3 ms·

Track Record In China Sets Cisco’s “TOS” Scandal in More Sinister Light

38 points by iProject 14y ago

Zenst 14y ago
Oh and if your thinking I can install dd-wrt then check it out as currently they don't support the chipset inside the ea3500 and have no plans to either. Currently. Kinda sad though that to use yoru own router saftly you need another router infront of it filtering out the extra overheads. Personaly not keen on linksys since they were purchased by Cisco and been a happy draytek customer for over 5 years. Though next upgrade I might go homecrafting again having previously run a OpenBSD p90 box for 5 years prior to the draytek. Think is nomatter what you get, if you don't have control of the firmware then there is nothing to stop them changing it later on down the line or the company get brought up and the same pattern playing out. That all said you don't have to upgrade blindly. Check out what the chanegs are and then decide. Think is though this whole story reoslves around Cisco being able to see what websites you visit and it's not like your ISP can't do that already and in alot of cases has to by law and keep that on record for x amount of time. Guess John Smith will be buying routers and internet connections for some from now on.
- SkyMarshal 14y ago
  >Oh and if your thinking I can install dd-wrt then check it out as currently they don't support the chipset inside the ea3500 and have no plans to either. Currently. A better strategy is buying a router based on whether it is supported by FOSS firmware or not. Just eliminate any router that isn't, and pick from what's left. Even if you end up with older hardware, you get the benefit of highly tuned software for it which can compensate for the hardware. I'm still mind-blown by how good my Linksys WRT54GL [1] is running Tomato Speedmod [2]. Best, most trouble-free router I've ever owned. I get the strong impression that the corporate firmware is produced to be just good enough, whereas something like Speedmod has been continually tweaked, tuned, and improved over ~8 years. Like a late-cycle console game squeezing every ounce of performance out of older console hardware. 1.a. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linksys_WRT54G_series#WRT54GL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linksys_WRT54G_series#WRT54GL 1.b. http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WRT54GL-Wireless-G-Broadband-Router/dp/B000BTL0OA?tag=duckduckgo-d-20 http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WRT54GL-Wireless-G-Broad... 2. http://touristinparadise.blogspot.com/2008/04/linksys-wrt54gl-routers-improving.html http://touristinparadise.blogspot.com/2008/04/linksys-wrt54g...
  - nodata 14y ago
    > A better strategy is buying a router based on whether it is supported by FOSS firmware or not. Just eliminate any router that isn't, and pick from what's left. This strategy doesn't work for routers people have already bought. And trying to buy a router based on open source firmware support is not as simple as you imply - the hardware pages are out-of-date as a rule. It's rare that new hardware is listed.
    - anthonyb 14y ago
      What part of Even if you end up with older hardware, you get the benefit of highly tuned software for it were you having trouble with? And if you want support for newer routers it's easy to arrange - buy two, and ship one to your nearest Tomato/DD-WRT/Hyper-WRT dev :)
      - nodata 14y ago
        But then I end up with a WRT54GL again.
- anthonyb 14y ago
  > if you don't have control of the firmware then there is nothing to stop them changing it Technically, there's nothing to stop them putting backdoors in the chip itself. If I recall correctly, there was something recently about backdoors in chips used by the US military.
quesera 14y ago
Cisco is untrustworthy, that's absolutely true, but it's a bit of a stretch to tie this to the China stuff. They enthusiastically jumped at the chance to sell Chinese-law-enabling hardware to the Chinese government. Juniper or Extreme would certainly have done the same, and Cisco probably got a promise to clamp down on counterfeit hardware out of the deal. It's beyond my personal threshold for ethical behaviour, but corporations don't always have the luxury of standing on principle. Neither do individuals, for that matter. I'm not absolving them. They did the wrong thing and it makes them untrustworthy. They did what the Chinese government asked them to do, and took the carrot offered. In other countries, it might have been done with a stick instead. But the inherent difference here is that the government will always get your packets (and voice datagrams) if they want them. Carrot or stick, hardware manufacturer or service provider or common carrier, they will get them. You have to accept that on some level to exist on the Internet. This Cisco TOS scandal is something else entirely. They think they can do something valuable (for Cisco) with your data, and your permission (not necessarily your awareness). This is just run of the mill abuse of customer privacy -- which we see everywhere and usually tolerate -- and very typical almost boilerplate content restriction rules for any image-conscious hosting service. The important difference is that customers don't get or expect anything of personal and specific value out of their Linksys router. Contrast to Facebook, Google, etc. Cisco really really doesn't want to be commoditized, either. They have spent many years in their enterprise markets going up-stack. They aren't satisfied with being easily replaceable in consumer markets either now, apparently. This is new, and troubling.

38 points by iProject 14y ago

Zenst 14y ago

Oh and if your thinking I can install dd-wrt then check it out as currently they don't support the chipset inside the ea3500 and have no plans to either. Currently. Kinda sad though that to use yoru own router saftly you need another router infront of it filtering out the extra overheads. Personaly not keen on linksys since they were purchased by Cisco and been a happy draytek customer for over 5 years. Though next upgrade I might go homecrafting again having previously run a OpenBSD p90 box for 5 years prior to the draytek. Think is nomatter what you get, if you don't have control of the firmware then there is nothing to stop them changing it later on down the line or the company get brought up and the same pattern playing out. That all said you don't have to upgrade blindly. Check out what the chanegs are and then decide. Think is though this whole story reoslves around Cisco being able to see what websites you visit and it's not like your ISP can't do that already and in alot of cases has to by law and keep that on record for x amount of time. Guess John Smith will be buying routers and internet connections for some from now on.

SkyMarshal 14y ago
>Oh and if your thinking I can install dd-wrt then check it out as currently they don't support the chipset inside the ea3500 and have no plans to either. Currently. A better strategy is buying a router based on whether it is supported by FOSS firmware or not. Just eliminate any router that isn't, and pick from what's left. Even if you end up with older hardware, you get the benefit of highly tuned software for it which can compensate for the hardware. I'm still mind-blown by how good my Linksys WRT54GL [1] is running Tomato Speedmod [2]. Best, most trouble-free router I've ever owned. I get the strong impression that the corporate firmware is produced to be just good enough, whereas something like Speedmod has been continually tweaked, tuned, and improved over ~8 years. Like a late-cycle console game squeezing every ounce of performance out of older console hardware. 1.a. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linksys_WRT54G_series#WRT54GL https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linksys_WRT54G_series#WRT54GL 1.b. http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WRT54GL-Wireless-G-Broadband-Router/dp/B000BTL0OA?tag=duckduckgo-d-20 http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Linksys-WRT54GL-Wireless-G-Broad... 2. http://touristinparadise.blogspot.com/2008/04/linksys-wrt54gl-routers-improving.html http://touristinparadise.blogspot.com/2008/04/linksys-wrt54g...
- nodata 14y ago
  > A better strategy is buying a router based on whether it is supported by FOSS firmware or not. Just eliminate any router that isn't, and pick from what's left. This strategy doesn't work for routers people have already bought. And trying to buy a router based on open source firmware support is not as simple as you imply - the hardware pages are out-of-date as a rule. It's rare that new hardware is listed.
  - anthonyb 14y ago
    What part of Even if you end up with older hardware, you get the benefit of highly tuned software for it were you having trouble with? And if you want support for newer routers it's easy to arrange - buy two, and ship one to your nearest Tomato/DD-WRT/Hyper-WRT dev :)
    - nodata 14y ago
      But then I end up with a WRT54GL again.
anthonyb 14y ago
> if you don't have control of the firmware then there is nothing to stop them changing it Technically, there's nothing to stop them putting backdoors in the chip itself. If I recall correctly, there was something recently about backdoors in chips used by the US military.

quesera 14y ago

Cisco is untrustworthy, that's absolutely true, but it's a bit of a stretch to tie this to the China stuff. They enthusiastically jumped at the chance to sell Chinese-law-enabling hardware to the Chinese government. Juniper or Extreme would certainly have done the same, and Cisco probably got a promise to clamp down on counterfeit hardware out of the deal. It's beyond my personal threshold for ethical behaviour, but corporations don't always have the luxury of standing on principle. Neither do individuals, for that matter. I'm not absolving them. They did the wrong thing and it makes them untrustworthy. They did what the Chinese government asked them to do, and took the carrot offered. In other countries, it might have been done with a stick instead. But the inherent difference here is that the government will always get your packets (and voice datagrams) if they want them. Carrot or stick, hardware manufacturer or service provider or common carrier, they will get them. You have to accept that on some level to exist on the Internet. This Cisco TOS scandal is something else entirely. They think they can do something valuable (for Cisco) with your data, and your permission (not necessarily your awareness). This is just run of the mill abuse of customer privacy -- which we see everywhere and usually tolerate -- and very typical almost boilerplate content restriction rules for any image-conscious hosting service. The important difference is that customers don't get or expect anything of personal and specific value out of their Linksys router. Contrast to Facebook, Google, etc. Cisco really really doesn't want to be commoditized, either. They have spent many years in their enterprise markets going up-stack. They aren't satisfied with being easily replaceable in consumer markets either now, apparently. This is new, and troubling.