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I don't understand why people talk about open-source as means of guaranteeing software integrity. For most software projects these days, it's impossible to ver

I don't understand why people talk about open-source as means of guaranteeing software integrity. For most software projects these days, it's impossible to verify that a binary blob came from a given set of source code. It's possible to do, though. Bitcoin, tor and a large number of Debian packages build reproducibly: https://wiki.debian.org/ReproducibleBuilds/About https://wiki.debian.org/ReproducibleBuilds/About https://blog.torproject.org/blog/deterministic-builds-part-two-technical-details https://blog.torproject.org/blog/deterministic-builds-part-t...

vilhelm_s 11y ago
The article explicitly mentions reproducible builds.
lifeisstillgood 11y ago
Open source is the only means to guarantee software integrity. What surprises me is the fear that not enough eyeballs will look. But for VW, the scrutinising eyeballs will be employed by GM, Toyota etc. The incentive to catch your competition in cheating and thus collapse their business is enormous. We should encourage more of it. Maybe give the competitors a factory each.
- roymurdock 11y ago
  Or they will collude, as they probably did with the emissions testing. There's no way GM and Toyota saw VW's numbers and just blindly believed they were plausible. They were probably scared of calling VW out because it would bring an industry-wide crackdown, which it is. Now things are going to be more expensive for all auto manufacturers.
- drdaeman 11y ago
  To be precise the first half of Freedom One [1] is the requirement (and not a guarantee), not "Open Source" or "Free Software". And the requisites for that requirement are decriminalization of research including sharing results of those, and possibility of said research, i.e. absence of technical measures that prevent access to the software. This may work with politicians. I fear, persuading them to grant users other freedoms (like a freedom to change program or distribute your changes) is very unlikely to happen. [1]: "The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish"

vilhelm_s 11y ago

The article explicitly mentions reproducible builds.

lifeisstillgood 11y ago

Open source is the only means to guarantee software integrity. What surprises me is the fear that not enough eyeballs will look. But for VW, the scrutinising eyeballs will be employed by GM, Toyota etc. The incentive to catch your competition in cheating and thus collapse their business is enormous. We should encourage more of it. Maybe give the competitors a factory each.

roymurdock 11y ago
Or they will collude, as they probably did with the emissions testing. There's no way GM and Toyota saw VW's numbers and just blindly believed they were plausible. They were probably scared of calling VW out because it would bring an industry-wide crackdown, which it is. Now things are going to be more expensive for all auto manufacturers.
drdaeman 11y ago
To be precise the first half of Freedom One [1] is the requirement (and not a guarantee), not "Open Source" or "Free Software". And the requisites for that requirement are decriminalization of research including sharing results of those, and possibility of said research, i.e. absence of technical measures that prevent access to the software. This may work with politicians. I fear, persuading them to grant users other freedoms (like a freedom to change program or distribute your changes) is very unlikely to happen. [1]: "The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish"