Schneier Analyzes Palladium

bcrowell writes "This month's CryptoGram from Bruce Schneier has an analysis of what little information people have been able to glean (without signing an NDA) about Microsoft's Palladium initiative." We might as well throw in a direct link to Schneier's look at the MPAA License to Hack bill as well.

Funny coincidence.

[A_Non_Moose]

Today's MacHall [machall.com]

A tired Hollywood plot?

[bunyip]

Viewed from the 10,000ft level, it sounds like a common Hollywood plot (Pd in parens):

It's the year 2050 (2004) and the government (MS) is telling everybody how they will live (compute). Trust is guaranteed by the government (MS) and violators will be punished (digitally locked out). The people (programmers), though outwardly happy (productive), harbor deep lingering desires for freedom (open source).

Then, along comes a rough-shaven, rogue hero (hacker), played by Stallone or Schwarzenegger (Torvalds). The aforementioned hero (hacker) then liberates the people (programmers) from the tyranny of the government (MS). The people (programmers) are overjoyed, their lives have returned to normal.

So - if it ever played out like this, I'm sure someone in Hollywood already has the rights to the script. Will they own us?

Alan.

Usefulness of Palladium?

[Wingchild]

After reading the article, I can't imagine that a home user would ever make a point of purchasing a system on the order described. Hardware-level tampering resistance is a good thing for Department of Defense computers, say, but does the average home user, surfing the web and storing recipes, really have to worry about someone leeching that information from residual information that could (maybe) be gleaned from the CPU itself?

Dear lord! Perish the thought.

I can't even imagine most companies having to deploy something on this order to safeguard their data. Hell, I'm not even sure the military needs it.

For reference, the Department of Defense has a series of guides and guidelines for locking systems down to ensure security. These are called STIGs and are created by DISA (Defense Internal Security Agency) and the NSA (National Security Agency). When the guides are applied the machines are as secure as can be made.

Part of the guidelines cover physical security; i.e., if someone can reach your hardware physically without being cleared for it, you fail that part of the check. As such, I can't imagine how Palladium would not be redundant to things we already have in place.

For good security, you can use smartcards with a PKI certificate, anyway. Don't let someone sign on without one, don't let them access data without one, have an active and interested central monitoring and issuing authority and practice good physical security. Save the money you'd spend on Palladium equipment.

Re:A tired Hollywood plot?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I have to admit, the parent post is insightful (stupid). The analogies are concise (tired) and accurate (cliched). It truly makes me proud (depressed) to read this masterpiece of slashdot (slahbot) eloquence (drivel).

vaporware... ?

[jukal]

Palladium, Pd46, Heat of vaporization 357.0 kJ/mol. I quess kJ/mol means, KiloJournalists / Microsoft's Obfuscated Literature?

Palladium (like chemists, Microsoft calls it "Pd")

[ejaw5]

as all chemistry students will learn:

Palladium (Pd) + MP[3/G/EG] (MP*) => Fire.

Re:VM Could break Pd perhaps?

[revery]

That is interesting...

Now I'm excited about Palladium. ;)

What is really disappointing in Palladium

[af_robot]

No one will ever even imagine a beowulf cluster of these Palladium PCs!! Damn!

Re:With all this non-resalable equipment and media

[Waffle Iron]

The Palladium scenario would be a net benefit for the environment. Nobody would ever throw away any electronic equipment ever again, for fear of losing the magic keys that enable them to watch the content that they paid for.

No circuit boards would be dumped in Asia. They would remain embedded in ever growing stacks of redundant consumer electronics devices in American living rooms.

One side effect: sales of outlet strips, surge protectors, A/V cables and video selector switches will skyrocket. Buy Belkin stock today to get in on the ground floor.

The wheel turns...

[jarrell]

I find it entertaining that after all these years, someone is finally re-implementing Multics...

Re:vaporware... ?

[infinite9]

Palladium, Pd46, Heat of vaporization 357.0 kJ/mol. I quess kJ/mol means, KiloJournalists / Microsoft's Obfuscated Literature?

That's it! Bill Gates is on a quest to make 1 mole of dollars! Let's see, $6.02x10^23... he's almost there!