Hardware security in PCs to accompany new Windows

[Sy]

On 5/18/05, Colin McGregor <colinmc151-bJEeYj9oJeDQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org> wrote:

> Intel has been putting serial numbers in their
> microcontroller CPU chips (for doing things like
> controlling industrial equipment where having a unique
> number can be very valueable). Intel did include
> serial numbers in some versions of the Pentium III but
> this was a "feature" that got killed (due to public
> outcry) in the Pentium IV and Celeron CPU chips. Still
> this would be a trivial "feature" to add to systems,
> either as part of the CPU or as some sort of external
> dongle (i.e. "to use this software you must plug in
> this USB memory key"). Now, external dongles have
> never been very popular even though they have been
> tried many times since the Commodore 64 days (and
> before)... Not sure how you could make something like
> serial numbers fly...

My company's product uses a hardware dongle (safe net inc's[1] "superpro").

I knew some guys who were involved with cracking software which used
dongles.  The c64 software dongle protection was so cool..

Dongles would actually be pretty well received as an OS protection
mechanism, considering how many USB ports people have.  Laptop users
would cry over it though.. maybe a pc card or cflash or some other
type of card would do the trick.

TWD industry's[1] "remote anything" has a serial number based on the
mac address of the network card.  I think that's a decent middle
ground.  It's only slightly difficult to clone a mac address.  =/  (I
never did it, but I have the instructions around here somewhere..)

I totally don't respect copy protection.  It requires hardware which
is not user-servicable, not user-accessible in any form and such..
otherwise it's just pathetic.  The push for computers which are just
dumb terminals hooked up to a highspeed connection, or a closed
hardware/firmware/drivers/operating system would be the only two
reasonably successful ways of preventing various forms of
content/software/whatever piracy.


Well whatever.. I'm ranting.. I'm not part of the solution anyways.  ;)

[1] http://www.safenet-inc.com/
[2] http://www.twd-industries.com/
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