Open Fabs

[grarpamp]

On Thu, Jul 30, 2015 at 4:22 AM, Mirimir <mirimir at riseup.net> wrote:
>>> then it is not possible to build a trusted CPU.
>>
>> You watch while... I collect wood and ore and smelt into axe, you
>> trust axe. I split tree and assemble hut, you trust hut. I put
>> wheel in water and make mill, you trust flour. I give you magical
>> computer before I make abacus, you throw in river and order me
>> make abacus first. Eventually trusted CPU is made.

> Woah! How many years to build the tool chain to a trusted CPU?

As before, the knowledge already exists, so physical replication
from the ground up should be very fast.
TCSEC is not unknown, but designing and embedding it into every
process is rather new (both as mindset and applied) so it will take
some time and must be done beforehand.

> Also, how many people? And how to trust them? One bad apple, you know.

Again... draw interested people from multiple philosophical sectors, use
multiple man rule, consensus rule. You don't have to trust them outside
the fab, only observe them inside. The more principled zealots like
Stallman and Juan involved the more likely somone will flag upon trust
violation.

The human problem is hard. But at the end of the day, if the outcome
of the project (trusted chips) is important, the right people will come
together to do it and the level of trust achieved will be orders of magnitude
higher than what exists today.