Re:California Governor Signs Law Requiring a ‘Kill Switch’ o...
by icebraining on Tuesday August 26, 2014 @02:43AM
(#8225963)
I can't really think of any feasible way for the user to be only person who can initiate a remote shutdown.
(Sure, you can probably come up with some hypothetical scheme involving public key crypto, but we know they're not doing that, and if they did most users wouldn't be able to figure out how to kill their own phones either).
You don't need any crypto. The user sets a killswitch password in her phone, then the command must provide the same password. If the user hasn't setup any password, the command works without one.
(Sure, you can probably come up with some hypothetical scheme involving public key crypto, but we know they're not doing that, and if they did most users wouldn't be able to figure out how to kill their own phones either).
You don't need any crypto. The user sets a killswitch password in her phone, then the command must provide the same password. If the user hasn't setup any password, the command works without one.