4 ms·

A similar situation exists for consumer grade WiFi routers in the US. For about a year now, it's well-nigh impossible to flash routers with DD-WRT, OpenWRT, an

A similar situation exists for consumer grade WiFi routers in the US. For about a year now, it's well-nigh impossible to flash routers with DD-WRT, OpenWRT, and friends due to the new FCC conditions manufacturers paid^H^H^H^H lobbied to get put in place.

vuln 9y ago
You've peaked my interest. Has then been new legislation that has enabled router manufacturers lock down their hardware to a point an end-user cannot change it? All three organizations you name are open source and community driven. They cannot possibly write or port their firmware to every platform.
- plasticchris 9y ago
  Parent likely refers to the 5ghz dfs rules, see https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/09/fcc-open-source-router-software-is-still-legal-under-certain-conditions/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/09/fcc-o...
  - AdieuToLogic 9y ago
    I wish that were the case, but alas it is not. The article you link was unfortunately an optimistic interpretation of what not yet known to come[0]. 0 - https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-locking-routers/ https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-l...
- ynezz 9y ago
  http://blog.true.cz/2017/02/free-your-router-again/#background http://blog.true.cz/2017/02/free-your-router-again/#backgrou...
- wmf 9y ago
  A history of the FCC router lockdown thing: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/08/fcc-forces-tp-link-to-support-open-source-firmware-on-routers/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/08/fcc-f...
- AdieuToLogic 9y ago
  Not legislation, but instead an interpretation of FCC policy. See here[0] and here[1] for more details. 0 - https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-locking-routers/ https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-l... 1 - https://hackaday.com/2016/02/26/fcc-locks-down-router-firmware/ https://hackaday.com/2016/02/26/fcc-locks-down-router-firmwa...

vuln 9y ago

You've peaked my interest. Has then been new legislation that has enabled router manufacturers lock down their hardware to a point an end-user cannot change it? All three organizations you name are open source and community driven. They cannot possibly write or port their firmware to every platform.

plasticchris 9y ago
Parent likely refers to the 5ghz dfs rules, see https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/09/fcc-open-source-router-software-is-still-legal-under-certain-conditions/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/09/fcc-o...
- AdieuToLogic 9y ago
  I wish that were the case, but alas it is not. The article you link was unfortunately an optimistic interpretation of what not yet known to come[0]. 0 - https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-locking-routers/ https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-l...
ynezz 9y ago
http://blog.true.cz/2017/02/free-your-router-again/#background http://blog.true.cz/2017/02/free-your-router-again/#backgrou...
wmf 9y ago
A history of the FCC router lockdown thing: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/08/fcc-forces-tp-link-to-support-open-source-firmware-on-routers/ https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/08/fcc-f...
AdieuToLogic 9y ago
Not legislation, but instead an interpretation of FCC policy. See here[0] and here[1] for more details. 0 - https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-locking-routers/ https://www.wired.com/2016/03/way-go-fcc-now-manufacturers-l... 1 - https://hackaday.com/2016/02/26/fcc-locks-down-router-firmware/ https://hackaday.com/2016/02/26/fcc-locks-down-router-firmwa...