BleepingComputer.com: Can you trust your computer?

<img src='/images/misc/cupofcoffee.gif' style='float:right' vspace='8' hspace='8'> <b>Can you trust your computer? <br /> <br /> Who should your computer take its orders from? Most people think their computers should obey them, not obey someone else. ..</b><br /><br />by Richard Stallman<br /> <br /> ...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. (Microsoft's version of this scheme is called "Palladium".) Proprietary programs have included malicious features before, but this plan would make it universal.<br /> <br /> 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.<br /> <br /> 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.<br /> <br /> 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. 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.<br /><br /> <div class='newslinks'><img src='http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/public/style_images/1/cs_page.gif'>&nbsp;<b>Link: <a href='http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html' target='_blank'><font color='red'>Complete Commentary plus Postscripts and Links</font></a><br />