4 ms·

easiest example: most components of a macbook laptop have their serial number baked in the OS (or some hardware controller, idr). So even if you can find a legi

easiest example: most components of a macbook laptop have their serial number baked in the OS (or some hardware controller, idr). So even if you can find a legit macbook part from another laptop, and you can even replace it yourself (which is also impossible but that's another story), the laptop won't boot. In order for it to boot, you need a special device which "official apple repair" people have, which can bake-in the new part's serial number.

scottyah 1y ago
Great from a security perspective, as far as mass stealing and swapping/scrapping parts for resale is concerned. I wonder how they'll prevent it now.
dgb23 1y ago
What's the purpose of that other than making it harder to repair? Is there any good faith argument to made made here?
- onesociety2022 1y ago
  Security measure - otherwise someone can intercept your MacBook during delivery, replace the original component with a fake one that has a backdoor and ship it to you and you start using it completely oblivious to the fact it has been hacked.
  - josephcsible 1y ago
    That might be an argument to reject non-genuine components, but it's not an argument to reject genuine components just because they've previously been installed in a different device. (And even if it's possible to modify a genuine component to add backdoors, this still doesn't help, since they could just modify the one that came out of your MacBook too.)
- skeaker 1y ago
  In theory people will steal Apple devices, then when they learn that digital locks make them impossible to use they will gut them for parts and sell those. Serial locking would defeat that. In practice, yes, it pretty much just exists to make them millions off of forced overpriced in-house repairs.
- Nextgrid 1y ago
  They will say "security", and unfortunately half of HN will gobble it up no-questions-asked. The security argument can be achieved just as well by giving the user the master key (on a Yubikey-style HSM if needed) to unlock the protection. The fact it's not done that way clearly shows the primary security they care about is that of Apple's bank account.
- trailbits 1y ago
  It does remove any incentive for a thief to steal a Macbook. They can't strip it for parts and sell those parts if they won't work.

scottyah 1y ago

Great from a security perspective, as far as mass stealing and swapping/scrapping parts for resale is concerned. I wonder how they'll prevent it now.

dgb23 1y ago

What's the purpose of that other than making it harder to repair? Is there any good faith argument to made made here?

onesociety2022 1y ago
Security measure - otherwise someone can intercept your MacBook during delivery, replace the original component with a fake one that has a backdoor and ship it to you and you start using it completely oblivious to the fact it has been hacked.
- josephcsible 1y ago
  That might be an argument to reject non-genuine components, but it's not an argument to reject genuine components just because they've previously been installed in a different device. (And even if it's possible to modify a genuine component to add backdoors, this still doesn't help, since they could just modify the one that came out of your MacBook too.)
skeaker 1y ago
In theory people will steal Apple devices, then when they learn that digital locks make them impossible to use they will gut them for parts and sell those. Serial locking would defeat that. In practice, yes, it pretty much just exists to make them millions off of forced overpriced in-house repairs.
Nextgrid 1y ago
They will say "security", and unfortunately half of HN will gobble it up no-questions-asked. The security argument can be achieved just as well by giving the user the master key (on a Yubikey-style HSM if needed) to unlock the protection. The fact it's not done that way clearly shows the primary security they care about is that of Apple's bank account.
trailbits 1y ago
It does remove any incentive for a thief to steal a Macbook. They can't strip it for parts and sell those parts if they won't work.