Bottomley: Solving the Looming Developer Liability Problem

And you're being obtuse.

An OS-less PC is still a PC. If that's how it's described, there's no problem.

A smart doorbell with no software to make it smart is (in all likelihood) not even a functional doorbell!

If you sell it for what it is, what's the problem? If it needs software to "function as described", but the software isn't supplied with it, then it's dodgy. If it's sold as "A PC" and it comes without software, well the customer might be surprised, but it is as described. If it comes as "A Windows PC", and the customer is told "well, you'll have to get and install Windows yourself", then it's NOT as described (which is a whole 'nother fraud entirely ...).

At the end of the day, the current situation is that stuff is being sold fraudulently, because it's not as described, and the customer has no recourse because everybody is passing the buck. What's worse is that everybody knows this is happening, and nothing is done about it.

The whole point of the CRA is to force manufacturers - be it smart TVs, mobile phones, cars, doorbells, whatever - to provide guarantees that their kit will work "as described" out of the box, and more to the point CONTINUE to work as described. And given that one of the requirements for mobile phones (and many other devices) is security, that's rather important.

THAT is why my phone has no security - and nothing worth securing! I simply don't trust it to keep my secrets safe ...

Cheers,
Wol