Comment by dane-pgp

> The difference now is that Microsoft are saying they will only support machines which have these TPMs

That's a reason to worry about Windows 11 requiring a TPM, rather than a reason to worry about Pluton specifically. But even so, I don't think it's an especially realistic one - outside extremely constrained setups, it's very hard to make remote attestation work in a way that gives you any meaningful guarantees (eg, simply forward the challenge on to a machine that is running the "approved" OS).

> The trap hasn't been sprung yet, but those are the teeth, yes.

Again, something they could just do today while zero people have Pluton.

If Microsoft want to lock-down the entire x86 market, they can do that now. They don't need to wait years for everyone to shift to new hardware that has Pluton in it.

Look at Google safety net and you will get a clear idea what is happening. If you want to use some streaming apps, etc they will make sure you run an unmodified and up to date OS.

On a side note: Microsoft already starts patronising users e.g. by blocking access to security tokens from nonelevated processes. I hate it when my os starts messing with my freedom to develop sth on top. It all comes in the name of security but will in the end effect freedom.

That's a bullshit scenario.

There are way more android and apple devices online than PCs. No ISP would do anything for PCs alone and if they did, I could easily turn my PC into an "Android Tablet". So Microsoft would have to get Google and Apple behind the same plan and then phase out all existing devices and force all ISPs to implement this. This would yield a huge public outrage because the first states to follow would be China et. al., where remote attestation would enforce you to install the latest government, ahem, upgrade, to your device. Of course the US government and various European nations would very much like to follow suit, but they would be slower than China and then look like they follow the authoritarian path a bit too closely.

Remote attestation will be sold to streaming providers so they can extend their DRM to cover unpatched systems. Maybe multiplayer games will follow. This ain't gonna happen at the ISP level.

Let's be realistic here. The real competition to Microsoft, Chrome OS, already has a feature to prevent you from delaying updates. It's not a bug or a risk, it's a feature. And it does not require any sort of TPM to be enforced. Microsoft could force all its users to run the latest version, and to run only signed executables today. What Pluton does is it allows those two things to happen more securely.

I don't think this is plausible (government mandate of remote attestation for any kind of Internet access), but if this happens, then I just add smallest and cheapest PC possible (think Atomic Pi) with this remote attestation hardware capability (Proton/TPM/whatever) to the separate VLAN on my home network (so it can't access any other host on LAN side of the router) and forget about the little thing until it fails, e.g. for next 15 years or so. I wouldn't trust this device with my data, I wouldn't run any meaningful applications on it, heck I won't ever attach any monitor or human input devices to the damn thing.

No problem for me, as I'm on the verge to say goodbye to Windows anyway. But I'm pretty sure it would be a problem for most of the people using Windows.