### Issue 1527 - Monday 17th January, 2022

## In Today's Issue

- UK government plans creepy encrypted messaging app FUD campaign
- Free TV Australia wants the government to mandate TVs make it easy to watch FTA broadcasts
- News, news, news and more news
- AMD CPUs have programmable fuses that lock it to specific vendors
- Cheap Amazon Echo Show 8, Spotify gift cards, 16TB Toshiba HDD, Elgato Stream Deck, PreSonus monitor speakers, Razer mice, Viofo dashcam, CyberPower UPS

## The News

### UK government plans creepy encrypted messaging app FUD campaign

Rolling Stone got its hands on leaked documents from advertising agency M&C Saatchi, who came up with a campaign to smear and delegitimise encrypted messaging apps on behalf of the UK government. One of the stunts in this campaign features an adult and a kid in a glass box in a public space, both playing away on smartphones. Throughout the day the glass box will become opaque so people can't see inside in order to "create a sense of unease by hiding what the child and adult are doing online when their interaction can't be seen". The aim of the campaign is to "force Facebook to evaluate their sense of responsibility". It takes a lot for me to be on Facebook's side in an argument, but fuck me, the UK government's spin doctors have done the job.

### Free TV Australia wants the government to mandate TVs make it easy to watch FTA broadcasts

Free TV Australia (7, 9 and 10's lobby group) submitted their thoughts to the Select Committee on Social Media and Online Safety and want the government to come up with a "prominence framework" to ensure "free-to-air services are prominent on connected TVs". This framework would have 3 principles - "Australians must have free, easy and universal access to terrestrial services and BVOD apps", "Australians must be made aware of the availability of FTA services" and to "maintain free, easy and universal access as new technologies emerge". Their argument seems to be that people don't realise their TVs can get FTA TV and it's unfair multi-national companies (Netflix, Disney, Samsung, Sony etc) have too much leverage, which to me sounds absolutely insane and glosses over the actual problem of nobody wanting to watch their ratshit infested broadcasts.

### News, news, news and more news

- I hope you aren't planning to watch a 4K Blu-Ray disc anytime soon on your fancy new 11th or 12th-gen Intel CPU. Playback requires SGX, a CPU feature that 4K Blu-Rays need for DRM but the new Intel CPUs lack because "Intel had more to gain from SGX's deprecation from the perspective of security" than keeping it alive for the 6 or so people watching 4K Blu-Rays on a PC.
- Tesla's range of insufferable trinkets like a S3XY mug, the "cyberwhistle" (a whistle in the shape of a Cybertruck), a Giga Texas belt buckle and a children's electric quadcycle are now available to purchase from Tesla's online store with Elon's favourite cryptocurrency - Dogecoin. The memecoin has grown in value almost 2000% in the last year. Fuck me dead.
- Speaking of crypto, North Korean hackers have stolen almost US$400m of various cryptocurrencies "across seven intrusions into cryptocurrency exchanges and investment firms". Over the lats 5 years they've liberated a total of US$1.5b from the hands of dorks, dweebs and wankers and repurposed those funds for missiles, tanks and VX nerve agent to kill exiled half brothers.
- Due to a Dutch regulator ruling, Apple is now allowing dating apps on their App Store to use their own payment service - but only in the Dutch App Store and with a 2nd separate binary of their app. Oh and Apple can and will charge a commission for use of the App Store to these developers that just happens to be the difference between what you pay a 3rd-party and the 15%/30% Apple would otherwise get.
- Also on the App Store, the developers of PUBG are suing Apple, Google, YouTube and the creators of Free Fire - a clone of PUBG. The reasons for suing the clone are obvious (total rip off, didn't even try to be different). The reason for suing Apple and Google however is for enabling Free Fire to exist on the App Store and YouTube for not removing videos promoting the clone.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### AMD CPUs have programmable fuses that lock it to specific vendors

AMD has a thing called Platform Secure Boot (PSB) as an optional feature on its latest Ryzen and EPYC CPUs. The CPUs have field programmable fuses that when blown, lock themselves to that vendor. You can't take a CPU that has PSB enabled and install it in another computer from a different brand (i.e: put a CPU from a Lenovo PC in a Dell PC). A real ball ache for secondary market. It was first noticed on servers a while ago where it might make sense, but now it's trickling down to "enterprise" desktop PCs. Apparently it allows a "silicon root of trust" to "protect the OEM's BIOS" - but they still allow it in other Lenovo PCs, so I don't know how secure that is really. Sounds more like OEMs being pricks under the disguise of security. Serve The Home has a video explaining the practical side of PSB.

## Bargains

- Amazon Echo Show 8 1st gen or 2nd gen - $79/$149 from Amazon
- 10% off Spotify gift cards at Coles this week
- 16TB Toshiba MG08ACA16TE HDD - $490.60 from Newegg
- Elgato Stream Deck MK.2 - $242.86 from Amazon
- PreSonus Eris E3.5 active monitor speakers - $202.39 from Amazon
- Razer DeathAdder V2 Pro wireles gaming mouse - $99 from Amazon
- Viofo A129 Plus Duo dashcam - $195.50 from Amazon
- Razer DeathAdder Essential gaming mouse - $24.95 from AZAU
- CyberPower Value Pro 700VA 390W UPS - $92.04 from Shopping Express' eBay store

## The End

📻 Freak - Silverchair

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