this post was submitted on 26 Jul 2023
1117 points (91.6% liked)

Programmer Humor

32411 readers
318 users here now

Post funny things about programming here! (Or just rant about your favourite programming language.)

Rules:

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Okay I did some research and I was wrong. There is no confirmation Intel specifically removed the IME from NSA's PCs. It's just that some reverse engineers found a flag that supposedly disables it, and their theory is that it was meant for the NSA.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Eureka-The-Intel-Management-Engine-can-finally-be-disabled-thanks-to-the-NSA.245922.0.html

I believe this is the switch System76 and Purism turn off, but as I said, since the blob is still there, we can't be sure that switch actually works or if it's just a trap.