674
Microsoft is plugging more holes that let you use Windows 11 without an online account
(www.theverge.com)
this post was submitted on 06 Oct 2025
674 points (99.4% liked)
Technology
75792 readers
2941 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
The hole they will never plug: Not using Windows.
In a few years If authoritarian shitholes keep fucking getting their way I can see using an "unverified/ untraceable OS" to be a "national security violation"
In theory Pluton enforcement platform-wide, which also includes forced SecureBoot without the ability to install user-signed keys, as well as OTA updates for that super-TPM, could block alt OSes on PC though.
Fortunately, Pluton never caught on and that hasn't happened so far.
I'm confused. don't all recent AMD and intel CPUs have pluton included? I remember such an AMD announcement from ryzen 6000 and onwards, and for intel too
It's not implemented in custom builds and most prebuilts to my knowledge.
I'm gonna need an explanation how anything could prevent me from just formatting the drive and doing what I want, barring the use of proprietary hardware.
I'm pretty sure that unless you use some unusual SBC, all your computer parts are proprietary hardware.
Proprietary hardware, like opaque bioses that can only be updated with signed, proprietary blobs? The bios that's in charge of picking something to boot from from storage? The bios that can decide which bootloader is allowed through digital signatures? The signatures that are only valid if their public key is registered in the bios? The proprietary, opaque bios that decide which bootloader's signature is valid through keys it can restrict?
Yeah, it's all coming together. Always has been. Joking aside, I'm still surprised this whole "fully locked bios" didn't take off. And I'm glad for it.
Forced SecureBoot with only MS keys and no way to install user-signed keys and no Linux shim would block non-Windows OSes from booting.
Basically, Pluton functions similar to how mobile devices function in terms of locked bootloaders.
AFAIK the only devices currently produced which actually use Pluton are Surface devices though, and if it's not being implemented as intended, it's just seen as a generic TPM by other OSes.
For anyone wondering what Pluton is: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/hardware-security/pluton/microsoft-pluton-security-processor
Pluton as TPM: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/security/hardware-security/pluton/pluton-as-tpm
just give 'em time. it's still a bit early in the game for that play