Microsoft Secure Boot Could Ban Windows From PCs
When Windows 8 computers start shipping later this year, they will come with a brand-new firmware feature called Secure Boot. A year ago, Linux lovers were worrying that Secure Boot was going to somehow give Linux the boot, but now it looks like there’s a brand-new twist to the story. It could be used to keep Microsoft’s software from running on a computer.
To date, nobody has pulled off this technically tricky feat. In fact, most people will have to wait for Windows 8 to ship before they can even give it a try. But Red Hat Developer Matthew Garrett has been working with the Secure Boot standards-makers, and he recently described how users can replace the Microsoft cryptographic keys that ship with Windows 8 with their own keys and then sign any software that they want so it can run on their machine.
This project would be no fun for most PC users, but because it puts the power of Secure Boot back into the hands of the users, it creates an interesting option for free software advocates. They could use these techniques to ensure that their computer wasn’t running any proprietary software on top of the firmware. In other words, they could turn the tables on Microsoft.
