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by jasonjei 4045 days ago
No, did I imply so? Just saying that I have very little confidence in the bot. I'm saying the intrinsic security flaw of the robot allows me to believe there are more serious defects. These do not need to be security related. The test cases not passing could lead to death.

I've made no commentary on VPN. Just commenting the communication protocol without augmentations (VPN, TLS, certificate, or otherwise) instills little confidence in the rest of the product. I wouldn't want to be operated under the bot.
1 comments
tedunangst 4045 days ago
I'm afraid I don't see the connection between the decision not to implement encryption and the presence of death causing defects.
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jasonjei 4045 days ago
> I'm afraid I don't see the connection between the decision not to implement encryption and the presence of death causing defects.

That's fine. Everyone is entitled to his/her opinion. I view the failure to implement encryption as a fatal error and an indication the code audit hasn't been thorough. Given that this is a telesurgery product, I'm quite confident encryption, trust, and authenticity are central to safe medical procedures carried over network. Otherwise, why would we bother with TLS when we access our online banking?

I'm just not confident I would want to undergo a surgery with a telesurgery robot with the "decision not to implement encryption."

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jauer 4045 days ago
We bother with TLS for accessing online banking because we don't manually build site-to-site VPNs between our house and our bank, unlike hospitals which have dedicated IT staff, a ton of security appliances of all types and, if they are in the same metro, often have dedicated waves or dark fiber between them.
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jasonjei 4044 days ago
The very problems that plague the unprotected networks to the site-to-site VPNs are the same: all it takes is one piece of malware. In fact, the complacency is the alarm. Just because you are in a "protected" network doesn't mean there aren't bad actors. The bad actors can get in, all they need is to find where your walls have a crack. There's a reason we call it Computer Insecurity.
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