waxwing on Nostr: Maybe people will finally realise (a) it's easier to audit software than hardware (b) ...

Maybe people will finally realise (a) it's easier to audit software than hardware (b) the threat model on hardware isn't realistically backdooring general purpose computers when they don't even know what software you'll run (c) you don't have to rip out network cards, if there is no accessible internet.

Maybe, maybe not ;)

I wonder if I was influenced by getting into bitcoin before hardware wallets existed. Back then the discussion was "don't be a dumbass and run your wallet on windows" and "keep it on a separate machine". People were running wallets on phones and getting into arguments about how much is safe to keep on it - I guess that just hasn't changed at all. BIP32 was just starting to become commonplace and people realized the 'watch only' concept could work (a massive step forward imo), people were just starting to tinker with the idea of special purpose devices, I remember Trezor starting up. I played with one a few times, small amounts, it's kind of cool technology, but I could never bring myself to put much money on it. It's sitting in a drawer, empty, now. I bought a couple Coldcards, gave one to a guy in El Salvador who used it for teaching, the other one sat in my drawer until the hack, shortly after which I took it out of its bag and used it as a teaching demonstration, myself. Thanks for coming to my ted talk.