this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2023
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THIS IS NOT (just) ABOUT GOOGLE
Currently, attestation and "trusted computing" are already a thing, the main "sources of trust" are:
This is already going on, you need a Microsoft signed stub to boot anything other than Windows on a PC, you need Apple's blessing to boot anything on a Mac, your smartphone manufacturer decides whether you can unlock it and lose attestation, all of Microsoft, Apple and Google run app attestation through their app stores, several governments and companies run attestation software on their company hardware, and so on.
This is the next logical step, to add "web app" attestation, since the previous ones had barely any pushback, and even fanboys of walled gardens cheering them up.
PS: Somewhat ironically, Google's Play Store attestation is one of the weaker ones, just look at Apple's and the list of stuff they collect from the user's device to "attest" it for any app.
False. Every PC I've had has allowed Secure Boot to be turned off, and some of them allow me to add another trusted certificate as well.
False. The Mac boot process is completely unlocked, at least on Intel Macs.
My Pixel 6 allows me to unlock the boot loader at any time.
Attestation exists, unfortunately, but it's not nearly as pervasive as you seem to think.
Uh, there was huge pushback. That's why even a Microsoft Surface won't stop you from installing Linux.
GOTO 10
My point is that at least some smartphone manufacturers make phones with unlocked boot loaders. As long as there's at least one such manufacturer, does that not disprove your argument?