Hacker News Reader

Comment by jimmydorry | Hacker News Reader

Once legislated, and two years after published, it will be mandatory for manufacturers to comply.

This functionality is not requested and is working against the user (and it is pretty unlikely for such a feature to be done completely locally on the car, and even if it was, it will almost certain have Over-The-Air updates creating what is colloqially referred to as a backdoor.

Which part of this do you disagree with?

View on HN

If this is a backdoor, then any functionality that can be updated by the manufacturer is a backdoor. Fine, but it's nice when words mean something.

And it's not mandatory. It may become mandatory in several-to-many years. The law is about exploring the possibility, just like OP said. This article is Facebook garbage that somehow made it's way onto HN.

automatic updates without the user's consent are the very definition of a 'backdoor.' just because a new name for it "update" has been commercially normalized doesn't mean the original name has lost its meaning.

Alright, then everything is a backdoor. Snaps are backdoors. Windows is a backdoor. MacOS is a backdoor. Watches are backdoors. Every cell phone is a backdoor. Thermostats and headphones and book readers are backdoors. Every car currently sold new is a backdoor. 90% of every device we interact with is a backdoor. So why put that in the title? It means nothing.

Very close. 90% of the computerized devices we interact with have backdoors. But then you jump to "backdoors must not be a problem" instead of "we have a severe problem all around us."

Not everything is a backdoor, but Windows absolutely is and that's part of why people dislike Windows and voluntarily use the older versions. MacOS, and some cell phone OS's, at least let the user choose if/when to update in which case they're not backdoors.

That's correct. Any functionality that can be updated and change how the system works at the whim of a third party (not the user) is essentially a backdoor.

What would you propose as the definition of a backdoor that does not include the above?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com