3 ms·

Don't they do it in this linked article? https://security.apple.com/blog/private-cloud-compute/ https://security.apple.com/blog/private-cloud-compute/

advael 2y ago
Woa, good catch! Maybe they're doing better about at least being concrete about it, though I still have to side-eye "Users control their devices" (Even with root on macbooks I don't have access to everything running on it). However, the section that promises to open-source the cloud software are impressive and if true gives them more credibility than I assumed. I would still look out for places where devices they do control could pass them keys in still-proprietary parts of the stack they're operating, as even if we can verify the cloud container OS in its entirety if there's a backchannel for keys that a hypervisor could use then that's still a backdoor, but they are at least seemingly making a real effort here
- threeseed 2y ago
  > Even with root on macbooks I don't have access to everything running on it Just disable System Integrity Protection and then you do.
  - advael 2y ago
    Ah, word. Probably not applicable to my use case (It's a laptop that's remotely administrated for a job, and I avoid proprietary stuff for my personal devices where possible) but it's good to know it exists
  - solarkraft 2y ago
    That has a few drawbacks, for instance you won't be able to run iOS apps anymore.
    - advael 2y ago
      Yea, nice as it is to hear that they're nice to their dev marketshare, there's probably never going to be a sanctioned iphone the end user actually gets to control. Bread and butter and such
senderista 2y ago
This approach is definitely not "secure by construction" like FHE, it's just defense-in-depth with a whole lot of impressive-sounding layers. But I don't see how this has anything to do with provable security (not that TFA claims it does).
KoolKat23 2y ago
The only two questions I would have would be, how often are they "periodically rebooted" and what are the predefined metrics logged/reported. We may have some insight into the second point when the code is published.

advael 2y ago

Woa, good catch! Maybe they're doing better about at least being concrete about it, though I still have to side-eye "Users control their devices" (Even with root on macbooks I don't have access to everything running on it). However, the section that promises to open-source the cloud software are impressive and if true gives them more credibility than I assumed. I would still look out for places where devices they do control could pass them keys in still-proprietary parts of the stack they're operating, as even if we can verify the cloud container OS in its entirety if there's a backchannel for keys that a hypervisor could use then that's still a backdoor, but they are at least seemingly making a real effort here

threeseed 2y ago
> Even with root on macbooks I don't have access to everything running on it Just disable System Integrity Protection and then you do.
- advael 2y ago
  Ah, word. Probably not applicable to my use case (It's a laptop that's remotely administrated for a job, and I avoid proprietary stuff for my personal devices where possible) but it's good to know it exists
- solarkraft 2y ago
  That has a few drawbacks, for instance you won't be able to run iOS apps anymore.
  - advael 2y ago
    Yea, nice as it is to hear that they're nice to their dev marketshare, there's probably never going to be a sanctioned iphone the end user actually gets to control. Bread and butter and such

senderista 2y ago

This approach is definitely not "secure by construction" like FHE, it's just defense-in-depth with a whole lot of impressive-sounding layers. But I don't see how this has anything to do with provable security (not that TFA claims it does).

KoolKat23 2y ago

The only two questions I would have would be, how often are they "periodically rebooted" and what are the predefined metrics logged/reported. We may have some insight into the second point when the code is published.