[geeks] Palladium

[Tim H.]

On Thu, 27 Jun 2002 10:15:59 -0400
Joshua D Boyd <jdboyd at cs.millersville.edu> wrote:

> 
> Microsoft wants the hardware to be redesigned to guaranty OS
> security.  I wonder how they think they are really going to pull that
> off?  Not the getting the hardware to cooperate, but being really
> secure, in this age when it is relatively easy to do bus taps (see the
> article on breaking the XBox security) and disect chips (and hey, we
> happen to know someone with a SEM that would probably be just perfect
> for the job) to get the authentication codes that were hardwired into
> the machine?

Actually, the microsoft guy that got interviewed said that sand and look
attacks were what they expected, and bus sniffing would work for the
first gen, but 2nd gen the security chip goes into the processor, so bus
sniffing no longer works.

And if you manage to sand and look without destroying the chip you have
access to a single machine, big deal.  I think microsoft is right, for
all practical purposes this is pretty uncrackable.  I mean why would a
bad guy go through all that work when all he has to do is buy the
universal back door from one of the political entities that will legally
have to have it?  Politicians are cheaper than electron microscopes. 
There is no way the government is going to allow security all the way to
hardware level without requiring a backdoor, and there is no way that a
"secret" known by more than 1 government agency will stay secret for
long.

I really enjoyed the way that this "came from the bottom at microsoft"
with no mention of all the work being done by the Intel consortium.

Tim