8 ms·

eFuses get physically melted by software. Microsoft bricked thousands of illicit China-developer xbox360 kits one spring morning, in the winter of 2010. they

eFuses get physically melted by software. Microsoft bricked thousands of illicit China-developer xbox360 kits one spring morning, in the winter of 2010. they also have bricked retail xbox360 consoles of nefarious (teenage) actors. cannot go into more detail on that one. maybe after a few more years.

water8 5y ago
Sorry I modified the dvd firmware when I was a teenager. It was really important to me to get level 50 in Halo 2. Hope you can understand lol.
- Jerrrry 5y ago
  It's okay. I had a 50 in every H3 playlist, and my own cease and desist letter from a few different AAA companies. We've all been there...
  - sharken 5y ago
    Even John Carmack got in trouble with the police at one time. Luckily he got off with a warning.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- _fat_santa 5y ago
  I fondly remember flashing my DVD drive on my 360 when I was 15 to play Saints Row (I had an ITCH for a GTA like game). Back then I was scared shitless of possibly bricking it. Now looking back, I laugh because of how trivial the mod was. Pretty sure this was a major contributing factor to me eventually perusing tech in my career.
  - KyleJune 5y ago
    Modding Xbox/Xbox 360 was for many people. I got started programming with writing CoD MW2 mods.
    - water8 5y ago
      When I saw that I could fill up my friends list on Xbox live by changing a few variables on the auto aim configuration I learned early on that computers are magic to most people, And if you know how they work that makes you a wizard
ehsankia 5y ago
> they also have bricked retail xbox360 consoles of nefarious (teenage) actors I believe these two podcast episodes cover that in depth. https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/45/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/45/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/46/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/46/
- Jerrrry 5y ago
  I have a condition that I cannot listen to media about things I know too much about. For this reason, I cannot watch/listen to darknet diaries, or a host of other topics. The physical cringe of wanting to correct the record is unbearable, but from what I heard, they are very accurate and have done their research. RIP anthony
  - nsavage 5y ago
    Not about the darknet diaries in particular, but you're describing the Gell-Mann Amnesia hypothesis: https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/ https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/
    - KennyBlanken 5y ago
      Just because a reporter covering some fluffy science piece might things wrong does not mean a different reporter, in a different department, covering a completely different subject, got things wrong (to the same degree, or at all.) That "hypothesis" is a genetic fallacy. It also doesn't distinguish between reporting ("Dr. Bob says wet streets cause rain"), analysis ("Dr Bob says wet streets cause rain; is this accurate?") and opinion ("In the opinion of the columnist/author, Dr. Bob is an idiot who thinks wet streets cause rain! This is just yet another example of the violence inherent in the system, decaying the moral fabric of our system." It also doesn't account for the Dunning-Kruger effect, or on Joe Q Public's near total ignorance on the subject of observational biases and dependency on anecdotes and personal experience.) That "hypothesis" leverages Joe thinking some reporter covering global warming is "fake news" when it's been a cold, snowy week...to get Joe to think that reporting about current events or politics is equally "fake." A reminder that a reporter who writes "Dr. Bob says wet streets cause rain" is not publishing fake news. It's reporting the fact that there is someone who said/thinks that. That is different from presenting their statement as fact.
nonrandomstring 5y ago
Ironically, criminal damage has its origins in the Frame-Breaking Act of 1812, carrying the death penalty, and designed to stem the rising tide of Luddites. Today companies like Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are the Luddites. Because the damage is permanent, to "tangible property", and "without lawful excuse" (and please don't knee-jerk to arguing "they can do what they want because you agreed to it" - you didn't and they can't), I'd think there's a very good case for criminal damage as distinct action from any computer misuse recourse. The argument needs to made, not on behalf of the users as a class action, but on behalf of another stakeholder - the environment. Every time a company makes and sells products that can be "bricked" they contribute to e-waste (see [1][2] if this issue isn't yet on your radar - it's something every hacker should be aware of). I have faith that smart people in European politics genuinely get this merging problem, and we have the courage, time and willingness to bring new legislation or trade restrictions that would make it impossible to sell such products in Europe. Even better I would like to see Microsoft made to pay the cleanup costs. [1] https://digitalvegan.net/digital-vegan-print-sample.pdf https://digitalvegan.net/digital-vegan-print-sample.pdf (ch 17 Wasteland) [2] https://www.fathom.pro/blog/2020/09/world-wide-waste-an-interview-with-gerry-mcgovern/ https://www.fathom.pro/blog/2020/09/world-wide-waste-an-inte...
- maxerickson 5y ago
  Shouldn't the scammers pay the cleanup charges? Like if you want to sell illicit XBoxes, it's on you to ensure that the thing can't be rendered inoperable by a third-party software update, it's not the third-party's responsibility to account for your hardware when they do software updates. Doing software updates that brick tampered hardware is harder to make a sarcastic argument about.
  - nonrandomstring 5y ago
    > Shouldn't the scammers pay the cleanup charges? No. First, the primary culprit is who designs and deploys a mechanism to do harm. If I set a lethal trap on my property with a sign saying "Beware the 10,00 Volt mantrap", I am not excused when a burglar is injured - even though they are breaking the law by trespass. Secondly, it seems that the manufacturer gets to decide, arbitrarily and post-facto (post-sale/agreement) what constitutes a "scammer". Finally, with "e-fuses" you are setting a trap mechanism on my property which I have purchased in fair expectation of my rights. > it's on you to ensure that the thing can't be rendered inoperable by a (third-party?) software update I believe in many places like the US, it could be breaking the law to ensure that, since reverse engineering and circumvention of protections would be required. Of course you're right that there's a sort of moral responsibility on people not to vandalise serviceable goods such that they become waste. But people throw away perfectly working technology every day. If by "third party" (I think we would use "first party" here) you mean the vendor/manufacturer when you say: > it's not the (vendors) responsibility to account for your hardware when they do software updates. then I heartily disagree. It's certainly their moral responsibility, and, unless they offer owners a reasonable way to disable updates, it ought to be their legal responsibility too. But that's not what's at issue. Otherwise your argument makes it seem like the update "accidentally" damaged the owners property. Quite the contrary, the vendor is sending out updates designed to cause harm, and in full knowledge and punitive intent. Am I mistaken? > Doing software updates that brick tampered hardware is harder to make a sarcastic argument about. I don't follow you. Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit and discouraged per HN guidelines in favour of arguing in "good faith".
danmur 5y ago
I am confused as to whether it happened in spring or winter.
k1ll3r 5y ago
Cool story bruh
- Jerrrry 5y ago
  chill eric
landr0id 5y ago
>they also have bricked retail xbox360 consoles of nefarious (teenage) actors. I was in the "xbox underground" group and later worked at Microsoft. they never bricked retails, lol.
- Jerrrry 5y ago
  I have my bricked retail sitting on my desk, it's my second favorite paperweight. After CON files were being resigned with 00000' keys, they tried and failed to maintain a "known bad" list of RSA private keypairs that were known to be resigning modified content. after that patchwork hack failed, because of the spread of CON resigners, they gave up on that effort. You can still find blacklisted keypairs in the NAND, if you looked around. but my retail was't exactly unmodified, so I was bending the definition of "retail", here... but yes, they bricked retail consoles posing as xDev and pNET kits. dont blame them. we were bad kids.

water8 5y ago

Sorry I modified the dvd firmware when I was a teenager. It was really important to me to get level 50 in Halo 2. Hope you can understand lol.

Jerrrry 5y ago
It's okay. I had a 50 in every H3 playlist, and my own cease and desist letter from a few different AAA companies. We've all been there...
- sharken 5y ago
  Even John Carmack got in trouble with the police at one time. Luckily he got off with a warning.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
_fat_santa 5y ago
I fondly remember flashing my DVD drive on my 360 when I was 15 to play Saints Row (I had an ITCH for a GTA like game). Back then I was scared shitless of possibly bricking it. Now looking back, I laugh because of how trivial the mod was. Pretty sure this was a major contributing factor to me eventually perusing tech in my career.
- KyleJune 5y ago
  Modding Xbox/Xbox 360 was for many people. I got started programming with writing CoD MW2 mods.
  - water8 5y ago
    When I saw that I could fill up my friends list on Xbox live by changing a few variables on the auto aim configuration I learned early on that computers are magic to most people, And if you know how they work that makes you a wizard

ehsankia 5y ago

> they also have bricked retail xbox360 consoles of nefarious (teenage) actors I believe these two podcast episodes cover that in depth. https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/45/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/45/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/46/ https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/46/

Jerrrry 5y ago
I have a condition that I cannot listen to media about things I know too much about. For this reason, I cannot watch/listen to darknet diaries, or a host of other topics. The physical cringe of wanting to correct the record is unbearable, but from what I heard, they are very accurate and have done their research. RIP anthony
- nsavage 5y ago
  Not about the darknet diaries in particular, but you're describing the Gell-Mann Amnesia hypothesis: https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/ https://www.epsilontheory.com/gell-mann-amnesia/
  - KennyBlanken 5y ago
    Just because a reporter covering some fluffy science piece might things wrong does not mean a different reporter, in a different department, covering a completely different subject, got things wrong (to the same degree, or at all.) That "hypothesis" is a genetic fallacy. It also doesn't distinguish between reporting ("Dr. Bob says wet streets cause rain"), analysis ("Dr Bob says wet streets cause rain; is this accurate?") and opinion ("In the opinion of the columnist/author, Dr. Bob is an idiot who thinks wet streets cause rain! This is just yet another example of the violence inherent in the system, decaying the moral fabric of our system." It also doesn't account for the Dunning-Kruger effect, or on Joe Q Public's near total ignorance on the subject of observational biases and dependency on anecdotes and personal experience.) That "hypothesis" leverages Joe thinking some reporter covering global warming is "fake news" when it's been a cold, snowy week...to get Joe to think that reporting about current events or politics is equally "fake." A reminder that a reporter who writes "Dr. Bob says wet streets cause rain" is not publishing fake news. It's reporting the fact that there is someone who said/thinks that. That is different from presenting their statement as fact.

nonrandomstring 5y ago

Ironically, criminal damage has its origins in the Frame-Breaking Act of 1812, carrying the death penalty, and designed to stem the rising tide of Luddites. Today companies like Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are the Luddites. Because the damage is permanent, to "tangible property", and "without lawful excuse" (and please don't knee-jerk to arguing "they can do what they want because you agreed to it" - you didn't and they can't), I'd think there's a very good case for criminal damage as distinct action from any computer misuse recourse. The argument needs to made, not on behalf of the users as a class action, but on behalf of another stakeholder - the environment. Every time a company makes and sells products that can be "bricked" they contribute to e-waste (see [1][2] if this issue isn't yet on your radar - it's something every hacker should be aware of). I have faith that smart people in European politics genuinely get this merging problem, and we have the courage, time and willingness to bring new legislation or trade restrictions that would make it impossible to sell such products in Europe. Even better I would like to see Microsoft made to pay the cleanup costs. [1] https://digitalvegan.net/digital-vegan-print-sample.pdf https://digitalvegan.net/digital-vegan-print-sample.pdf (ch 17 Wasteland) [2] https://www.fathom.pro/blog/2020/09/world-wide-waste-an-interview-with-gerry-mcgovern/ https://www.fathom.pro/blog/2020/09/world-wide-waste-an-inte...

maxerickson 5y ago
Shouldn't the scammers pay the cleanup charges? Like if you want to sell illicit XBoxes, it's on you to ensure that the thing can't be rendered inoperable by a third-party software update, it's not the third-party's responsibility to account for your hardware when they do software updates. Doing software updates that brick tampered hardware is harder to make a sarcastic argument about.
- nonrandomstring 5y ago
  > Shouldn't the scammers pay the cleanup charges? No. First, the primary culprit is who designs and deploys a mechanism to do harm. If I set a lethal trap on my property with a sign saying "Beware the 10,00 Volt mantrap", I am not excused when a burglar is injured - even though they are breaking the law by trespass. Secondly, it seems that the manufacturer gets to decide, arbitrarily and post-facto (post-sale/agreement) what constitutes a "scammer". Finally, with "e-fuses" you are setting a trap mechanism on my property which I have purchased in fair expectation of my rights. > it's on you to ensure that the thing can't be rendered inoperable by a (third-party?) software update I believe in many places like the US, it could be breaking the law to ensure that, since reverse engineering and circumvention of protections would be required. Of course you're right that there's a sort of moral responsibility on people not to vandalise serviceable goods such that they become waste. But people throw away perfectly working technology every day. If by "third party" (I think we would use "first party" here) you mean the vendor/manufacturer when you say: > it's not the (vendors) responsibility to account for your hardware when they do software updates. then I heartily disagree. It's certainly their moral responsibility, and, unless they offer owners a reasonable way to disable updates, it ought to be their legal responsibility too. But that's not what's at issue. Otherwise your argument makes it seem like the update "accidentally" damaged the owners property. Quite the contrary, the vendor is sending out updates designed to cause harm, and in full knowledge and punitive intent. Am I mistaken? > Doing software updates that brick tampered hardware is harder to make a sarcastic argument about. I don't follow you. Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit and discouraged per HN guidelines in favour of arguing in "good faith".

danmur 5y ago

I am confused as to whether it happened in spring or winter.

k1ll3r 5y ago

Cool story bruh

Jerrrry 5y ago
chill eric

landr0id 5y ago

>they also have bricked retail xbox360 consoles of nefarious (teenage) actors. I was in the "xbox underground" group and later worked at Microsoft. they never bricked retails, lol.

Jerrrry 5y ago
I have my bricked retail sitting on my desk, it's my second favorite paperweight. After CON files were being resigned with 00000' keys, they tried and failed to maintain a "known bad" list of RSA private keypairs that were known to be resigning modified content. after that patchwork hack failed, because of the spread of CON resigners, they gave up on that effort. You can still find blacklisted keypairs in the NAND, if you looked around. but my retail was't exactly unmodified, so I was bending the definition of "retail", here... but yes, they bricked retail consoles posing as xDev and pNET kits. dont blame them. we were bad kids.