alt Hacker NewsHardware wallets are air-gapped. The issue here was a distributor got acquired and then snuck a chip in that could read the spi link between the microcontroller and the screen. The chip had its own cellular modem and could send the passphrase that was shown on the screen to the attackers.
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The post you're replying to is arguing that it wouldn't be feasible to do that with a MacBook (at least if you buy it off the shelf at Best Buy).
Boy that was a slog, to dig deep enough through the slop to find the technical details…
In retrospect @gigachad’s summary is worth as much as both articles combined, but for the Clauded technical source (with pictures!) that Ledger’s Claude-release refers to: https://www.tibane.net/research/ledger-nano-x-implant
Nobody said hardware wallets aren't air-gapped. They said take something normal and usual enough not to be an attractive target for bespoke crypto stealers, and then airgap that to make your wallet.
If you sell a device specifically for storing large amounts of liquid assets, that puts a huge target on that device. You are basically asking for supply chain attacks
An ordinary MacBook does not have that issue. If you are a high-value target, you can further decrease your risk profile by buying it from a random physical store, further preventing targeted attacks.