= Issues of an Assured Tool-Chain =

We do not have any assurance that our basic tools are not compromised.
* Compilers
* Operating Systems
* Hardware Platforms
* Verilog and Other Tools to Produce Chips

At the base, is the compiler.  The fear was first formally expressed in
Ken Thompson's 1984 Turing Award Lecture
[http://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ganger/712.fall02/papers/p761-thompson.pdf Reflections on Trusting Trust].

David A. Wheeler's PhD thesis, [http://www.dwheeler.com/trusting-trust/ Fully Countering Trusting Trust through Diverse Double-Compiling]
outlines how we might deal with the compiler trust conundrum.