch to treacherous computing, the pressure to accept it may be enormous. Today people often use Word format for communication, although this causes several sorts of problems (see http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html). If only a treacherous computing machine can read the latest Word documents, many people will switch to it, if they view the situation only in terms of individual action (take it or leave it). To oppose treacherous computing, we must join together and confront the situation as a collective choice.
For further information about treacherous computing, see http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/users/rja14/tcpa-faq.html.
To block treacherous computing will require large numbers of citizens to organize. We need your help! The Electronic Frontier Foundation (http://www.eff.org%20/) and Public Knowledge (http://www.publicknowledge.org%20/) are campaigning against treacherous computing, and so is the FSF-sponsored Digital Speech Project (http://www.digitalspeech.org/). Please visit these Web sites so you can sign up to support their work.
You can also help by writing to the public affairs offices of Intel, IBM, HP/Compaq, or anyone you have bought a computer from, explaining that you don't want to be pressured to buy "trusted" computing systems so you don't want them to produce any. This can bring consumer power to bear. If you do this on your own, please send copies of your letters to the organizations above.

[Gabi Hayes]

1. wait a minute

there



seriously, if this is true, and why shouldn't it be......

[proud patriot]

5. oh that is classic

:rofl:

[Turbineguy]

6. Very Stylish!

But where's your hat?

[HysteryDiagnosis]

9. So... do you just set it on defrost when you come in from

the cold, or do you just set it on high and let the pieces fly where they will??

[AlCzervik]

2. mine would take a bullet for me.

[bemildred]

3. This is why you build your own ... nt

[Jim Warren]

4. Interested

Howdy I'm interested in your reply. Could you spot some info on this, or links you've found credible? Can it end up costing less? How about a portable laptop type? What OS?
Anything would be appreciated, thanks.

[bemildred]

7. I'm not much help I'm afraid.

I've been building my own for about twenty years, but it's always a new experience. I usually dual boot with some form of Windoze and FreeBSD, but things are changing. I don't believe I will use Windoze in the future, and my Windoze98SE install disk is not likely to be enough any more, you need all those drivers and stuff, Microsoft has EOL-d it, etc.

If you are a technical and industrious sort of person you can do as you like. If you are not, and you are looking for Windoze alternatives, you need to look at the Linux community. I am not a member of the Linux community. I can say however that for most purposes that normal people have computers for, you can do the same thing fine with Linux and various application packages, of which there are thousands, and you will be far more secure at the same time, and pay much less. It is usually even less work.

The down side is that it's harder to find "support", because nobody is paying for it. And you have to learn a new way of doing things. That last is what Microsoft relys on really, the baby-duck syndrome, the fact that people become attached to the first thing they learn and don't want to have to spend the effort to learn something new.

So you need to find some Linux people, and they can point you in the direction of good distros for new users. And in that context, you need to look into supported hardware before you go buy something.

Good luck.

[The Vinyl Ripper]

8. Knoppix and PCLinuxOS

Are two flavors of Linux that are about as easy to use as Windoze..

Both are free downloads and can run from a single CD ROM without ever needing to be installed on your hard drive at all.


http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html

http://www.pclinuxos.com/

Very good for getting your feet wet in Linux without the stress of having to install it.

[satya]

10. Another shot fired in the Class War. Only folks who are able/willing to buy the new hardware

will be "allowed" Internet access, I guess ...

[peacetalksforall]

11. Is this Apple also or does it apply to Apple also whenver MS

applications are running?

Man, how I despise MS.