Trusted computing - opportunities & risks

Abstract

Computer security is undeniably important in IT era nowdays. Most computer users today are fighting for - either by battling viruses, spam, phishing or other malware, or by fending off schemes to compromise privacy and extract confidential information. With these worries in mind, the Trusted Computing Group (TCG) was established to develop specifications for trusted computing building blocks and software interfaces that could address the problems and aims to enhance security by using the transitive properties of trust. However, the implementation of this technology seems to have consequences for many people. At present, there is no standard mechanism for establishing trust in the Trusted Computing (TC) on a particular machine. The TC specification is not rigidly defined when it comes to implementation, leaving many open issues for research and development efforts. There are major issues, especially related to privacy. One big worry is the potential loss of anonymity and the threat of unwanted surveillance and even control. TC also affects areas other than purely technical ones. The capabilities of TC technology have legal as well as economic consequences. The main legal concerns are copyright, anti-trust law, data privacy law and digital rights management, the impact on which are not yet clear. This paper will discuss the TC in concept and study on the opportunities and risks of the system in existing computing system environment particularly related to security matters.