So the only trust anchor remaining are the kernel and the hardware. It seems an attacker has to build a kernel module that detects the bootstrapping process and

So the only trust anchor remaining are the kernel and the hardware. It seems an attacker has to build a kernel module that detects the bootstrapping process and injects the (self-replicating!) bad code while building the final gcc. I like the work, but I still don't think the kind of attack mitigated here is practical. OTOH it's nice to have the option (if I was to build/publish my own distribution I would use this as my trust anchor, plus some ancient hardware and Linux 2.4 CDs to build my own bootstrap environment; though as a random guy on the internet I am probably less trustable than e.g. the Debian people).