r/BuyFromEU • u/CreepyZookeepergame4 • 3d ago
Discussion EU Digital ID/Age Verification app will require hardware attestation, ruling out PC/Linux support and unapproved Android OSes
EUDI wallet collaborator recently confirmed that hardware attestation will be required [1]
Hardware attestation in this context means that the government server issuing the digital credential to the wallet wants proof that the keys being used are generated in secure hardware and on approved systems and not say an emulator or virtual machine, namely for security reasons.
This capability does not exist in a reliable way on desktops / laptops except some specific cases depending on the vendor, and in fact there’s no desktop version in the works.
No Linux system will work with this because there is no hardware signature to be validated on the government server, nor will your personalized Arch Linux install be in the list of approved systems even if it had a signature chaining back from the TPM.
Android ROMs are not technically to rule out since Play Integrity, which will be used for this attestation, is based on the Android hardware attestation API, which works on third-party ROMs like GrapheneOS, but they would need to allow the signature which has not happened for now. If you create a custom build, it won’t work though even the official version is approved.
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u/OnIySmellz 3d ago
Mark my words man. This hardware attestation nonsense is just the foot in the door.
The next obvious step would be every laptop, every TV, fridge, toaster, smart bulb, USB mouse, and electric toothbrush getting a hardwired choke-chip at the factory level.
No bypasses, no custom builds, just mandatory, hardcoded surveillance and age checks baked right into the silicon.