>The nagging knowledge that no matter how thoroughly I secure my environment it is insecure by design at a base level. That's like worrying about leaving the h

>The nagging knowledge that no matter how thoroughly I secure my environment it is insecure by design at a base level. That's like worrying about leaving the house since a meteorite strike could kill you. If you're that concerned about the security of your environment then you shouldn't connect your PC to the internet or any wired or wireless network regardless of having IME or not. Everything you didn't design and build yourself from the ground up or which you can't thoroughly inspect and audit in detail is insecure by design and should be treated as such, IME or not, yet the entire world still functions just fine with billions of devices talking to each other over the internet because those are the pros of commonization of hardware and software while we have learned to minimize the security risks associate with that commodization. The threat model you're scared of is easily solved by air gapped systems which is what we have at work in our secure environment making your perceived IME threat blown out of proportion.