Trusted hardware, hardware that can't lie

In the latest, 2018-01-31, interview with Charles Hoskinson, he mentions trusted hardware, “hardware that can’t lie” which caught my attention:

I adore trusted hardware, hardware security modules have the potential of bringing Cardano to every corner of our world and Charles knows it! No matter how remote, HSM + Ada = freedom for all!

Now the dark side, without hardware manufactures embracing transparency, open source, their unethical design is a given, think Meltdown and Spectre.

Bring the light back, perhaps it will be RISC-V chips; toss in some Ada and freedom will propagate like time, touching everything and everyone.

I want to live in that world.

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I’m glad you brought this up. I was wondering how closed source and afflictions like Meltdown and Spectre fit into to all of this. Glad to learn RISC-V chips are out there. Sounds like a perfect fit with Cardano. What type of chips are in Ledger and Trezor?

(edit) found this line in todays article about Ledger integration. about the chips specific to Ledger.

Private keys are made even more secure thanks to the secure chips that Ledger’s hardware wallets are built on. These chips are based on the same technology used in chip and PIN payment and SIM cards, strengthening protection against potential cyber hacks.

Anybody know if these chips are open source?

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They are not, and that is the crux of it.

Self-managed storage such as those products do provide good security, as long as you trust them and your physical USB link comes down to your personal risk tolerance.