Canonical CEO asks businesses to abandon firmware

Canonical CEO Mark Shuttleworth has called on companies to abandon proprietary firmware code, calling such software a threat.

Firmware is software written in machine language that is created by companies exclusively for a device model, and only the manufacturer knows its properties and characteristics in detail.

In a blog post, Shuttleworth makes the case that manufacturers are simply too incompetent and attackers (including government surveillance agencies) are too capable for firmware security to work anymore.

“Any firmware code running on your phone, tablet, computer, TV, wifi router, server, even your dishwasher is a threat,” Shuttleworth says, calling on industries to definitively abandon secret firmware.