Google's New Remote Attestation Scheme is As Bad As Its Old One

Google owes its existence to the open web, but today, its technological “innovations” have much to do with locking users into a “walled garden.” The latest of these is “reCAPTCHA Mobile Verification,” an experimental initiative that will let companies block users if they are running independent, "de-googled" versions of Android. These “indie Android” versions are favored by people who want to protect their privacy and their attention by blocking trackers and ads. Worse, this is just the latest in a line of similarly user-hostile measures. Long before “agentic AI,” we had the idea that software would act as your agent on the internet. That's why the old-fashioned technical term for a browser is a “user agent.” Your browser acts on your behalf to retrieve information and then show it to you, in the format you choose. It's your agent. This is a powerful and profound idea. It is because browsers are our “agents” that we expect them to accept our directives, say, by blocking pop-ups, or by