Dartmouth Project Combines Linux With TCPA

SiliconEntity writes "A new project from Dartmouth College demonstrates significant advances in combining Linux with TCPA. The software turns a Linux PC into a 'virtual secure coprocessor', which is able to check that none of its software is compromised and even (in a future version) prove its integrity to a remote system. Full GPL source code is available for the 2.4 kernel. This work is separate from the earlier IBM research which also combined Linux with TCPA, with the new project apparently more complete and with a road map towards a very functional Linux based trusted computing system. This could be an important technology for Linux to challenge Microsoft as it pushes forward with NGSCB (aka Palladium)."

Comments

Re:Sweet

[advocate_one]

I think you'll find Linux will have it well before MSFT does... and it'll work... and it won't require special hardware either. And you'll be able to double check the source code instead of having to take it on trust...

The source code

[OpenSourcerer]

>Full GPL source code is available for the 2.4 kernel

Please make sure that all the efforts are undertaken to remove any references to the construct 'main()' as it will infringe on SCO copyrights

Re:The source code

[kasperd]

main() as it will infringe on SCO copyrights

Luckily no important part of Linux uses that construct. It is mentioned a few times in the documentation and comments, but we can remove that without breaking anything. (Hint: Linux is a kernel, not a program.)

Re:The source code

[sholden]

Does it takes lots of efforts to be that stupid?

$ find linux-2.6.0-test5 -name '*.c' | xargs grep '^int main('
linux-2.6.0-test5/drivers/scsi/aic7xxx/aic asm/aica sm.c:int main(int argc, char *argv[]);
linux-2.6.0-test5/drivers/atm/fore200e_ mkfirm.c:in t main(int argc, char** argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/i386/boot98/tools/bu ild.c:i nt main(int argc, char ** argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/i386/boot/tools/buil d.c:int main(int argc, char ** argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/sparc/boot/piggyback .c:int main(int argc,char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/sparc/boot/btfixup prep.c:in t main(int argc,char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/sparc64/boot/piggy back.c:in t main(int argc,char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/kernel/skas/uti l/mk_ptre gs.c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/sys-i386/util/m k_thread_ kern.c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/sys-i386/util/m k_sc.c:in t main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/util/mk_constan ts_kern.c :int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/util/mk_task_ke rn.c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/um/main.c:int main(int argc, char **argv, char **envp)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/mips/boot/elf2ecof f.c:int main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/cris/arch-v10/ker nel/asm-of fsets.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/cris/arch-v10/b oot/tools/bu ild.c:int main(int argc, char ** argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/m68knommu/kernel/asm -offset s.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/arm26/boot/comp ressed/misc. c:int main()
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/arm26/kernel/asm-of fsets.c: int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/m68k/kernel/m68 k_defs.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/m68k/tools/amig a/dmesg.c:in t main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/prep/dum my.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/openfi rmware/dummy .c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/simple /dummy.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/ addSystemMap .c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/add RamDisk.c :int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/mkb ugboot.c: int main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/mk prep.c:int main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/mk tree.c:int main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/ad dnote.c:in t main(int ac, char **av)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/boot/utils/mknot e.c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc/kernel/find _name.c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc64/kernel/asm-o ffsets.c: int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc64/boot/pigg yback.c:int main(int argc, char *argv[])
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc64/boot/addSys temMap.c:i nt main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc64/boot/addRamD isk.c:int main(int argc, char **argv)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/ppc64/boot/mknote. c:int main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/arm/kernel/asm- offsets.c:in t main(void)
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/arm/boot/compre ssed/misc.c: int main()
linux-2.6.0-test5/arch/parisc/kernel/asm-o ffsets.c

Not compatible with eachother ?

[MoonFog]

From the PDF :
The exact relation between TCPA and the former Palladium is not clear; one suspects that at some point in the TCPA design process, Microsoft decided to withdraw and build their own variant.
This probably means the two technologies will not be compatible with eachother, files created under one will not be able to be opened under the other.

Re:Sweet

[advocate_one]

and it won't require special hardware either

correction... just managed to get into the site... it will require a "Trusted Computing Module" on the motherboard.

Re:Sweet

[MoonFog]

The TCPA is a comitee and is not something that belongs to Microsoft, although they are part of this comitee. IBM are also working on a TCPA technology. Palladium, or whatever it is called now, is perhaps the most "famous", but definately not the only one.

Don't like pdfs? Here's the TCPA paper in HTML

[flopsy mopsalon]

http://216.239.33.104/search?q=cache:nZrXhIU65ocJ: www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~sws/papers/msmw03.pdf:&hl=en &ie=UTF-8

Oooh! Verifiable integrity and an encrypted FS.

[Read Icculus]

Sounds like just the thing I need. That hacked together script that I currently use to md5sum all my important system binaries + files and verify them against the Known Goods database every 2 minutes is going out the window along with chkrootkit just as soon as I can go over every LOC with an STM and run this fine piece of software. Thanks be to you my fellow linux-users, I have finally found people who wear more layers of foil on their heads than I.

Re:Oooh! Verifiable integrity and an encrypted FS.

[mikeee]

I have finally found people who wear more layers of foil on their heads than I.

You fool! If you wear more than one layer the psychotronic carrier waves will resonate and penetrate the barrier!

Difference between Palladium and TCPA

[kompiluj]

The difference between Palladium and TCPA (Trusted Computing Platform Architecture) may be not obvious at the technological level but it is very simple - TCPA aims at integrity of kernel and system components - to assure you that your system can be trusted. It is easy to achieve with open software, because the system must defend itself from attacs from outside. Palladium, on the other hand, uses similar technology to make sure that the user does not do anything else than what is allowed by content owners. In that case software openness is impossible - otherwise you could do some harm to their system - attacking from inside...

So similar architecture from technical point of view - but different aims yield different results.

Re:Difference between Palladium and TCPA

[hanssprudel]

Not true at all. DRM and other user control systems only need to be closed when they are software based, because otherwise people can change the programs to remove the user hostile code.

The difference between Palladium and TCPA is really that while Palladium is a whole system for a building user hostile computers, TCPA is just an enabler.

What TCPA does is sign a hash of the OS that is loaded with an "endorsement key", embedded in the TCPA by the vendor and unaccessible to the user. Thus the TCPA chip is a able to do two things: it can verify to an outside source (that trusts the vendor) that the machine is a running a specific operating system (ie one that supports DRM and thus can be "trusted"), and it can encrypt data from one operating system so that another operating system cannot decrypt it.

TCPA provides everything that is needed at the hardware level to write any user hostile system on top of it, because the successive verification of signatures prevents any tampering with the code (even if the OS is open sourced). Palladium could be implemented with TCPA as it's only hardware aspect.

Thus, the argument that is sometimes seen here that TCPA would prevent the computer from booting Linux or any other operating system is false (incorrect scare tactics against these systems are unfortunate, they do more harm then good). What TCPA will do, is enable sites on the Internet to not allow you to read the data they give out, unless you are running an operating system that is user hostile and DRM friendly (and not in the "this site doesn't support mozilla" fashion, which can always be hacked around, but in a cryptologically safe fashion).

Re:Difference between Palladium and TCPA

[hanssprudel]

True .. but tell me:
1) Of what use is a Linux system, if no content can be decrypted on it?

Not much.

2) Will content-providers make content available to versions of Linux which can't be "trusted"?

Undoubtably not. But what format they release the data in is their concern.

It is important to remember that the only political issue here is fighting laws against compulsary DRM and laws against circumventing it where it exists. We should not fall into the whiner trap of trying to claim that we are somehow entitled to "content" in open formats. We are not.

The manner in which we should fight DRM is to explain to be people why they should not accept it. (And we need to start here on Slashdot - look at how many Slashdotters laud iTunes).

3) If you make a "trusted" version of Linux, will it then be modifiable by the user (say, a new kernel-patch)?

It will be modifiable of course, but then you are back to 1).

4) Of what use are Open Source advantages, if you cannot use them?

Not much.

5) Is this a threat to the Open Source development model?

Definitely.

Re:Difference between Palladium and TCPA

[sjames]

Like many things, TCPA is a neutral technology. If the TCPA just sits on the board unused, you'd never know it's there at all. With Palladium, your system will be actively user hostile and RIAA/MPAA/MS friendly.

TCPA in itself won't prevent booting Linux. The fear is that a BIOS could then be written that won't load an OS that isn't signed by Bill Gates. TCPA merely enables that non-functionality. In addition, it is entirely possible to have a CPU come up in crippled mode until it validates the BIOS against the TCPA so that an unsigned BIOS won't run either. That is the fear, a total lock-down.

On the other hand, if the user has the signing key (I say user, since in reality, whoever has the signing key is the owner), TCPA permits (but does not assure) user friendly, outsider hostile strong system security.

The problem is that we are all aware that certain corporations in the U.S. would happily torture all of their customers to death if it was shown that after all of the lawsuits are settled, they make an extra $0.10 over the next 5 years than they would otherwise. They will be more than happy to build a user hostile system and lease it to their customers if they can find a way to kill off the competition.

Even if the lease is called a sale, I maintain that it's in reality a lifetime lease since, as I said, whoever has the signing key is the real owner of the system.

One possible roadblock to that would be to get the above paragraph enshrined in law. Not only would that force vendors to be more honest in their sales of Palladium enabled systems, it would place a nice large tax burden on a corporate holder of the signing key since they would be forced to acknowledge that they actually own all that hardware out there. More likely, it would kill the whole thing since under that law, hardware vendors would have to treat the transaction as a gift to MS and themselves as a lease broker for MS.

Not the right idea...

[hanssprudel]

We want to fight Palladium by fighting acceptance of the idea that the computer should control the user and how he can access the data on his own machine, NOT by developing something functionally equivalent that happens to run under Linux.

Building a DRM system of our own, even if it is open and standards based, just strengthens the paradigm that will leed to an Internet where no data can be accessed as plaintext, applications that are allowed read data have to be accepted and certified by the media industry, and computers exist no longer to enable, but to control, their users.

Please protest against Palladium, TCPA, and all the other DRM proposals by refusing to have anything to do with them: not by strengthening their hand.

(And before somebody replies that TCPA isn't about DRM: Bullshit! Look up what an "endorsement key" is in the TCPA vocabulary.)

Re:Not the right idea...

[amcguinn]

Unfortunately, this kind of thing is valuable in some specialised areas. For high security systems, you want to know that only certain approved code can run.

What we care about is the preservation of general-purpose computers controlled by the user. If we aim to ensure that all computers are controlled only by the user, we will fail, and fail badly, because having, say, a firewall that cannot run introduced code is something so useful that we will not be able to prevent it.

I have hope: firstly, the overhead of trying to deploy this over a large office PC system (the main buyer of general-purpose PCs), will be too high for the benefits.

Secondly, the value of a general-purpose computer that will easily run new software is so high even for the ordinary home user that they will not be entirely replaced by DRM-enabled home entertainment consoles.

It is possible (but unlikely) that this infrastructure will eventually reach the **AA goal of preventing copying of their products. I can live with that provided that our ability to write software for our own computers isn't collateral damage.

Re:Not the right idea...

[hanssprudel]

The specialized areas thing just doesn't hold up. I have yet to see a single example of this that couldn't be solved by current hardware. A lot of people talk about company employees: but few employees have root on their computers anyways, so what is the point with the TCPA chip?

I'm at work right now, and since my local workstation is a Sun Ray I don't even have physical access data in ways that the operating system and application will not allow me (since they all run on a server somewhere). Why would TCPA be necessary to control what I did with my employers documents, instead of just software?

Even IBM admits that TCPA chips can be circumvented by hardware hacks (expect modchips to start appearing), so it can not be used to secure valuable information. The only logical purpose for this technology is to use it on home users, where access to mod chips is limited by laws like the DMCA.

It is possible (but unlikely) that this infrastructure will eventually reach the **AA goal of preventing copying of their products. I can live with that provided that our ability to write software for our own computers isn't collateral damage.

It is not the ability to write our own software that we will be sacrificing, it is the ability to use that software to communicate with the world. Once the TCPA infrastructure is there, the temptation to use it will be to strong to resist:

- eBay will be able to lock out all but some verified list of applications from accessing auction data, so that application to raise bids at the last minute can't be used.

- Microsoft recently kicked off other application from their IM system for "security reasons". As it stands now, this can be hacked around, do you think they'll hestitate to use TCPA to make that impossible? You think AOL are any different.

- Websites will be able to lock out browsers that can block pop-up ads, or that allow cookies to be cleared, or that lie about themselves in the User-Agent string.

- Games will be able to lock out modified versions.

- Given the common confusion that TCPA is about "security", how long do think it will be until your bank starts requiring it?

I could go on and on. The acceptance of TCPA spells the end of the open Internet, and the beginning of a closed network, where all but a few applications are locked out.

I know what I'll do. Whatever it comes to, I will not have a part of this, and I will simply refuse to accept having a computer that is hostile toward me. The reason I argue this so vehemently is because I hope it won't be lonely out here...

Re:Not the right idea...

[amcguinn]

The specialized areas thing just doesn't hold up. I have yet to see a single example of this that couldn't be solved by current hardware. A lot of people talk about company employees: but few employees have root on their computers anyways, so what is the point with the TCPA chip?

I don't have root on my win2k PC right now, but I've got a tomsrtbt floppy in my jacket pocket which works just fine.

Now, if the company was prepared to make the large investment in setting up a full TCPA-style architecture to stop me doing that, it would be prepared to make the much smaller investment in ripping the floppy drive out of my PC. As I say, I don't think the ordinary office desktop is a useful area for this.

I think real uses for this are very rare, just as PCs which are configured by their adminstrators to really lock down what the users can do are currently very rare. But they exist.

I know what I'll do. Whatever it comes to, I will not have a part of this, and I will simply refuse to accept having a computer that is hostile toward me.

Me too. But I think most of the world will be with us, not because they agree with our principles, but because the immediate, practical benefits of being able to run any piece of software on their PC without it being approved by any third party are far too great to sacrifice for the miniscule benefits (in normal circumstances) of "Trusted Computing".

Re:Not the right idea...

[paulhar]

Why this may or may not be a worthy cause I don't believe it's got a fundamental weakness. While each application relies on and uses the data it receives it may still take actions that weren't intended by the designer of the system.

Most "office" type applications execute the data directly (e.g. macros, vbscript, etc) and it would be a large step backwards to disable this even for the increase in security it would bring. We could turn it all off today (java, jscript, vbscript, macros etc) and we're still vunerable to bugs that get exploited.

Tricking "signed" applications to doing things they aren't supposed to do was demonstrated to great effect with the XBox hack.

Re:Not the right idea...

[bruthasj]

Question: Do you currently protest GPG signatures and encryption algorithms? Where do you draw the line between what *you* want to encrypt/control and what *you* want *others* to encrypt/control? Or do you want to pull an RMS and have no passwords to protect your systems, no security to lock your documents that you created and no rights to control stuff that you created? Shouldn't we let people have the right to handle guns and the right to handle encryption/document rights/system verification in anyway shape or form they please? Whether that be individuals, groups, churches, cults, governments, corporations, criminals, gangs, ACLU, EPA, Green Peace or whoever else!

Everything has an avenue of abuse, but that does not mean scrapping the whole thing because it's got a hole for possible misuse. I mean, look at another case in point: P2P networks. Do we sue the thing out of existence? Or do we fix the violators? What are the definitions of violators?

It's all nice and rosy to flat out and protest something that's "unknown", but the fact is the technology is here and big players are pushing for its existence. Unbelievers in the technology will always be a small ragtag of protestors holding up placards in front of large corporation buildings towering the skies of Redmond, WA.

Don't get me wrong, I hate Windows and I'm a Linux zealot, but I just cannot take your protest position at this time. Sorry.

Re:Not the right idea...

[hanssprudel]

My point was exactly that a lot of people (including you apparently) would find these applications favorable. So once TCPA is in place, we can expect the Internet to begin moving toward a closed system where all these things are possible.

So what will this mean?

It will means that innovation will be strangled, that new program features will be decided by lawyers on a comittee. Remember the RIAA's stated model regarding P2P software: you cannot write it without our permission. Welcome to that world.

It means that the open source development model, which relies on the usability of thousands of versions of the same program will be destroyed. And since the people doing the signing will be the commercial software vendors it seems doubtful they would consider signing even a single version of an open source app for free.

It means that ability to communicate and publish data will be recentralized through the signature authorities. It means the ability to censor every copy of a piece of data with the press of a button. Think that wouldn't happen? Think again: once the courts find out is possible, they will start with something that nobody can defend, like a piece of child porn or particularly egregious slander. Before you know it, it will be leaked scientology papers, and then any criticism against them.

It means the end of anything close to balance regarding in copyright law. Copyright law will become redundant, because all data will be encrypted and completely at the mercy of the publisher. The goal of ending the public domain once and for all will be achieved.

It means that people who decide that they own their computers, and refuse to submit to their computers authority over them, will be locked out from the Internet, and successively from society.

Re:Not the right idea...

[hanssprudel]

Because the only purpose of DRM is the control the user. This is unethical in and of itself, regardless of it's purpose. A computer program is responsible for acting in the interest of it's user the same way a doctor is to a patient, or a lawyer is to his client. Machines should be subjects to people, not the other way around.

I have never argued for forcing anything on those who wish to close their data. They can do whatever they want. I argue two things (and only the first in this particular thread):

1) People should not use TCPA, they should not accept it's presense in their hardware or software, and unless they actually want a closed Internet they should not be developing for it (like the Dartmouth people).

2) Our governments should not be making laws that remove OUR RIGHTS to hack through these system on our own machines, or to make them mandatory.

The people who do wish a closed network can knock themselves out writing DRM systems as far as I am concerned. I will continue arguing as loudly as I can that people should not use them.

Re:Not the right idea...

[riptalon]

a firewall that cannot run introduced code is something so useful that we will not be able to prevent it

This is true but you don't need TPCA to do this. Putting this functionality at the firmware level is sufficient to achieve what you suggest. In fact I would be suprized if it wasn't done already by specialized vendors. There is a difference between not trusting the computer user and the owner. An organisation can have firewalls with secure firmware such that no one can load any old software on to them without the right codes or keys (without pulling the battery on the CMOS, which is good enough, especially if you have a lock on the case). Putting the functionality in hardware is only useful for stopping the owner of the computer from using it anyway they want.

There is no valid security reason for TPCA. All security problems to do with stopping users from doing stuff the owner of the computer doesn't want done can be handled at the firmware and OS level. This sort of hardware solution is only necessary for DRM where even the owner of the computer isn't trusted. TPCA/Palladium is likely enough to spread through the installed base, leveraged by Microsoft's market share, without any help from the free software community. If it succeeds then free software is dead in the long term, so any cooperation with it is akin to attempted suicide.

Great business plan!

[Anonymous Coward]

Who will be the first to start selling mod chips for pc computers?

Trustworthy computing

[sneakybilly]

I love this bit from the microsoft ngscb pagen "Data can be protected with a secure pathway from the keyboard through the computer to the monitor screen, preventing it from being secretly intercepted or spied on" Yeah like this is a major security problem with current day computing. I've always wondered if my information is secure between my keyboard and the monitor :)

Re:Trustworthy computing

[hanssprudel]

It's not meant for you, none of this technology has anything to do with _your_ security. These products are intended to protect people from you, specifically, in this case, the movie industry who don't want you re-recording movies from the monitor cable.

Start Song..

[instanto]

Its the end of the world as we know it...

(I could have typed more, but then I would probably owe RIAA 150.000$ per slashdot user who read this)
(all 5 of them since I have a bad karma)

Palladium is actually about security

[Photo_Nut]

Think about this for a moment before you call me a troll, mark this post as flamebait, or bash me for being a MS supporter on the issue. It's not funny, it's serious.

Palladium/TCPA is a security measure, not just a DRM platform. Enabling DRM is impossible in the sense that DRM doesn't cover the analog hole. As long as people have the ability to reproduce video and audio, DRM will only prevent people who do not have other recording mechanisms from copying raw data. Digital cameras get cheaper each day. Multimedia devices are falling in price and becoming higher quality every day. Today I saw a $50 DVD/CD/MP3 player. Star Trek like systems will be here before most of us die of cancer.

Now lets get back to our topic. Security. Palladium. The thing which Palladium prevents is unsigned code from executing. It's literally a form of sandbox for x86 code. Say that you write a program which attempts to install itself into my system registry and that installer mechanism isn't signed, my computer can prevent you from installing software on it. Of course, if I (as the user of the machine) am given the choice, and let you install the software anyway, knowing it is unsigned, then at least I can share the blame for the insecurity.

Bill Gates is no stupid man. It is right that these systems are systems based on trust. If you don't trust Microsoft, it doesn't work. If the magic key-granting-key for granting root keys is ever discovered or hacked at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, then the game is over. Of course, in the Linux world, that magic key is somewhere else. Maybe there is a new key for each distribution.

Now, I'm not saying that this system doesn't have potential for being abused. If I sign my worm for Red Hat Linux, then the protection system is useless. Worms might still be able to get inside via the older flawed software. Microsoft needs legacy applications to continue its business. The reason that MS owns so much of the computer market is that it had so much of the application share before and it didn't ruin feature compatibility with newer versions, among MS apps and with 3rd parties that were important.

The initial hole in Palladium is the same hole in DRM: In order for it to be successful, it has to work. DRM doesn't work (analog hole, memory and simulation based attacks), and Palladium may make a huge dent in internet worms, but it won't stop Macro Viruses or prevent IE from popping up new windows.

Palladium is one step in the right direction: locking down the OS to only perform installs of "trusted"/signed software. There are several other serious security measures which need to be taken:
1) Buffer Overflow prevention
2) Unsigned Device Driver prevention, and strict certification of Device Drivers
3) Lock-Down of all user and administration activities into appropriate accounts
4) Making all of the above trivial to set up for a newbie

Microsoft isn't much farther along than Linux in any of these areas, but Linux won't gain any momentum among novice users if it doesn't improve in ease of use. The next 4 years should be very interesting in the software market. The industry has matured a great deal recently after its adolescence period/dot com crash.

Re:Palladium is actually about security

[amcguinn]

There are two reasons for wanting this in hardware, as opposed to just in the software:

1. To enforce rules that the user can't break ("hostile computing").
2. To prevent the boot loader from being corrupted by malware.

The second reason is a tiny capstone on a pyramid of security that most people haven't built to anywhere near the height where it would be useful. It can be practically disregarded.

All the other things you list can be done without hardware support, and the only catch is that the end user can choose to disable them. Even then, he might need to open up the box to do it. (password-protected BIOS, no booting except from hard disc: most PCs can do that.)

And you're wrong about worms. In most cases, as far as the OS is concerned, the worm isn't running. Some ordinary program (e.g. SQL Server in the case of the slammer worm) is running, but the worm, by feeding it bad data, has caused it to corrupt itself so that it has effectively become the worm. There is no "worm.exe" for a security processor to refuse to run.

Re:Palladium is actually about security

[Ed Avis]

But if you don't want to run a particular program (such as a worm), don't run it. There is no need for all this signature stuff, except to prevent the user from running software of his own choosing.

If you did decide to run only code signed by a trusted key, the only reasonable system would be for the owner of the PC to posess that key. (This could be the company IT department, or the individual user for home systems.)

Re:Palladium is actually about security

[Minna Kirai]

Enabling DRM is impossible in the sense that DRM doesn't cover the analog hole.

The technologies being used to enable DRM hardware create user-hostile computers and are a step along the way to plugging the "analog hole". You mention that digital cameras (still or video) are getting cheaper and better all the time. But digital watermarking already exists, and digital shape-recognition is getting better and better. Long-term, the advances in software will overwhelm hardware improvements. Hardware may open an analog hole, but software will close it.

Future scenario:
20 years from now, a friend visits you with a laptop, and he plays music while your webcam dumps his whole visit into a 3 terabyte AVI.

Weeks later, you'll order a few MP8 songs with your credit card. A click-through license agreement gives the publisher certain rights to monitior your compliance. In collaboration with your OS vendor, they transmit a program onto your PC during a routine system update. This program runs automatically during periods of low CPU use and scans your audio data for any patterns resembling something the publisher owns (not just the songs you rented, but anything in their vast catalog). The software is fast, because it only needs to read user-recorded files. The majority of your songs were legally downloaded and have a copy-protect flag, so they can be skipped.

If an unprotected file gets a 98% confidence match on anything they own, it is automatically uploaded to a lawyer on another continent. This man doesn't know what user's computer it came from, and is sworn not to violate your privacy if the file turns out to be anything other than an analog copy of his client's work. After a quick human-verification that the file sounds the same, the publisher's HQ sends an emergency message to both the OS vendor and the FBI. Instantaneously, your computer freezes up to protect evidence, and an arrest warrant pours out of the fax machine of the nearest police department.

The owner of the PC does NOT own the master keys

[NZheretic]

The long term problem with IBM's model of the TCPA is exactly the same with that of clipper chip encryption, the owner of the PC does NOT control the attestation master keys. This leads to the same escrow agent model which is far to open to exploitation by The New American Corporate Soviet.

I'm sorry but totally avoid TCPA

[FeatureBug]

You cannot copy the keys inside TCPA hardware. I'll explain what this means (if you don't like reading about technicalities, just skip to the final paragraph)

Every time you buy a new PC with TCPA you will not be able to copy the old TCPA keys on your old PC to your new PC. This means you will completely lose access to your videos and your music which you legally purchased and used on your old PC. Effectively you have to buy another set of keys to regain access to your videos and your music collections.

TCPA and other DRM technologies are being pushed by the publishing industry and hardware manufacturers like IBM who want to sell more of their hardware equipped with DRM to make it attractive to commercial content locked-down publications.

TCPA means LOCK-down, LOCK-out, LOCK-up enabler. Avoid getting anything with TCPA.

Re:I'm sorry but totally avoid TCPA

[omen]

TCPA means LOCK-down, LOCK-out, LOCK-up enabler. Avoid getting anything with TCPA.

[ Disclaimer, I'm one of the primary developers. ]

Score: -3 Mis-informative

You are assuming that TCPA is being used to enforce DRM, and that that is the only valid use of TCPA. Have you looked at what we have done? We are using TCPA, but not for DRM. We are providing a way for the admin to use TCPA to help secure their computer against outside attack. Again, check out the IBM white papers: http://www.research.ibm.com/gsal/tcpa/.

Omen

Re:I'm sorry but totally avoid TCPA

[russotto]

Sorry, but TCPA pretty much can only be used for evil. The "killer app" for TCPA is DRM. The way TCPA enables -enforceable- DRM have been posted and written-about ad nauseum.

TCPA probably wasn't devised with DRM in mind; it resembles the old "compartmented workstation" idea, and I imagine that's where its roots lie. But DRM is certainly the blazingly obvious use for it, and unlike other DRM schemes, TCPA-based schemes can actually work on general-purpose hardware.

What about an emulator?

[Yartrebo]

Couldn't this be defeated by running a Pentium-with-palladium emulator. It would implment all the normal instructions (like add, jmp, etc) properly, it would handle the authentication instructions by always saying yes, and it would handle encryption and decryption opcods with noops. For the icing on the cake, it could log all keys sent to it to /var/www/html/keys.txt.

You would start with a freshly formatted harddrive (prefferably non-DRM crippled, but as long as it can run Linux and your emulator, it's fine) and install Linux on it. Then you would install your Pentium emulator with fake DRM support (a bit like Wine). Then you would install your Windows-with-DRM through the emulator. All the DRM software wouldn't know the difference.

Assuming that a DRM system will allow unsigned code to run (and just stop you from modifying/copying signed data), this will allow crackers and rippers to make perfectly functional non-DRM programs and media files that will run on normal (DRM-crippled) systems, and if not, then there will be a HUGE incentive to get uncrippled machines, much like mod chips for game consoles.

Re:What about an emulator?

[hanssprudel]

Yes, but you need a root key that is signed by some authority (the kind of keys that are embedded in the chips).

If you can get ahold of one of these keys, then you can simulate running a "trusted" system and cheat the DRM. They won't be easy to get ahold of though. Modchips will probably prove a better avenue.

TCPA does have good uses

[Old time hacker]

The TPM is a hardware component that implements the security model. It so happens that this exists on a bunch of modern IBM laptops. It is disabled by default.

Background: The TPM contains a number of PCRs. These are (roughly) hashes of bits of code -- the BIOS, the bootloader, the kernel, etc. The TPM also contains a private/public key pair which is generated when you reinitialize the TPM (i.e. the private key is not known to anybody).

The TPM can be used to encrypt a blob of data using the private key. It can also mark the encrypted blob such that it will only decrypt it if (some set of) the PCRs have the *same* value.

What is this good for?

This means that you can tell if your kernel has been modified in a very secure way. If your application is stored encrypted on disk, then you can ask the TPM to decrypt it (probably you just ask it for the key). It will only perform this operation *if* the boot process was the same as when the application was setup.

It means that someone with a boot floppy cannot get to your data (different boot process). You could also arrange to have the data protected from single-user mode.

However, there is a downside -- upgrading the OS becomes really tricky!

Tinfoil for the mad hatter

[poptones]

If you have a collection of AVI movies and MP3 songs, where did you get those? Is there some great archive sites I've never heard of where movie and music studios are giving away tens of thousands of high quality downloads? Is McGraw-Hill offering all their new books in PDF downloads? See, I keep hearing "content provider this" and "content provider that" but I still don't see any evidence this new scnario represents any sort of change from the one we have already...

Are there any websites that offer high quality streaming video? Or even high quality downloadable movies? How about high quality MP3s? Anything at all the publishers are offering "legally" in a format of higher quality than I have been getting (for years) absolutely free via USENET?

How about plain ol' "information" websites? Hmmm... let's see. Geocities might be a good example. No streaming video (big deal) but they host tens of thousands of home pages. So does AOL. So let's say they decided to use this Palladium-Longhorny stuff to keep their "members pages" available only to those willing to use their client software.

Uhhhh... so what? I can't recall the last time I visited a geocities page (much less an AOL members page), and I'm pretty sure if I go over the proxy logs I'll not find anything more than a few "404" pages with their name on'em. Yahoo? I used to read a couple of their groups, but they're gonna send spam to you one way or another so I quit that long ago. There's just as much content in usenet, and I get to call the shots.

See? This doomsday scenario really isn't much different than what we have now - it's just more of the same but with encryption. I really don't give a shit if universal wants to put their movies online and lock them away behind MS-centric operating systems, because I wouldn't use the service even if they slapped a Penguin on the door and made the "movie viewer" part of the RH12 base distribution. I wouldn't use it because a) I don't have broadband and b) if I want my own copy of a movie I will rent the DVD and rip it myself, or do a sneakernet trade for a copy from someone I trust to do a good job of it.

"Content providers" will lock away only as much as is economically viable. If there's no money in it, they won't lock any of it away. But right now they have it all "locked" away (at least as much as they are able). So what does any of this "evil" new technology change?

Having a system I can trust even if it's hanging out on a raw IP is a very good thing. If the tradeoff I have to accept is that Universal will use the same technology to sell movies to people with plenty of disposable income, more power to'em.

Re:Tinfoil for the mad hatter

[Minna Kirai]

Visited the NYT lately? How about LA Times? How about MIT Press? There are already hundreds, if not thousands of sites, locking their content away behind logins - they don't need DRM to do it.

You're avoiding the point. They already use logins today, and will in the future. But someday they can have these logins protected by DRM technology. They will get a minor economic advantage from this extra protection, but newspaper margins are slim, so they'll grab for it.

Then, it will be impossible to visit those sites with an untrusted OS. It will be impossible to build a PC, compile Linux, compile Mozilla, and use that to browse the web. The freedom of disorganized amateurs to create useful computer systems will be gone.

When free expression is no longer possible on US soil, US dollars will make sure there's a world of domains out there where speech remains free

That's a head-in-the-sand argument. "The government cannot now enforce a prohibition against a behavior. Therefore they will never be able to prohibit it."

Sorry, but in the face of ever-increasing computer power, that viewpoint just doesn't hold up. If you don't believe me, Lessig has published extensive documents describing exactly why.

There's a lot of talk

[Kickasso]

about how TCPA will kill open source. This outcome is very probable. But they can also work fine together. There is a solution, and open source people would do good by pursuing it instead of blindly fighting the inevitable.

TCPA needs an agreed-upon, standard microkernel around which different OSes could be built. A whole bunch of new open source OSes and, yes, new Microsoft OSes. This microkernel would be developed by an independent body and signed by DRM-loving vendors. Because it would be very small, and change very rarely, there should be little problem with it. Yes, end-users won't be able to modify it; that's the price one pays. They won't want to do it very much because the microkernel provides very little functionality.

Hardware vendors would release drivers for their wares that would work with this microkernel. These drivers would be otherwise OS-independent and would include decryptors and decoders needed for playing content. The vendors would get their drivers signed, too. (And open-source OSes will get closed-source drivers for free: a nice bonus!)

The rest of the OS and the entire universe of user apps would need not be trusted at all. They would run in user space and be totally unprivileged.

So I think open-source people should approach TCPA and offer to work together along these lines. There's nothing to lose, and much to gain, so why not at least try it?

Re:The owner of the PC does NOT own the master key

[omen]

The long term problem with IBM's model of the TCPA is exactly the same with that of clipper chip encryption, the owner of the PC does NOT control the attestation master keys.

[ Disclaimer, I'm one of the primary developers. ]

That is blatantly not true. Whoever does the "Take Ownership" command of the TPM controls the master key. In the case of the Enforcer, the admin is the one that owns the TPM.

Omen

Re:Prove integrity?

[Minna Kirai]

2. Has the kernel module loading facility been disabled?

No, but it verifies that any modules have also been signed before loading them. (Alternatively, the superuser could force an untrusted module to be loaded, but this will taint the whole kernel and it will lose the ability to open protected files until you reboot)

1. Its open source. You must (by requirements of the GPL) be given everything you need to compile a derivitive work of this.

The currently prevaling legal interpretation (shared by Linus Torvalds amoung others) is that the signing key cannot be construed as part of the source code. Source code is human-readable description of what software does. A key is just 1024 bits of random noise.

The argument is that the GPL requires people to give you the source code to a program; they don't have to buy you the hardware needed to run it.

Suppose you buy a Playstation5 from Sony and request the kernel code under GPL. If you compile the kernel without having the key, you've got a working kernel. The hardware you own won't load it, but that's not Sony's problem. If you sign a pile of NDAs and supply a check for $65000, Sony will rent you one of the same developer-class machines their own programmers use to write games. That system will load unsigned code, although you've sworn in blood not to abuse that great priviledge.

I would rather that this legal interpretation doesn't hold, as it perverts the intent of GNU "Free Software", but it hasn't been seriously challenged yet.