10 ms·

Microsoft really seemed to be ahead of the curve with console security. They really thought this through back in 2005 or so, to the point where clearly, they kn

by jchw 4y ago

Microsoft really seemed to be ahead of the curve with console security. They really thought this through back in 2005 or so, to the point where clearly, they knew people would hack the drives to rewrite the serial number. It's probably for the best that they never actually did anything about the knowledge that gave them, but they clearly stayed a step ahead of the game. As much as I hate it, their actions show a great deal of respect towards the ingenuity of console hackers, because if they didn't, they would've never bothered to do such an effort thwarting them. Compared to the Nintendo Wii, which had a decent security model that was ultimately ill-fated due to several fatal flaws in both hardware and firmware, and the PlayStation, where Sony seems to have a continual problem developing security measures that hackers and modders can just completely ignore, Microsoft really pulled it off. I still wish game consoles would allow you to just run your own code. Xbox has dev mode, which I haven't ever used since I generally do not buy game consoles, but it does seem like the absolute best option that's been available to consumers lately. Before then, it was OtherOS (ill-fated,) PS2 Linux (cool but kinda limited,) and Net Yaroze? Which seemed awesome to me, but unfortunately was a relatively uncommon good. Beyond that, official escapes from the walled garden are truly scarce. A sad reality that will get worse when measures like remote attestation finally make their way to general purpose computers. Remember: you can never have nice things. Ever. Thanks for FATXplorer BTW, it is very useful.

RandomBK 4y ago
Every time I hear about the XBox's platform security, I think back to this talk [1] about how Microsoft protected the XBox One. A lot of it boils down to clear requirements and good engineering, and many of these technologies are now showing up via Project Pluton. [1] https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/chen/ https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/chen/
- airstrike 4y ago
  This is what I found on "Project Pluton" https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2020/11/17/meet-the-microsoft-pluton-processor-the-security-chip-designed-for-the-future-of-windows-pcs/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2020/11/17/mee...
  - transpute 4y ago
    There was a PSEC 2019 talk on Azure Sphere (IoT), with some details on Pluton security features and the Microsoft Linux hardened kernel based on OpenEmbedded/Yocto. Briefly mentioned is Microsoft's QEMU emulation of Pluton for CI/CD and their segmented architecture for delivery of 10 years of Linux security updates to the device, even if the IoT vendor goes out of business leaving the application firmware unmaintained. https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/seay/ https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/seay/ (click Hardware tag to seek video to the Pluton section) IEEE paper (2021, paywall) on Pluton, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9512305 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9512305
- userbinator 4y ago
  and many of these technologies are now showing up via Project Pluton. More awareness needs to be made of how this will have a devestating impact on end-user freedom. They're attacking the PC, one of the last holdouts of general-purpose computing freedom. Remote attestation will make it so you "can" technically run your own hardware and software (and that's what the FUD-spreaders will always say), but you'll be denied access to lots of, increasingly online, services. Edit: nice, downvotes. Hello corpo-authoritarians, we know what's up :-)
  - RandomBK 4y ago
    Apple (and to a lesser extent Android) have already gone this route, and Windows 11 originally wanted to push _hard_ on enforcing the presence of more platform security. DRM schemes already perform remote attestation before you can stream 4K Netflix. Linux and Open Source may be one of the last remaining barriers to this becoming widespread. It's one of the main reasons I whole-heartedly support Valve and their Steam Deck ambitions, and encourage everyone to do the same. Money trumps everything else, so as long as the money to be made from supporting SteamOS > money thought to be saved from piracy, I believe we can still thwart this.
    - transpute 4y ago
      > DRM schemes already perform remote attestation before you can stream 4K Netflix. On Intel clients, this is done via the Management Engine, bypassing both the CPU and operating system, as the ME can control display output.
      - SturgeonsLaw 4y ago
        Is there any mechanism for it to validate that the thing connected to the display output is an unmodified monitor which also implements DRM? Otherwise it would be almost trivial to have a device with HDMI-in that gets a pixel perfect feed of the protected stream.
        userbinator 4y ago
Jerrrry 4y ago
>their actions show a great deal of respect towards the ingenuity of console hackers, because if they didn't, they would've never bothered to do such an effort thwarting them. dude. The irony. They bricked our machines and joked about it. They had a fellowship with the FBI. They (MS and EA) threw OP, the author of this fkn submission, in jail. Their own Terms of Service and Policy Enforcement page still brags about "pwning the pwnrs" - to this day. Make no mistake, MS and Xbox still hate us. It's just from a capitalist perspective, its hard to compete with losing PC audience. Their only selling point is itself, an unhackable console. They did have restraint. There is a list of console ID's hardcoded in every NAND because originally a few souls had reversed the NAND enough to RSA-sign CON files - they were just gonna ban everyone who had made modified content, but didnt... because of Halo3's File Share incidentally preserving personal RSA keys, making it difficult to reconcile modified content, once spread. Regarding hacked DVD drives....they did the math and banned millions when it was profitable, ironically.
- jchw 4y ago
  Yes. I agree. > Make no mistake, MS and Xbox still hate us. I should point out that I was not suggesting there was a good relationship between console hackers and Microsoft. Quote from me again: > respect towards the ingenuity of console hackers I did not say they had respect for the people, or that what they were doing was good, or anything like that. I'm claiming that from a security standpoint, they took the threat very seriously. Microsoft legally bullying people is bad, but it's nothing new from Microsoft. Hell, it's nothing new from the console industry either. I actually was not aware of Microsoft putting anyone in jail over the Xbox homebrew/modding scene, but it does not surprise me. I remember what happened with Sony and Geohotz. Still, from a sterile, technical point of view, I do think that in 2005 they were way, way ahead of keeping their console "secure" according to their threat model. I am never going to be particularly fond of a threat model where the adversary is the customer, but that's not really the point.
  - Jerrrry 4y ago
    > I do think that in 2005 they were way, way ahead of keeping their console "secure" according to their threat model. I agree, see my other comment re: KV.bin They built the x360 with layers, upon layers, like an onion. Two exploits (JTAG and RGH), and a few forever-unspeakable social engineering incidents aside, they did great work. Until Mw2 came out in 2011.
stefan_ 4y ago
This was not a security feature at all, it wasn't securing anything? This is purely a feature to allow Microsoft to resell hard drives at 3x the price.
- psychphysic 4y ago
  It secured a fat profit.
- jchw 4y ago
  Sounds like semantics to me. I think you will agree that security in computing is not just "prevent people from getting hacked" or some static goal like that, but rather security is the management of "threats" under a given "threat model". DRM, for example, is DEFINITELY a form of security software. DRM is an attempt to uphold policies around the access and/or copying of digital data such that access, distribution, etc. is controlled by said policy. Like any security software, it is meaningless if it's trivial to bypass, so it employs techniques to prevent users from modifying it, inspecting it, and otherwise bypassing its security measures. Similarly, technology that is meant to only allow licensed hardware is largely the same idea. Like SEGA's Trade Mark Security System, although instead of cryptographic signatures, they instead hinged on the threat of a lawsuit. This is still a form of security system, just with a very different model of the threat. What I am not saying is that these security measures are any good for the consumer. Obviously, these measures are very largely anti-consumer. Arguably there are some potential consumer benefits in limited cases (the most honest answer is probably anti-cheat, because most online games are frustratingly unplayable without some strong approach to dissuade cheating) but that is still not really my point. How is this security? It's simple. It's security against the threat of the end user. It upholds policies that the device vendor would like to impose on the consumer. A lock is still a security device even if you abuse it to lock somebody in a room against their will.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
alexklarjr 4y ago
Xbone is not hacked because nobody care about essentially a boring pc without any memorable games. It will remain in history as another Microsoft marketing disaster. One day it will eventually and silently destroyed to be emulated like all ancient arcades and microcomputer games protections. Every protection can and will be broken. Regarding unsuccessful money grab, Idea that Microsoft minds forsaw that people will want to upgrade their boxes with cheap generic parts and that must be punished is indeed new, no car manufacturers never did anything like that since 90s.
- b1ue64 4y ago
  > Xbone is not hacked because nobody care about essentially a boring pc without any memorable games. No, it's because MS gave them the keys right out of the gate with Dev Mode.
  - fomine3 4y ago
    Anyway mission successful
  - vgb2k18 4y ago
    The keys couldn't unlock the GPU door though (I mean, dev mode apps couldn't use the graphics api). And iirc ram was limited. To me that allows for some incentive to root/jailbreak the device.
psychphysic 4y ago
I don't get this. Hacking was huge on the 360, as was piracy that JTAG thing using the cooler runner and browning out the processor after slowing it, there were multiple mod chips and finally the ODEs coming out the wazhoo. The funny thing about security is it's about the weakest links they find. So you can harden link A as much as you want if link B is a dud all the extra work on A was wasted energy. What's most impressive is Xbox realised this and added in Dev mode. What's shocking is Sony knew this from the PS2 era and gave it up!
- droopyEyelids 4y ago
  All or nothing thinking about security misses the point entirely. Security is about reducing the frequency of events, and the impact of those events- Not making things philosophically impossible.
- jcpham2 4y ago
  I had an xecuter mod on the first Xbox and a 2TB hard drive, you could do so many many things with Xbox Media Center on the very first Xbox - FTP your games over. TBH the Xbox 360 console was like a refresh of XBMC. One of the greatest things about the 360 out of the box was it played popular video codecs directly from USB storage - unmodded! Unheard of at the time. I had an early model PSX console in high school and bought the plug and play mod chip online in 2000 or so. Rented a lot of games and bought a lot of verbatim blue bottoms Later a USB plus 1 wire mod chip for the PS2 that let me play backups and homebrew
  - Jerrrry 4y ago
    >TBH the Xbox 360 console was like a refresh of XBMC. According to sources, a modified original Xbox running the latest XBMC was put on the center podium, was shown off, and the executives had ordered the engineers to "make the new xbox do this"...and it was.
    - IntelMiner 4y ago
      The 360's early media capabilities were absolutely unheard of for the time I was blown away when half way through the setup of my 360 my desktop running Vista helpfully chimed in saying it found the 360 and offered to let me stream all my MP3's right to it while playing games
capableweb 4y ago
I love the newest entrant to the console wars, who decided to just run their game store on a Linux computer, optimize the UX a bit and make it all work great with its chosen hardware. Currently maybe a bit underpowered, but shows great promise and I believe the Steam Deck has a bright future in front of it.
- Waterluvian 4y ago
  The Steam Deck has sold fewer than 1% the number of Switches sold, which tells me there is far more to selling a console than the technology. Well, that’s an obvious statement, but I think many of us tech people commonly under-appreciate all the “non-engineering” components to making a product successful. I think “optimize the UX a bit” is what they did, and it falls very woefully short of what they need. Especially when it arguably has a far bigger and better library of titles. I hope Valve doesn’t throw in the towel after the first round. The Steam Deck idea can be a killer one. It just needs a lot more UX polish and marketing.
  - LelouBil 4y ago
    I think they sold enough to justify its existence, even if it's not much comparing to console manufacturers
  - caslon 4y ago
    The Switch is the fifth best selling console of all time. That's not at all a fair comparison, especially given the difference in price point and how long the Switch has been on the market. On the other hand, it's plausible that the Steam Deck could hit within 50% of Vita, the Wii U or Gamecube, which is amazing for Valve's second push into the console market, and immensely profitable, given Valve owns pretty much the only avenue with which people will be buying games for it and gets a 30% cut, on top of the Deck being significantly more expensive than any comparable console, now or historically.
    - Waterluvian 4y ago
      I think it’s also not fair to compare it to commercially failed consoles like the Wii U or Game Cube. I just picked the closest analog: a modern handheld that can be plugged into a TV.
jiggawatts 4y ago
To this day, there is significantly better security in your XBox account to protect your in-game collectables than can be achieved by huge enterprises trying to protect their corporate secrets on Microsoft 365. E.g.: the corporate default settings for MFA show zero additional information. Literally just an “accept” button. The XBox equivalent shows location, etc…
- Godel_unicode 4y ago
  All of that is available in M365 though, it’s just off because many large IT departments optimize for ticket volume as opposed to quality or security.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
blibble 4y ago
I think they focused on it somewhat more after the 8 or so huge amateur security flaws on the original Xbox
twoodfin 4y ago
I’m assuming their “threat model” wasn’t individual users going through sophisticated hoops to install their own hard drives. More likely they wanted to make it difficult for grey-market vendors of unauthorized disk drives to escape cease and desist orders from Microsoft’s army of lawyers.
rjh29 4y ago
Nintendo is not far behind Sony in the (in)security department. The 3DS was hacked in several ways including an browser exploit that worked on recent firmware. The 3DS eShop was serving games via CDN with no authentication. And the first edition Switch has a hardware-based exploit that is unpatchable!
- oynqr 4y ago
  We really ought to thank Nvidia for that last one.
gymbeaux 4y ago
I don’t think Xbox Dev Mode is really worth a damn. You can sideload apps but it’s not a vector for piracy or running Windows or Linux. PS3 Linux was about as useless as PS2 Linux, because the PS3 had only 256MB of RAM. I put Ubuntu Server on one and used it as a Squid proxy server to route P2P traffic through to the university’s college of computing since P2P was blocked in the dorms. For some stupid reason I totally got away with it. PS3 running in one of the research labs 24/7 routing traffic all day.
- pjmlp 4y ago
  The idea was for gamers to get a feeling what it meant to be a game developer, and as former PS2Linux user, having so many instead trying to make a PC out of Playstation is what killed the fun for Sony.
- Jorengarenar 4y ago
  >I don’t think Xbox Dev Mode is really worth a damn. You can sideload apps but it’s not a vector for piracy That's the point
  - gymbeaux 4y ago
    The person I’m replying to make it sound like Xbox Dev Mode came about because Microsoft was tired of trying to keep hackers out, but the reality is Microsoft has kept hackers out. You can’t jailbreak an Xbox One.
    - alexklarjr 4y ago
      yet, valid for january, 2023
    - Jorengarenar 4y ago
      If I recall correctly, Microsoft was about to cripple down the Dev Mode, what caused in the community, what led to increased interest in hacking X1, what made MS back off on their decision, after what the discussions quieten down. I won't claim Dev Mode is their solution to hacker, but there seems to be some correlation.
goosedragons 4y ago
Probably helps they are a big OS company but I think they went all out on security because of how severe softmodding scene was on the original Xbox. IIRC there wasn't useful softmods for GameCube or PS2 during the lifetime of the system whereas I knew several people with modded Xboxes with larger drives that they'd rip rentals onto. Xbox 360 also had XNA, I think you needed a paid membership to actually boot a game on it though. And on the last few Nintendo consoles they've had BASIC programs available letting you write your own software. Obviously there's some limitations there but people have done some neat stuff and it's even possible to do 3D. The original Famicom also had BASIC available.

by jchw 4y ago

RandomBK 4y ago

Every time I hear about the XBox's platform security, I think back to this talk [1] about how Microsoft protected the XBox One. A lot of it boils down to clear requirements and good engineering, and many of these technologies are now showing up via Project Pluton. [1] https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/chen/ https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/chen/

airstrike 4y ago
This is what I found on "Project Pluton" https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2020/11/17/meet-the-microsoft-pluton-processor-the-security-chip-designed-for-the-future-of-windows-pcs/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/security/blog/2020/11/17/mee...
- transpute 4y ago
  There was a PSEC 2019 talk on Azure Sphere (IoT), with some details on Pluton security features and the Microsoft Linux hardened kernel based on OpenEmbedded/Yocto. Briefly mentioned is Microsoft's QEMU emulation of Pluton for CI/CD and their segmented architecture for delivery of 10 years of Linux security updates to the device, even if the IoT vendor goes out of business leaving the application firmware unmaintained. https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/seay/ https://www.platformsecuritysummit.com/2019/speaker/seay/ (click Hardware tag to seek video to the Pluton section) IEEE paper (2021, paywall) on Pluton, https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9512305 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9512305
userbinator 4y ago
and many of these technologies are now showing up via Project Pluton. More awareness needs to be made of how this will have a devestating impact on end-user freedom. They're attacking the PC, one of the last holdouts of general-purpose computing freedom. Remote attestation will make it so you "can" technically run your own hardware and software (and that's what the FUD-spreaders will always say), but you'll be denied access to lots of, increasingly online, services. Edit: nice, downvotes. Hello corpo-authoritarians, we know what's up :-)
- RandomBK 4y ago
  Apple (and to a lesser extent Android) have already gone this route, and Windows 11 originally wanted to push _hard_ on enforcing the presence of more platform security. DRM schemes already perform remote attestation before you can stream 4K Netflix. Linux and Open Source may be one of the last remaining barriers to this becoming widespread. It's one of the main reasons I whole-heartedly support Valve and their Steam Deck ambitions, and encourage everyone to do the same. Money trumps everything else, so as long as the money to be made from supporting SteamOS > money thought to be saved from piracy, I believe we can still thwart this.
  - transpute 4y ago
    > DRM schemes already perform remote attestation before you can stream 4K Netflix. On Intel clients, this is done via the Management Engine, bypassing both the CPU and operating system, as the ME can control display output.
    - SturgeonsLaw 4y ago
      Is there any mechanism for it to validate that the thing connected to the display output is an unmodified monitor which also implements DRM? Otherwise it would be almost trivial to have a device with HDMI-in that gets a pixel perfect feed of the protected stream.
      - userbinator 4y ago

Jerrrry 4y ago

>their actions show a great deal of respect towards the ingenuity of console hackers, because if they didn't, they would've never bothered to do such an effort thwarting them. dude. The irony. They bricked our machines and joked about it. They had a fellowship with the FBI. They (MS and EA) threw OP, the author of this fkn submission, in jail. Their own Terms of Service and Policy Enforcement page still brags about "pwning the pwnrs" - to this day. Make no mistake, MS and Xbox still hate us. It's just from a capitalist perspective, its hard to compete with losing PC audience. Their only selling point is itself, an unhackable console. They did have restraint. There is a list of console ID's hardcoded in every NAND because originally a few souls had reversed the NAND enough to RSA-sign CON files - they were just gonna ban everyone who had made modified content, but didnt... because of Halo3's File Share incidentally preserving personal RSA keys, making it difficult to reconcile modified content, once spread. Regarding hacked DVD drives....they did the math and banned millions when it was profitable, ironically.

jchw 4y ago
Yes. I agree. > Make no mistake, MS and Xbox still hate us. I should point out that I was not suggesting there was a good relationship between console hackers and Microsoft. Quote from me again: > respect towards the ingenuity of console hackers I did not say they had respect for the people, or that what they were doing was good, or anything like that. I'm claiming that from a security standpoint, they took the threat very seriously. Microsoft legally bullying people is bad, but it's nothing new from Microsoft. Hell, it's nothing new from the console industry either. I actually was not aware of Microsoft putting anyone in jail over the Xbox homebrew/modding scene, but it does not surprise me. I remember what happened with Sony and Geohotz. Still, from a sterile, technical point of view, I do think that in 2005 they were way, way ahead of keeping their console "secure" according to their threat model. I am never going to be particularly fond of a threat model where the adversary is the customer, but that's not really the point.
- Jerrrry 4y ago
  > I do think that in 2005 they were way, way ahead of keeping their console "secure" according to their threat model. I agree, see my other comment re: KV.bin They built the x360 with layers, upon layers, like an onion. Two exploits (JTAG and RGH), and a few forever-unspeakable social engineering incidents aside, they did great work. Until Mw2 came out in 2011.

stefan_ 4y ago

This was not a security feature at all, it wasn't securing anything? This is purely a feature to allow Microsoft to resell hard drives at 3x the price.

psychphysic 4y ago
It secured a fat profit.
jchw 4y ago
Sounds like semantics to me. I think you will agree that security in computing is not just "prevent people from getting hacked" or some static goal like that, but rather security is the management of "threats" under a given "threat model". DRM, for example, is DEFINITELY a form of security software. DRM is an attempt to uphold policies around the access and/or copying of digital data such that access, distribution, etc. is controlled by said policy. Like any security software, it is meaningless if it's trivial to bypass, so it employs techniques to prevent users from modifying it, inspecting it, and otherwise bypassing its security measures. Similarly, technology that is meant to only allow licensed hardware is largely the same idea. Like SEGA's Trade Mark Security System, although instead of cryptographic signatures, they instead hinged on the threat of a lawsuit. This is still a form of security system, just with a very different model of the threat. What I am not saying is that these security measures are any good for the consumer. Obviously, these measures are very largely anti-consumer. Arguably there are some potential consumer benefits in limited cases (the most honest answer is probably anti-cheat, because most online games are frustratingly unplayable without some strong approach to dissuade cheating) but that is still not really my point. How is this security? It's simple. It's security against the threat of the end user. It upholds policies that the device vendor would like to impose on the consumer. A lock is still a security device even if you abuse it to lock somebody in a room against their will.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

alexklarjr 4y ago

Xbone is not hacked because nobody care about essentially a boring pc without any memorable games. It will remain in history as another Microsoft marketing disaster. One day it will eventually and silently destroyed to be emulated like all ancient arcades and microcomputer games protections. Every protection can and will be broken. Regarding unsuccessful money grab, Idea that Microsoft minds forsaw that people will want to upgrade their boxes with cheap generic parts and that must be punished is indeed new, no car manufacturers never did anything like that since 90s.

b1ue64 4y ago
> Xbone is not hacked because nobody care about essentially a boring pc without any memorable games. No, it's because MS gave them the keys right out of the gate with Dev Mode.
- fomine3 4y ago
  Anyway mission successful
- vgb2k18 4y ago
  The keys couldn't unlock the GPU door though (I mean, dev mode apps couldn't use the graphics api). And iirc ram was limited. To me that allows for some incentive to root/jailbreak the device.

psychphysic 4y ago

I don't get this. Hacking was huge on the 360, as was piracy that JTAG thing using the cooler runner and browning out the processor after slowing it, there were multiple mod chips and finally the ODEs coming out the wazhoo. The funny thing about security is it's about the weakest links they find. So you can harden link A as much as you want if link B is a dud all the extra work on A was wasted energy. What's most impressive is Xbox realised this and added in Dev mode. What's shocking is Sony knew this from the PS2 era and gave it up!

droopyEyelids 4y ago
All or nothing thinking about security misses the point entirely. Security is about reducing the frequency of events, and the impact of those events- Not making things philosophically impossible.
jcpham2 4y ago
I had an xecuter mod on the first Xbox and a 2TB hard drive, you could do so many many things with Xbox Media Center on the very first Xbox - FTP your games over. TBH the Xbox 360 console was like a refresh of XBMC. One of the greatest things about the 360 out of the box was it played popular video codecs directly from USB storage - unmodded! Unheard of at the time. I had an early model PSX console in high school and bought the plug and play mod chip online in 2000 or so. Rented a lot of games and bought a lot of verbatim blue bottoms Later a USB plus 1 wire mod chip for the PS2 that let me play backups and homebrew
- Jerrrry 4y ago
  >TBH the Xbox 360 console was like a refresh of XBMC. According to sources, a modified original Xbox running the latest XBMC was put on the center podium, was shown off, and the executives had ordered the engineers to "make the new xbox do this"...and it was.
  - IntelMiner 4y ago
    The 360's early media capabilities were absolutely unheard of for the time I was blown away when half way through the setup of my 360 my desktop running Vista helpfully chimed in saying it found the 360 and offered to let me stream all my MP3's right to it while playing games

capableweb 4y ago

I love the newest entrant to the console wars, who decided to just run their game store on a Linux computer, optimize the UX a bit and make it all work great with its chosen hardware. Currently maybe a bit underpowered, but shows great promise and I believe the Steam Deck has a bright future in front of it.

Waterluvian 4y ago
The Steam Deck has sold fewer than 1% the number of Switches sold, which tells me there is far more to selling a console than the technology. Well, that’s an obvious statement, but I think many of us tech people commonly under-appreciate all the “non-engineering” components to making a product successful. I think “optimize the UX a bit” is what they did, and it falls very woefully short of what they need. Especially when it arguably has a far bigger and better library of titles. I hope Valve doesn’t throw in the towel after the first round. The Steam Deck idea can be a killer one. It just needs a lot more UX polish and marketing.
- LelouBil 4y ago
  I think they sold enough to justify its existence, even if it's not much comparing to console manufacturers
- caslon 4y ago
  The Switch is the fifth best selling console of all time. That's not at all a fair comparison, especially given the difference in price point and how long the Switch has been on the market. On the other hand, it's plausible that the Steam Deck could hit within 50% of Vita, the Wii U or Gamecube, which is amazing for Valve's second push into the console market, and immensely profitable, given Valve owns pretty much the only avenue with which people will be buying games for it and gets a 30% cut, on top of the Deck being significantly more expensive than any comparable console, now or historically.
  - Waterluvian 4y ago
    I think it’s also not fair to compare it to commercially failed consoles like the Wii U or Game Cube. I just picked the closest analog: a modern handheld that can be plugged into a TV.

jiggawatts 4y ago

To this day, there is significantly better security in your XBox account to protect your in-game collectables than can be achieved by huge enterprises trying to protect their corporate secrets on Microsoft 365. E.g.: the corporate default settings for MFA show zero additional information. Literally just an “accept” button. The XBox equivalent shows location, etc…

Godel_unicode 4y ago
All of that is available in M365 though, it’s just off because many large IT departments optimize for ticket volume as opposed to quality or security.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

blibble 4y ago

I think they focused on it somewhat more after the 8 or so huge amateur security flaws on the original Xbox

twoodfin 4y ago

I’m assuming their “threat model” wasn’t individual users going through sophisticated hoops to install their own hard drives. More likely they wanted to make it difficult for grey-market vendors of unauthorized disk drives to escape cease and desist orders from Microsoft’s army of lawyers.

rjh29 4y ago

Nintendo is not far behind Sony in the (in)security department. The 3DS was hacked in several ways including an browser exploit that worked on recent firmware. The 3DS eShop was serving games via CDN with no authentication. And the first edition Switch has a hardware-based exploit that is unpatchable!

oynqr 4y ago
We really ought to thank Nvidia for that last one.

gymbeaux 4y ago

I don’t think Xbox Dev Mode is really worth a damn. You can sideload apps but it’s not a vector for piracy or running Windows or Linux. PS3 Linux was about as useless as PS2 Linux, because the PS3 had only 256MB of RAM. I put Ubuntu Server on one and used it as a Squid proxy server to route P2P traffic through to the university’s college of computing since P2P was blocked in the dorms. For some stupid reason I totally got away with it. PS3 running in one of the research labs 24/7 routing traffic all day.

pjmlp 4y ago
The idea was for gamers to get a feeling what it meant to be a game developer, and as former PS2Linux user, having so many instead trying to make a PC out of Playstation is what killed the fun for Sony.
Jorengarenar 4y ago
>I don’t think Xbox Dev Mode is really worth a damn. You can sideload apps but it’s not a vector for piracy That's the point
- gymbeaux 4y ago
  The person I’m replying to make it sound like Xbox Dev Mode came about because Microsoft was tired of trying to keep hackers out, but the reality is Microsoft has kept hackers out. You can’t jailbreak an Xbox One.
  - alexklarjr 4y ago
    yet, valid for january, 2023
  - Jorengarenar 4y ago
    If I recall correctly, Microsoft was about to cripple down the Dev Mode, what caused in the community, what led to increased interest in hacking X1, what made MS back off on their decision, after what the discussions quieten down. I won't claim Dev Mode is their solution to hacker, but there seems to be some correlation.

goosedragons 4y ago

Probably helps they are a big OS company but I think they went all out on security because of how severe softmodding scene was on the original Xbox. IIRC there wasn't useful softmods for GameCube or PS2 during the lifetime of the system whereas I knew several people with modded Xboxes with larger drives that they'd rip rentals onto. Xbox 360 also had XNA, I think you needed a paid membership to actually boot a game on it though. And on the last few Nintendo consoles they've had BASIC programs available letting you write your own software. Obviously there's some limitations there but people have done some neat stuff and it's even possible to do 3D. The original Famicom also had BASIC available.