Re:YouTube Ditches Flash, and It Hardly Matters
by geofft on Saturday February 07, 2015 @02:28PM
(#9015035)
> Really if anything, EME is about security for vendors, not users.
EME as originally conceived is about security for vendors, yes. But Firefox and Chrome, which take their roles as user agent seriously, made sure the spec is one that they can also implement securely on their end. This is a ridiculously huge improvement over NPAPI.
Browser plugins can restrict your freedom in two ways:
1. They can monitor and restrict what you do with the content you're accessing through the plugin.
2. They can monitor and restrict what you do with ANYTHING ELSE IN THE BROWSER OR ANYWHERE ON YOUR COMPUTER.
EME-restricted video can do 1, but cannot do 2. This is not a complete victory for freedom, but it's a significant step forward.
Most of us do not live in a free-software utopia where we have direct control over every part of our machine from the firmware on up. (Although I have a lot of respect for the people who are trying to get us there!) Even if we're running a free OS, we assume, against our better judgment, that the firmware is doing only what it should be doing. If it's not, then it throws the rest of our freedom out the window.
Sandboxing EME allows us to ensure that one non-free part of the system, if we can't get rid of it, is restricted to doing only what it says it can do. This is a lot better than the status quo for any mixed free/non-free system (including free OS/non-free firmware). It's not quite the same as getting rid of it or making it free, but it's certainly not nothing.
EME as originally conceived is about security for vendors, yes. But Firefox and Chrome, which take their roles as user agent seriously, made sure the spec is one that they can also implement securely on their end. This is a ridiculously huge improvement over NPAPI.
Browser plugins can restrict your freedom in two ways:
1. They can monitor and restrict what you do with the content you're accessing through the plugin.
2. They can monitor and restrict what you do with ANYTHING ELSE IN THE BROWSER OR ANYWHERE ON YOUR COMPUTER.
EME-restricted video can do 1, but cannot do 2. This is not a complete victory for freedom, but it's a significant step forward.
Most of us do not live in a free-software utopia where we have direct control over every part of our machine from the firmware on up. (Although I have a lot of respect for the people who are trying to get us there!) Even if we're running a free OS, we assume, against our better judgment, that the firmware is doing only what it should be doing. If it's not, then it throws the rest of our freedom out the window.
Sandboxing EME allows us to ensure that one non-free part of the system, if we can't get rid of it, is restricted to doing only what it says it can do. This is a lot better than the status quo for any mixed free/non-free system (including free OS/non-free firmware). It's not quite the same as getting rid of it or making it free, but it's certainly not nothing.