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> The argument they're making is obviously true, both in theory and in fact (look up how Best Buy repair technicians act as informants for the government). I c

> The argument they're making is obviously true, both in theory and in fact (look up how Best Buy repair technicians act as informants for the government). I can also look up how repair technicians have affixed GPS trackers to cars or defrauded consumers during repairs. But I'm still glad that I can take my car to a non-manufacturer repair shop. The "TPM's are all going to fail" argument is the "terrorists will win" argument, except for HN instead of regular citizens. In most cases this is an unnecessary conflict -- compromising the TPM wouldn't be necessary for many of the repairs consumers want to make. From the article: > After all, TPMs are in Dell computers. Dell makes diagnostic software and diagnostic codes and schematics available for their hardware and I haven’t heard Microsoft or anybody else suggest that a TPM on a repairable Dell laptop is any less secure than the TPM on an unrepairable Microsoft Surface. We could make a lot of progress on right to repair without ever coming in conflict with existing TPMs. If that's Microsoft's concern, then fine -- I'm OK starting with the noncontroversial, unsecured stuff first, like keyboards, glass, and batteries.

michaelt 7y ago
We could make a lot of progress on right to repair without ever coming in conflict with existing TPMs. Maybe not TPMs - but the iPhone Secure Enclave is going to crop up pretty early in any such discussions, after iOS 9 disabled iphones where a third party replaced the home/touch id button [1] - often because a broken screen had been replaced. A later apple update walked this back to merely permanently disabling touch id and apple pay on such phones. [1] https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/what-is-iphone-error-53-3634865/ https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/what-is-iphone-err...
- danShumway 7y ago
  You're right that iPhone is an interesting case, but even with iPhone we could still make a lot of progress. To be clear, I do not have a lot of sympathy for Apple's arguments around secure enclave. As far as I'm concerned, right-to-repair is a tangible issue that effects nearly everyone, and having the government install a separate touch id button is a largely theoretical risk for most people. But, even the iPhone has parts that aren't effected by secure enclave -- so if it takes this argument off the table, I'm willing to let it go. We still have Apple blocking replacement parts as counterfeits when they enter the country; and we still have a bunch of diagnostic information, specs, and tools that are only available to authorized technicians. It's also worth noting that Error 53 wasn't forcing consumers to make a choice between the fingerprint reader and a 3rd-party screen replacement -- it was "bricking" the phone. That Apple was willing to roll that back and change their design so that Secure Enclave only disabled fingerprints, says to me that even Apple has admitted that secure enclave doesn't need to monitor every single part of their phones to keep consumers safe.

michaelt 7y ago

We could make a lot of progress on right to repair without ever coming in conflict with existing TPMs. Maybe not TPMs - but the iPhone Secure Enclave is going to crop up pretty early in any such discussions, after iOS 9 disabled iphones where a third party replaced the home/touch id button [1] - often because a broken screen had been replaced. A later apple update walked this back to merely permanently disabling touch id and apple pay on such phones. [1] https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/what-is-iphone-error-53-3634865/ https://www.macworld.co.uk/feature/iphone/what-is-iphone-err...

danShumway 7y ago
You're right that iPhone is an interesting case, but even with iPhone we could still make a lot of progress. To be clear, I do not have a lot of sympathy for Apple's arguments around secure enclave. As far as I'm concerned, right-to-repair is a tangible issue that effects nearly everyone, and having the government install a separate touch id button is a largely theoretical risk for most people. But, even the iPhone has parts that aren't effected by secure enclave -- so if it takes this argument off the table, I'm willing to let it go. We still have Apple blocking replacement parts as counterfeits when they enter the country; and we still have a bunch of diagnostic information, specs, and tools that are only available to authorized technicians. It's also worth noting that Error 53 wasn't forcing consumers to make a choice between the fingerprint reader and a 3rd-party screen replacement -- it was "bricking" the phone. That Apple was willing to roll that back and change their design so that Secure Enclave only disabled fingerprints, says to me that even Apple has admitted that secure enclave doesn't need to monitor every single part of their phones to keep consumers safe.