Maybe not (yet).
This makes me think about the entire iPhone/iOS NSO Group mess. In one
article they where aptly described as the “SpaceX of surveillance”. In
other words: they have brought economy of scale to something that was
previously only possible for very resourceful nation states. Now every
potbelly dictator can buy their services.
Maybe exploiting ME is possible? Maybe right now only a nation like the
US or China is able to pull it off? I have no idea.
What I do know:
- there is another computer in my computer
- it has access to all peripherals
- it can run even when the computer is powered off
- it runs proprietary code that was written by imperfect humans working
for an for-profit enterprise and likely under deadline - my government insists on having an off-switch for it
If a nation state wants to spy on me they will. They don’t need the ME
for that. I am worried about the enterprising Cyber-criminal gaining or
having this capability while we all tell each other that it’s not really
a factor.
