Re: CfC to remove Peripherals APIs from the Devices and Sensors WG Charter

Microsoft believes these APIs address important use cases and fit within the scope of the Devices and Sensors Working Group. We would prefer that the group retain them as tentative deliverables and continue developing them, while taking the documented security concerns including firmware reprogramming, device abuse, persistent grants, and fingerprinting seriously.

The Formal Objection's alternative conditions largely describe work that will be necessary regardless of venue: documenting known exploit classes, defining normative mitigations where feasible, obtaining appropriate security and privacy review, and clearly identifying risks that remain with user agents or device vendors. Adoption as a tentative deliverable would provide a venue for that work and would not endorse the current designs or guarantee advancement to Recommendation.

Despite our concerns, we will not block consensus to remove these deliverables from the DAS charter. Given the proposed WHATWG Peripheral APIs workstream (https://github.com/whatwg/sg/pull/264), removal would primarily change the venue rather than end the work. We encourage continued iteration on these APIs and expect the concerns raised by the Formal Objection to be addressed before they advance in either venue.

-Michael
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