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Comment by ethanhunt_ | Hacker News Reader

Very cool workaround in the article, but it feels like it's just another hole that is going to be closed off. It's impossible to balance because on the one hand we want these fortresses to protect us from prying eyes (see apple vs fbi), but manufacturers are also using these fortresses to keep out owners who just want to hack on their own things.

I'm glad Apple is working to keep backdoors out of iOS, but I still prefer Android because I can get into it anyway I want, and do things like the OP without having to resort to backdooring my own device.

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> It's impossible to balance because on the one hand we want these fortresses to protect us from prying eyes (see apple vs fbi), but manufacturers are also using these fortresses to keep out owners who just want to hack on their own things.

I think it's very easy to balance: it's my fortress, because I bought it; I should therefor be allowed and enabled to make it do anything I like. The recent changes which Google have announced — which mean that apps will no longer respect the keys I have installed on my devices — are a move in exactly the wrong direction.

How do you prove to the device that you are the one who bought it? You don't want e.g. an FBI agent to be able to root your device.

> How do you prove to the device that you are the one who bought it?

An arbitrarily-complex passphrase of my choosing plus a fingerprint seem reasonable.

Plus a set of long and complex commands to type to stop normal people being tricked into enabling it

Y'know, I honestly don't care all that much if normal people can screw up: learning not to screw up should be part of the public school education all our taxes pay for. We trust normal people not to stab themselves in the eye, not to shoot themselves through the head, not to crash their cars into others: we should trust them not to do stupid stuff on their computing devices.

And when they do, we should hold them liable for any damage their actions have caused to others, just as we do with all those other tools. Yes, I think liability for allowing one's computer to become part of a botnet is a Good Idea™. Car crashes aren't accidents, and allowing one's computer to become infected isn't accidental either.

We ban guns, have extensive driving courses, and let anyone do anything with computers.

Of course if your car crashed because you were driving down a street that a criminal was standing on you'd probably take it back for being terrible.

> We ban guns

Not in civilised countries.

> have extensive driving courses

That's what I'm arguing for. In this country the public pays for 12-13 years of education and subsidises another four; I'm arguing that among the subjects we should cover with that massive investment is 'don't be an idiot with computers,' much as we have drivers' ed.

> which mean that apps will no longer respect the keys I have installed on my devices

Wow, that sounds bad. Where can I read about this change?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12061320

> but manufacturers are also using these fortresses to keep out owners who just want to hack on their own things.

I'll play the devils advocate:

1. From manufacturers perspective, it is very difficult to differentiate if the modification are being intentionally done by the owner of the device, or if the owner is being attacked by a 3rd party (e.g. via malware or JTAG)

2. Ownership ends with the device and the app - you cannot 'own' a service that Google/Niantic/Apple/Steam are providing. They can dictate the terms for providing that service and for an online game like Pokemon, not having access to the service makes the ownership the app and the device pointless.

I think 98% of people are really better off in a closed system (excluding piracy). The real issue IMO is getting developer access to any Android or iOS device should be a straightforward and free process.

They're not better off - that's a bit like saying people would be better off if hairdryers were DRMed by magic to heat up only hair. Those closed systems are significantly limiting the usefulness of computing devices. Hell, it's getting hard to call modern mobile platforms "computing devices" - they're becoming glorified TV screens / pretty interfaces to your credit card.

Also, that remaining 2% has to come from somewhere. People learn to make next-gen tech by playing with and reverse-engineering today's tech.

Considering how many people download and install software that harms their PC, where tablets and phones are 'safe' it's complicated. People just don't ask others to come and fix my tablet which really is a vast improvement.

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