Re: Part 2: System Structure

[Bas Wijnen]

On Fri, May 19, 2006 at 10:37:00AM +0200, Pierre THIERRY wrote:
> > But currently any program can be reverse engineered, because in order
> > to execute it, you get the binary (this is true for things which run
> > on your own computer).
> 
> No, this is not true locally on a system. At least under Linux and
> probably under all existing Unices, just give execute permission without
> read permission on a binary, and it will happily run for you, without
> being inspectable.

I wrote:

> > to execute it, you get the binary (this is true for things which run
> > on your own computer).

Currently, I am root on my computer.  There is no way you can let me run a
program on a GNU/Linux machine where I am root without allowing me to see the
binary.

> So in this matter, the constructor is not a loss of freedom in any way.
> It's just a cleaner way of enforcing this kind of system policy.

It's a system policy which is there by accident.  Nobody uses it.  If the
constructor makes this kind of behaviour default, or at all starts using it,
then that definitely is a loss of freedom in practice.

It's much more so because even the system administrator cannot bypass it.
(The machine owner can, as long as we're not using TC, but he'll need a system
reboot for that, which is way too much trouble.)

> > We _could_ implement some new protections for people who make
> > proprietary software.  If we do, they're happy and might demand the
> > same protection from other systems.  If we don't, they won't even know
> > that it's possible.
> 
> You're late, they already know it's possible, because it *is* possible
> in other systems...

Technically it is possible, yes.  But it isn't used, because it doesn't really
work (mostly because the system administrator can bypass it).  And because the
technical people (that's us) don't even consider using it, the content people
(that's the RIAA) indeed don't even know it's possible.

And anyway, even if it would be possible, it's not like the RIAA has an
account on my computer that they can use to provide me with content.  If they
would, I (as machine owner) would indeed make sure that their account is fully
open to me, as opposed to "normal" user accounts.

Thanks,
Bas

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