[Ilc] ILC bar BoF summary

[David Mazieres <[e-mail]>]

Just a brief follow-up to the bar BoF.  We talked about several
potential applications of ILC, including enhanced versions of
certificate transparency, pseudonymous reputation systems, and
software/package transparency.

The application that stood out as the most compelling was binary
transparency of firmware updates for IoT devices.  There's a good chance
that powerful actors will attempt to compromise such devices' firmware
on a large scale.  Merely requiring updates to be digitally signed could
prove insufficient if the manufacturer is compromised.  By contrast,
publicly logging any updates in some data structure checkpointed by all
of the world's log authorities would require a far higher level of
complicity by the manufacturer and greatly increase the chances of
exposing nefarious firmware.

We also thought that it might be best to include transparency from the
start in any standard for authenticating firmware updates.  If we try to
add some kind of transparency to an existing firmware update standard,
it seems unlikely to get as widespread adoption as if transparency is an
integral part of any update standard from day one.

David