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> the lengths organisations like Google go to to disable it

TIL about this detail. Where can I learn more?

EDIT: So this is now at 0 points. Interesting...

A recent talk [0] by Ronald Minnich from Google gives a nice overview of their efforts to replace parts of Intel ME and UEFI with Linux, mostly for security reasons.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iffTJ1vPCSo

https://firmwaresecurity.com/tag/google/

ME is a useful part of the system. It is in charge of watchdog timers (I think) and mid-level power management. The problem is that it is persistent and opaque. If the operating system were responsible for configuring and managing ME, it would allow it to perform these tasks without being so odious.

Why does it need access to all RAM for watchdog timers and mid-level power management?

It also facilitates some hardware bring-up, and has management (hence the name) functionalities. So it's not really surprising that it has access to everything. That's not to say that it's at all acceptable that modern machines have such a gigantic security flaw.

The govt may have forced them into putting it there.