Re:What is AT&T doing at 1111340002?
by lxgr on Sunday November 07, 2021 @08:34AM
(#29139325)
> The cell network should not get to determine what people attach to it; it should just pass data back and forth.
I absolutely agree.
> And it doesn't require a smartcard either.
There are many good reasons why a counterparty does not trust you (fully) with a set of keys.
The biggest one is keys that allow financial transactions or billing events to happen: It makes the "I lost my password" defense for friendly fraud much less credible. Another can be to discourage sharing of a service (i.e. "account sharing").
Now there's two ways to keep "your" keys safe as a service provider: You build a fully locked down platform and only allow devices sold and made by you to attach to it (and play your content, use your phone network, transact on your payments network etc.), or you standardize the interface to the "key jail", keeping the rest of the device open and accessible to independent security research.
You can call such a tamper-proof device holding some issuer's private or symmetric key any way you want – functionally, it will be very similar to a smartcard.
I absolutely agree.
> And it doesn't require a smartcard either.
There are many good reasons why a counterparty does not trust you (fully) with a set of keys.
The biggest one is keys that allow financial transactions or billing events to happen: It makes the "I lost my password" defense for friendly fraud much less credible. Another can be to discourage sharing of a service (i.e. "account sharing").
Now there's two ways to keep "your" keys safe as a service provider: You build a fully locked down platform and only allow devices sold and made by you to attach to it (and play your content, use your phone network, transact on your payments network etc.), or you standardize the interface to the "key jail", keeping the rest of the device open and accessible to independent security research.
You can call such a tamper-proof device holding some issuer's private or symmetric key any way you want – functionally, it will be very similar to a smartcard.