- cross-posted to:
- google@lemdro.id
- programming@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- google@lemdro.id
- programming@programming.dev
The much maligned “Trusted Computing” idea requires that the party you are supposed to trust deserves to be trusted, and Google is DEFINITELY NOT worthy of being trusted, this is a naked power grab to destroy the open web for Google’s ad profits no matter the consequences, this would put heavy surveillance in Google’s hands, this would eliminate ad-blocking, this would break any and all accessibility features, this would obliterate any competing platform, this is very much opposed to what the web is.
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Note of amusement: The GitHub issues tracker for that proposal got swamped with tickets either mocking this crap or denouncing it for what it is, this morning the person who seems to be the head of the project closed all those tickets and published this blog post, in essence saying “Shut up with your ethical considerations, give us a hand in putting up this electric fence around the web”. Of course that didn’t stop it.
Also somebody pointed out this gem in the proposal, quoted here:
6.2. Privacy considerations
Todo
Quick edit: This comment on one of the closed tickets points out the contact information of the Antitrust authorities of both US and EU, i think i’m gonna drop the EU folks a note
Edit: And they disabled commenting on the issues tracker
My favorite part is when they ask you to give them the benefit of the doubt, but also anyone who disagrees with them in a way that doesn’t fit their expectations is “noise.”
And if you have issues with the “use case” itself, you’re shit out of luck, shut it, shithead!
If you raise legal issues with the ‘use case’ of their ‘web platform’ thing, ppl will just not respond to you!
Meaning: we don’t care if the shot we plan might be illegal, and we won’t be stopped by you fucks telling us if it is or not "
What benefit of the doubt?
The absolute best possible case is repulsive.
Benefit of the doubt, as in “I doubt this is a good idea”
Wow, that blog post is truly nauseating and infuriating to read, knowing the context.
Fuck Google. They’re the Nestlé of tech.
I don’t think Google has recently insisted that child slavery is just a thing we all have to be OK with if we want chocolate, or starved millions of babies by convincing their mothers that their breast milk is dangerous. But I also wouldn’t be shocked to learn that they had…
Ha! Fair point. I guess the Internet is ultimately peanuts compared to the real world.
But as far as relative negative effect on its sphere of influence, I’d say they’re comparable.
[Don’t assume consensus nor finished state]
Often a proposal is just that - someone trying to solve a problem by proposing technical means to address it. Having a proposal sent out to public forums doesn’t necessarily imply that the sender’s employer is determined on pushing that proposal as is.
It also doesn’t mean that the proposal is “done” and the proposal authors won’t appreciate constructive suggestions for improvement.
[Be the signal, not the noise]
In cases where controversial browser proposals (or lack of adoption for features folks want, which is a related, but different, subject), it’s not uncommon to see issues with dozens or even hundreds of comments from presumably well-intentioned folks, trying to influence the team working on the feature to change their minds.
In the many years I’ve been working on the web platform, I’ve yet to see this work. Not even once.
…?
What is this, “Good vibes only?”“Good vibes only” seems to be embedded in the culture of web development today. Influential devs’ Twitter accounts have strong Instagram vibes: constantly promoting and congratulating each other, never sharing substantive criticisms. Hustle hustle.
People with deep, valid criticisms of popular frameworks like React seem to be ostracized as cranks.
It’s all very vapid and depressing.
Do you have an article about react? I’d love to read it. And yes tech is chock full of egos and fakers.
Alex Russell is a good read on React. His position gives him a broad view of its impacts and has kept him from being sidelined. This Changelog podcast is a decent distillation of his criticisms – it was recorded earlier this year, a few days after his Market For Lemons blog post.
(Sorry for the late reply! I’ve been a bit swamped lately and away from kbin.)
The amount of noise IS the signal
Never seen it work? These faang people are totally delusional. Google keeps putting off their third party cookie retirement exactly because of outcries like this.
This is why we need Firefox.
And Firefox needs to be a market that can’t be ignored.
@TheYang Exactly! Came here to say this. Everybody actively using chromium based browsers is a part of the problem.
Or even if Microsoft edge disables this
Stop with this excuse and stop Insulting people. I’ve been on Firefox for nearly 20 years, but Mozilla has ruined it for me little by little. The last straw has been the horrible UI redesign. So I switched to a Chromium browser. Tell Mozilla to make a better browser and to listen to their community, instead of blaming people for using what serves them best.
Firefox depends on google for funding though. Google could probably deal a killing blow quite easily.
i think they probably donate so much to make sure they have at least one competitor so they don’t get busted up like Standard Oil
I’m skeptical if the government would even do that given how stacked it is with cronies
Don’t know what government you’re referring to, but if the EU anti-trust regulation kicks in it will affect everyone. EU agencies are slow but they do their job eventually.
Yeah I think they are still in court with the EU. If Mozilla fell, the EU would almost certainly come after chrome immediately.
Man, I hope the EU pulls the trigger on Google. They are way, way overdue for getting broken up. It’s insane how easily they can change the entire internet on a whim with zero oversight. The Biden admin will never do it.
They are not donating, if I remember correctly fairly recently Microsoft outbid them and bing was default for a bit.
But maybe I’m not remembering correctly tbh.
Vote with your wallet. I recently increased my monthly donation to Mozilla.
I thought I read somewhere that donations to Mozilla legally can’t go to Firefox.
Indeed. Donations go to Mozilla Foundations for their activities (advocacy and whatever). Firefox is developed by Mozilla Corp.,whom can’t legally receive donations.
They do that because of Firefox goes, Google is open to being trust busted. Killing Firefox would be literal suicide for Google
I’ve never donated to Mozilla before, but will now.
Firefox will most likely support this, if it doesn’t want to get cut off from most of the web.
However, it would be nice to have a Firefox or Chromium fork with a switch to disable the “feature”, an option to remove any links to websites requiring this stuff, and some search engine free of links to websites requiring it.
However non technical folk will not be able to or really be interested in all that and will just download the regular browser and leave the option enabled. This only gets traction if the option it turned off by default.
Firefox will most likely support this, if it doesn’t want to get cut off from most of the web.
well, if more people used Firefox websites couldn’t just throw them under the bus, which is why I said it’s so important.
We’ll have to see, but I’d hope Firefox puts up at least some resistance.
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Please drink verification can
Or they just ban you without recourse and poof all your data and accounts are dead.
Edit: consider using Google Takeout to download your data periodically as a hedge against trouble with your account. This will help prevent data loss in the event your account suddenly goes poof. It won’t help you with the apps you bought though.
Don’t forget you also lose all the android apps you purchased. Oh wait, isn’t there a community that helps you avoid that?
Sorry, can’t run code not signed by an attester recognized by your hardware manufacturer.
Please enable bootlock and wipe your device to regain attested status.
Can’t enable bootlock, your device’s attestation expired 1 months ago, please use an up to date device if you wish to use attestation.
Rip Linux, Android custom roms.
Kind of. Several apps already refuse to run without bootlock or on a rooted system if it wasn’t for Magisk, this will make web apps to refuse running too.
Thanks for this. I skimmed the proposal doc itself and didn’t quite understand the concern people have with it – most of the concerns that came to my own mind are already listed as non-goals. The first few lines of this comment express a realistic danger that’s innate to what’s actually being proposed.
Being listed as a non-goal means nothing though. Who says it won’t become a goal later on?
Glory to
Arstotzka… I mean Alphabet.Please write for black mirror!
I’m sorta sitting here in that same scenario. My iphone screen was severely broken last week, I don’t use any other apple services. When I tried to get into it, my phone went into security lock mode. Coincidentally all of my 2FAs for my other accounts did their monthly checkin. No phone, no checkin so now I’m locked out of nearly all of my work accounts. Apple ID will renew in a few days, but I didn’t think to take my broken phone with me on a trip, so my SIM with my phone number is now 1000s of miles away. So now I’m boned til I get home. 2FA works well until it works too well.
I would just move on at step 3
THIS IS NOT (just) ABOUT GOOGLE
Currently, attestation and “trusted computing” are already a thing, the main “sources of trust” are:
- Microsoft
- Apple
- Smartphone manufacturers
- Third party attestators
This is already going on, you need a Microsoft signed stub to boot anything other than Windows on a PC, you need Apple’s blessing to boot anything on a Mac, your smartphone manufacturer decides whether you can unlock it and lose attestation, all of Microsoft, Apple and Google run app attestation through their app stores, several governments and companies run attestation software on their company hardware, and so on.
This is the next logical step, to add “web app” attestation, since the previous ones had barely any pushback, and even fanboys of walled gardens cheering them up.
PS: Somewhat ironically, Google’s Play Store attestation is one of the weaker ones, just look at Apple’s and the list of stuff they collect from the user’s device to “attest” it for any app.
you need a Microsoft signed stub to boot anything other than Windows on a PC
Not necessarily, most motherboards and laptops (at least every single one I’ve ever owned) allow users to enroll their own Secure Boot keys and maintain an entirely non-Microsoft chain of trust. You can also disable secure boot entirely.
Major distros like Ubuntu and Fedora started shipping with Microsoft-signed boot shims as a matter of convenience, not necessity.
Secure Boot itself is not some nefarious mechanism, it is a component of the open UEFI standard. Where Microsoft comes in to play is the fact that most PC vendors are going to pre-enroll Microsoft keys because they are all shipping computers with Windows, and Microsoft wants Secure Boot enabled by default on machines shipping with with their operating system.
Windows 11 is saying you’re required to have tpm 2.0 enabled in your bios in order to upgrade. Didn’t know what it was on my self built computer until recently when windows said my system wasn’t compatible to upgrade.
Tpm modules are pretty good. And you can buy them separately like another card. Motherboards usually have a slot for them. They are tiny like usb drives. They essentially are usb derives but for your passwords and keys. You can even configure Firefox to store your passwords in tpm
TPMs are a security threat. If malware manages to infiltrate it, then that malware is now impossible to remove and has unfettered access to the entire system. You have to junk the entire computer.
No they don’t. Worst case known attacks have resulted in insecure keys being generated. And even if malware could somehow be transferred out of it you wouldn’t have to trash your whole computer - just unplug the TPM
I’m afraid you are sorely mistaken. Here’s an RCE vulnerability in the TPM 2.0 reference implementation.
Your own article says it’s VMs. The tpm itself can be bricked. Ok that sucks. Still not persistent like you describe.
TPM and SecureBoot are separate UEFI features. Windows 11 requires TPM 2.0. If your system meets the CPU requirements, then it should support this without needing to install a hardware TPM dongle. However, until recently, many vendors turned had this feature turned off for some reason.
Where some confusion comes in is another Windows 11 requirement, that machines be SecureBoot capable. What this actually means in practice is that your system needs to be configured to boot in UEFI mode rather than CSM (“Legacy BIOS”) mode.
You can’t disable secure boot if you want to use your Nvidia GPU :( though. [edit2: turns out this is a linux mint thing, not the case in Debian or Fedora]
Edit: fine, there may be workarounds and for other distros everything is awesome, but in mint and possibly Ubuntu and Debian for a laptop 2022 RTX3060 you need to set up your MOK keys in secure mode to be able to install the Nvidia drivers, outside secure mode the GPU is simply locked. I wasn’t even complaining, there is a way to get it working, so that’s fine by me. No need to tell me that I was imagining things.
Hogwash. Running Fedora on closed source nvidia drivers with secure boot disabled.
“works for me”
What does that even mean?! Yes it works for me. That’s the whole bloody point of saying it. Someone was saying “it won’t work for anyone” and I was saying “well it works for me”.
“We can’t land at the moon!” “Eh, we already have” “‘Works for me’, so that’s not really valid”
Head_scratch.gif
My experience is that Nvidia plays nicer without secure boot. Getting Fedora up and running with the proprietary Nvidia drivers and fully working SecureBoot was quite a headache, whereas everything just worked out of the box when I disabled it.
But this is very much an Nvidia problem and not a SecureBoot problem. There is a reason basically no-one else provides their drivers as one-size-fits-all binary kernel modules.
I started looking at Mac’s for my next computer. Due to this amazing project. https://asahilinux.org/
you need a Microsoft signed stub to boot anything other than Windows on a PC
False. Every PC I’ve had has allowed Secure Boot to be turned off, and some of them allow me to add another trusted certificate as well.
you need Apple’s blessing to boot anything on a Mac
False. The Mac boot process is completely unlocked, at least on Intel Macs.
your smartphone manufacturer decides whether you can unlock it and lose attestation
My Pixel 6 allows me to unlock the boot loader at any time.
Attestation exists, unfortunately, but it’s not nearly as pervasive as you seem to think.
This is the next logical step, to add “web app” attestation, since the previous ones had barely any pushback
Uh, there was huge pushback. That’s why even a Microsoft Surface won’t stop you from installing Linux.
your smartphone manufacturer decides whether you can unlock it and lose attestation
My Pixel 6 allows me
GOTO 10
My point is that at least some smartphone manufacturers make phones with unlocked boot loaders. As long as there’s at least one such manufacturer, does that not disprove your argument?
The Mac boot process is completely unlocked, at least on Intel Macs.
On Modern Macs, the process is somewhat convoluted, but you are able to boot into a custom compiled boot loader / operating system while secure boot is enabled. It just needs a few minor hoops to sign the boot loader - steps that would be difficult to social engineer around but perfectly reasonable to do them intentionally if installing an alternate operating system is your thing.
iPhone is, of course, a different story. Hopefully that changes some day. The CPU and boot process is the same as a Mac, so there’s no reason it couldn’t be unlocked. Might require government intervention though.
It just needs a few minor hoops to sign the boot loader - steps that would be difficult to social engineer around but perfectly reasonable to do them intentionally if installing an alternate operating system is your thing.
Does that not create a barrier for entry for non-technical people looking to use an alternative operating system?
non-technical people looking to use an alternative operating system
Umm, you don’t see the oxymoron there?
My Pixel 6 allows me to unlock the boot loader at any time.
By doing that, you no longer pass SafetyNet, and some apps refuse to work without it. If unlocking your device removes features, then you aren’t really allowed to do so.
you need a Microsoft signed stub to boot anything other than Windows on a PC
Can you expand on this? Maybe I’m just misunderstanding you, but a “pc” is not a Windows made machine. It is a collection of disparate computer parts made by different companies with no requirement to run Windows as the exclusive OS once put together.
Even on a Windows OS, I can run any program I want (that’s made to operate with Windows). I may get a warning if it’s not a “known” developer, but I can still run it. Did I miss a big update to how 11 works with unknown software or something?
PCs have been switching to UEFI instead of legacy BIOS startups, one of the features of UEFI is Secure Boot, which ensures all code being run during the boot process is signed with a valid key, which most PC manufacturers have been choosing to be a Microsoft key by default because Windows requires Secure Boot and most PC users want to run Windows. Depending on the manufacturer, you may be able to switch to “legacy BIOS” boot, add your own keys, disable the check, or use a Microsoft signed stub for your alternative OS. Only the last one is guaranteed to work, though.
Even on a Windows OS, I can run any program I want
Windows 10/11 Home in S mode only allows running programs from the Microsoft Store, you need to upgrade the license if you want to “sideload” stuff.
I have yet to encounter a PC where Secure Boot can’t be turned off.
Interesting. I wasn’t aware of all that. Troublesome.
If i recall you can toggle s mode off inside the Microsoft store and use it normally, you just cant turn it back on without a reboot.
S mode?? Man that feels like using a PC with a child lock turned on.
I believe he is talking about secure boot
I’m working on essentially removing Google from my life.
That is the only solution to all this!
To everyone: Please remove at least as much Google products/services as you can from your life. Start with the easiest ones. Have a plan and gradually find alternatives for all other products/services of them. Remove them from your life. It will help even if you do this partly. This is for the benefit of us all.
Also, let’s do the same to Microsoft, Apple, Meta, Reddit etc. Let’s not let our lives depend on them. They are corporations. They are programmed to maximize profit.
I know there’s currently not a lot of good alternatives out there, but if enough of us ditch these ass-companies, more and more open-source, decentralized, not-for-benefit services will pop up, and the existing ones will improve greatly. These are not for-profit projects that can be bought by corporations later and used to their benefit. They will only benefit their users.
Let’s do this!
Fuck megacorporations!
I wish it were feasible to get off youtube…
deleted by creator
For me the most annoying part was switching off gmail (I went to fastmail) and the hardest habbit to break was Google search (I mostly use DDG).
I use fastmail, great service.
What motivated me to do that is finding these megacorp providers do not keep your email private.
I don’t remember what my breaking point was, but since I dropped gmail there have been 2 or 3 announcements about it that would have gotten me to that point again.
The only thing I have left is YouTube. Apparently Piped allows registering and then storing subscriptions, maybe I’ll move mine there.
Gotta say, deleting my google account would be very awesome to do
I use FreeTube, which is opensource and allows you to subscribe to channels without an account. The awesome thing is that you can categorize channels under different “profiles”.
However, I think it won’t take too long for Google to paywall YouTube APIs and do what it can to prevent web scraping (through disabling login-less use or attempts such as the one linked in this thread.). So our best option would be to ask our favorite Youtubers to move (or duplicate) their videos to other platforms such a peertube, and start using those platforms ourselves.
Use invidious to watch YT videos “outside YT”. I think viewing from there doesn’t count towards their metrics, so you’re “freeloading” on their content. Some instances:
Not a bad idea. Just also avoid Microsoft, Apple, and any non-open hardware or software… they all do the same stuff or worse.
I don’t let perfection be the enemy of progress.
Is it progress, or just picking a different cage?
Good luck in your voyages though, my approach is to try keeping stuff in multiple cages, also far from perfect.
Spoiler for a later stage of your journey: Your phone gets wayv faster. That part is pretty nice.
Oh really? Is this from like not having to contact google analytics for every action?
I’m not sure, honestly.
Charitably, we could assume it’s just from removing Google and various carriers background apps meant to improve my experience.
Uncharitably, I have my suspicions. For the last five or so versions of Android something always seemed to be using processor cycles and battery when I wasn’t actually doing much with my phone.
But I never saw evidence of usage data exfiltration via Google apps - at least after I turned off the related optional settings.
In any case, switching to GrapheneOs was a startling and pleasant speed boost for me, whatever the real root cause.
It’s time for Alphabet to be broken up into separate letters.
Or have some letters removed all together.
The number of people protesting against them in their “Issues” page is amazing. The devs have now blocked the creation of new issue tickets or of comments in existing ones.
It’s funny how in the “explainer” they present this as something done for the “user”, when it’s clearly not developed for the “user”. I wouldn’t accept something like this even if it was developed by some government – even less by Google.
I have just reported their repository to GitHub as malware, as an act of protest, since they closed the possibility of submitting issues or commenting.
Yeah, as if github aka Microsoft is going to do anything about it … but hey, anything to keep the pressure up and not letting this go through.
Ad blockers are my best disability accommodation. The things they do with ads to capture attention f with my brain. I’m really going to struggle if this happens. And I’m dependent on the internet for so many things, from groceries to prescriptions to people.
Give me Firefox or give me death.
I’m a non-techie and don’t understand half of this, but from what I do understand, this is a goddamn nightmare. The world is seriously going to shit.
My ELI5 version:
Basically, the ‘Web Environment Integrity’ proposal is a new technique that verifies whether a visitor of a website is actually a human or a bot.
Currently, there are captchas where you need to select all the crosswalks, cars, bicycles, etc. which checks whether you’re a bot, but this can sometimes be bypassed by the bots themselves.
This new ‘Web Environment Integrity’ thing goes as follows:
- You visit a website
- Website wants to know whether you’re a human or a bot.
- Your browser (or the ‘client’) will send request an ‘environment attestation’ from an ‘attester’. This means that your browser (such as Firefox or Chrome) will request approval from some third-party (like Google or something) and the third-party (which is referred to as ‘attester’) will send your browser a message, which basically says ‘This user is a bot’ or ‘This user is a human being’.
- Your browser receives this message and will then send it to the website, together with the ‘attester public key’. The ‘attester public key’ can be used by the website to verify whether the attester (a.k.a. the third-party checking whether you’re a human or not) is trustworthy and will then check whether the attester says that you’re a human or not.
I hope this clears things up and if I misinterpreted the GitHub explainer, please correct me.
The reason people (rightfully) worry about this, is because it gives attesters A LOT of power. If Google decides they don’t like you, they won’t tell the website that you’re a human. Or maybe, if Google doesn’t like the website you’re trying to visit, they won’t even cooperate with attesting. Lots of things can go wrong here.
And the attester will know where you’re navigating, always.
It sounds like VPN’s would also get flagged as bots? Or could easily be treated as such.
They could get rid of ad blockers, anonymity, Tor, VPNs, Firefox, torrenting sites, independently hosted websites, open-source servers and non-Google Linux clients all in one go. It would be a corporate dream come true.
Or we could stop using their tools and services and fork off the internet run for people from the internet run for profit. It doesn’t need to be big or slick; it just needs to be there.
I like the idea of Internet 2.0. Kinda like what we are doing here on Lemmy. Corporate ruins it, we build it anew!
There are even alternative root-servers so we can even escape from the TLD hell
Your final paragraph is the real kicker. Google would love nothing more than to be the ONLY trusted Attester and for Chrome to be the ONLY browser that receives the “Human” flag.
And I’m sure Google definitely wouldn’t require your copy of Chrome to be free of any Ad-Blocking or Anti-Tracking extensions to get that “Human” flag /s
Too late.
Microsoft, Apple, and most hardware manufacturers have been the ONLY trusted attester on their own hardware for years already.
Also Microsoft on most PCs.
Appreciate you and everyone else who broke this down for me!
- You open an app…
The rest already works like that.
You can replace Google with Apple, Microsoft, any other hardware manufacturer, or any company hardware attestation software.
So, a lot of the replies are highlighting how this is “nightmare fuel”.
I’ll try to provide insight into the “not nightmare” parts.The proposal is for how to share this information between parties, and they call out that they’re specifically envisioning it being between the operating system and the website. This makes it browser agnostic in principle.
Most security exploits happen either because the users computer is compromised, or a sensitive resource, like a bank, can’t tell if they’re actually talking to the user.
This provides a mechanism where the website can tell that the computer it’s talking to is actually the one running the website, and not just some intermediate, and it can also tell if the end computer is compromised without having access to the computer directly.The people who are claiming that this provides a mechanism for user tracking or leaks your browsing history to arrestors are perhaps overreacting a bit.
I work in the software security sector, specifically with device management systems that are intended to ensure that websites are only accessed by machines managed by the company, and that they meet the configuration guidelines of the company for a computer accessing their secure resources.
This is basically a generalization of already existing functionality built into Mac, windows, Android and iPhones.
Could this be used for no good? Sure. Probably will be.
But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t legitimate uses for something like this and the authors are openly evil.
This is a draft of a proposal, under discussion before preliminary conversations happen with the browser community.
This is nothing less than a brazen attempt at total control of the primary large-scale communication mechanism of humanity.
This is a total affront to the ethos of the web and everyone involved in drafting this awful proposal should be publicly shamed. Stick sandwich boards on each of them saying “I tried to build the Torment Nexus”, chain them together and march them through the streets while ringing a bell and chanting “shame”.
Here you go
If only Ben was wiser.
Those names read like some characters in a bad novel…
This is so silly. There is no technical solution to trust. What if Russia or China want to run a bit farm? Or the US goverbment? Are you not going to trust their signatures, and face legal action i their markets? This stuff is so stupid, just be honest that you want people to watch your ads. Than we can all refuse and move on with our lives.
There is no technical solution to trust.
Google knows this. Trust isn’t really the problem they’re trying to solve.
This is my biggest issue, it’s such a bare-faced lie!
It’s completely insane for the browser to need to trust the client. Instead, you implement zero-trust, and require authentication and authorization for anything sensitive.
The server absolutely shouldn’t trust the client isn’t malicious, instead it should assume it is malicious until proven otherwise
Well good thing they have a company slogan of do no evil… Oh wait.
Yep, that sounds like a very Mega-Corp thing to do.
