Re: Confinement (even with TPMs) and DRM are not mutually exclusive

[Marcus Brinkmann]

At Wed, 07 Jun 2006 01:43:03 -0400,
"Jonathan S. Shapiro" <address@hidden> wrote:
> The problem here is liability and lawsuits: if something goes wrong,
> there is no evidence to decide later whether the program was executing
> legitimately or not. Neither the developer nor the user is adequately
> assured that a robust determination of whether liability might exist
> under contract is possible.

Liability is a legal subject matter, not a technical.  In this case,
it is not the developer who needs the attest that the developers
software has been run, but the user, in order to proof to court that
this is indeed the software he ran.  Thus, I think you got the
benefits backwards.  The developer can only be hurt by an attestation,
because it potentially increases the developers liability.  I have not
researched it, but intuitively it seems to me very well possible to
come up with technology that protects the users freedom while allowing
the user to demonstrate to court which software he ran at a particular
point in time, and what the software did.  However, if TC technology
were to be used, a user should desparately try not to have the
developer receive the attestation, but a third agent whose interests
side with the user.

In the end, it is a court which will decide who is liable for what,
not computer chips.

[...]

> The reason that ActiveX is such a disaster is that it relies on
> interfaces. You install an ActiveX control. It uses 15 others. One of
> these gets upgraded in a way that breaks the interface contract. In
> consequence, a seemingly unrelated control misbehaves in a way that the
> user can observe.
> 
> Good luck figuring out who to call or who to blame.

"Blame is for god and little children."  (Dalton Trumbo)

Thanks,
Marcus