That’s true. But that may also be a plausible deniability thing - you create a place to hide binary modifications by making sure no two builds are exactly the s

That’s true. But that may also be a plausible deniability thing - you create a place to hide binary modifications by making sure no two builds are exactly the same. It could be chalked to some lack of care; however, up until 2000 or so, non reproducible builds were considered a bug in at least two places I worked in. The fact that it has become so hard to make builds reproducible could be Increased “entropy” (because no one cares To fix it) - but it could also be orchestrated by someone with a vested interest. E.g. - suppose you are a three letter agency, and want to implement a “reflections on trusting trust” attack. Non reproducible builds become a pre-requisite.