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EFF Warns TI Not To Harass Calculator Hobbyists
Ponca City, We love you writes "The EFF has warned Texas Instruments not to pursue legal threats against calculator hobbyists who perform modifications to the company's programmable graphing calculators. TI's calculators perform a 'signature check' that allows only approved operating systems to be loaded, but researchers have reverse-engineered signing keys, allowing tinkerers to install custom operating systems and unlock new functionality in the calculators' hardware. In response, TI has unleashed a torrent of demand letters claiming that the anti-circumvention provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act require the hobbyists to take down commentary about and links to the keys. 'This is not about copyright infringement. This is about running your own software on your own device — a calculator you legally bought,' says EFF Civil Liberties Director Jennifer Granick. 'Yet TI still issued empty legal threats in an attempt to shut down discussion of this legitimate tinkering. Hobbyists are taking their own tools and making them better, in the best tradition of American innovation.'"
You're all fucking fat.
Love,
Netham45
"Hobbyists are taking their own tools and making them better, in the best tradition of American innovation"? I think you misspelled "Pirates and cyber-terrorists are stealing money from TI's hardworking engineers at virtual gunpoint."
someone show apple this news. :/
What about all the similar crap that goes on with other devices? iPhone, XBOX, Wii, NDS, plus loads others?! EFF, why aren't you defending user's rights there?
Maybe they are afraid someone will write a decent RPN code for their calc?
Or maybe they'll change the startup screen to say "58008" upside down
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TI seems to have a perfectly valid case here. This seems like a clear breach of the DMCA. The law itself is completely unacceptable, but don't blame the company for a bad law, blame the legislators.
The product was not sold as a computer or development platform. It was sold as an end user product with documented functionality as described in the user's manual. Sure enough, when the hacks disable their machines TI will get the support call. Most slashdotters will probably flame me for this.
I hate being bipolar; it's awesome!
Oh man, the TI-84's are great.
Thought not considered hacking, me and my mates have found the best use for these small powerhouses. Since both Honors Chemistry and Honors Trig require extensive memorization of theorems and things a like, we load them all onto the calculators and then on the exams it looks like we're solving equations, as opposed to cheating :)
Some would argue this should be posted as AC, but posting as AC is for pussies.
"The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has it's limits" - Albert Einstein
How many people have to buy the overpriced calculators because they are required for an exam.... by required I mean "approved" for use on an exam. Think about it, a calculator costing $100 dollars? What year is it again? If you could program them yourselves suddenly all those "approved" calculators aren't so trustworthy not to solve the exam for students.... although honestly if a calculator can solve the exam then probably the exam isn't testing much...
Once TI backs down, others will smolder. Then I can finally modify my Tektronix 465 scope to become a mind probe. Once its calibrated of course.
When will companies realize that kicking and screaming about an issue they can't legitimatize will kick them in the testicles? Will T.I. really lose oodles of greenbacks because Joe geek likes to mod his calculator to play Mario or run Linux or watch porn (last item questionable). I highly doubt people hacking their calculators will cut into revenue, if anything it will increase it by bolstering interest in the extended possibilities of their products.
Technophiles do not like to buy equipment they are legally castrated for modding or learning about the inner-workings.
When profit is valued more than satisfaction of customers...oh wait..*status quo* *status quo*.
The answer to the original question lies our government and legal system's ability to cease giving them the fucking pacifier every time they cry wolf.
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
Thank you EFF for confronting the corporate greed machine where it concerns this electronic frontier. Now we need to find lawyers to confront them on every other issue where citizens and consumers are ripped off and enslaved by corporate monoliths and their shareholders. People come first. Not Corporate interests. Wake up America. We need better elected officials, apparently.
From my slashdot-learned knowledge of the DMCA this seems to be exactly what the DMCA is designed to prevent.
Insanity: voting in the same two parties over and over again and expecting different results
The DMCA is totally ridiculous, but it's the only thing TI can grasp onto in this situation. TI graphing calculators are the de facto standard for many high school and university level math classes. It's easy to verify that one has had the memory erased when it's in an untampered state. Of course there are somewhat sneaky ways to make it look like it's been erased without close inspection, but performing the reset in front of someone made it almost a certainty. If the hack causes schools to move away from such an "untrustworthy" device, TI stands to lose many sales of those overpriced gadgets.
in the best tradition of American innovation
But how can this be innovation if no-one is making any money from it?
-- Braden's law of data: All data spends some of its lifetime in an excel spreadsheet.
The numbers they are distributing are the prime factors of the RSA key used by the calculators. The factors were determined by a general number field sieve calculation; this was effective because the keys are only 512 bits long.
The public key itself - the modulus - might be subject to copyright. However, the prime factors were never copied from TI - they were mathematically determined from the modulus. Attacking them because they distribute numbers mathematically derived from a copyrighted number is new legal territory.
If numbers derived from a calculation on a copyrightable number are themselves "derivative works" in the copyright sense, it would cause far-reaching problems well beyond calculators. For one thing, it would be illegal to distribute SHA-1 hashes of copyrighted material without permission.
"Screw Sun, cross-platform will never work. Let's move on and steal the Java language." - Visual J++ Product Manager
If you're going to be such a pain - I think you should stop using any and all free software now! give it all back.
A prime number can represent information which is forbidden to possess.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_prime
This goes back about a decade to the AACS encryption key controversy.
Although a Ti-83 can definitely be enhanced by a custom OS, the usefulness of a Ti-83 would greatly decrease for students if custom OS's existed. On many standardized tests, including the SATs and ACTs, the tests specify which calculators are permitted for the test. They have a very specific list, based on which ones they think are not too powerful and would give an unfair advantage to a test taker. All ti-83's are allowed on either test for example. But if the makers of the test knew that people could have ti-83's that had undocumented, unfair functions (such as symbolic algebraic solving as in the ti-89), the test makers would most likely disallow these calculators. Why do you think TI still sells the Ti-83 plus, a calculator created in 1999? Certainly hardware abilities and processor speeds have greatly increased in the last 10 years. The reason is that test makers will not accept calculators with very powerful abilities. They want the student to solve the problem and not the calculator. When browsing calculators at education.ti.com, each calculator has a page called "exam acceptance" (ex. http://education.ti.com/educationportal/sites/US/productDetail/us_ti83p.html?bid=2). That is because TI sells a large number of its calculators to students. The custom OS's could greatly hurt TI's reputation in the eyes of its biggest supporters: the test makers.
Not really. The argument about the AACS key was not that the number itself was copyrighted, but rather that the number was the means to circumvent the protection measures controlling access to a copyrighted work. Thus, distribution of the number was a violation of the DMCA.
I'm not aware of anyone claiming that the number itself was copyrighted. Some people have suggested that line of argument in this case, but if TI really wanted to pursue this in court, they'd have to register the signing key with the copyright office (you have to do this prior to starting litigation). I'd really like to see them try to register a small number!
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
"All I wanted to do was program in pictures of boobies rather than type 5138008..."
The "legal list of allowable calculators" is precisely why the scientific calculator development is pretty much stagnant. I have an HP50G but it is basically a repackaged HP48 with a marginally better screen. But even the 48G was not allowed in the last math class I took that allowed calculators.
I started using an HP28S in college back in 1988. Back then, many teachers did not know what the calculators were capable of. Of course, I had one professor who did, and in fact LOVED them, and so made the tests that much harder to be used in conjunction with said devices.
Anyway my point is the calculator manufacturers are definitely in a pickle. They can't make their calculators too good, or their primary market - college students - can't use them.
If people can hack the OS of "approved" calculators, you can, as you note, basically sneak in anything in what appears to be a normal calculator.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
>It's really hard for me to see how TI has a case under the DMCA at all. They're claiming
>the anti-circumvention clause, but it doesn't seem to apply here.
They are going to claim anything and everything, because there is a lot of money at stake. If people crack one of TI's "exam approved" line of calculators such that anyone can download a new, unapproved OS (or other data) onto it, odds are good that schools will yank that entire line of calculators off of the "exam approved" list.
Bye-bye sales for that line of calculators.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
Someone enlighten me here. I'm trying to figure out the business reason why HP would care about this, and would not want people to buy more of it's calculators.
The problem with quotes on the internet, is that nobody bothers to check their veracity. -- Abraham Lincoln
> The DMCA is a bad law, but it's not so broad as to say "everything to which a technology company with a market capitalization of over $10 million objects is henceforth illegal."
Don't worry. They plan to fix that whenever they get the chance...
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Lawsuits are a convenient way of getting the law changed or at least ruining it for those that abuse it. If one can prove the point that the law is unacceptable by demonstrating it using this case, then the law is unenforceable from that point forward.
What would you have people do? Write desperate missives to their congressmen imploring on them how ridiculous this law is in theory using hypotheticals? How far do you think that has ever gotten anyone?
If you could program them yourselves suddenly all those "approved" calculators aren't so trustworthy not to solve the exam for students.... although honestly if a calculator can solve the exam then probably the exam isn't testing much...
I never really understood why my high school and college math instructors insisted on writing exams that required me to work to a result such that a calculator was required. A well-written exam that tests knowledge of evaluating the arithmetic or calculus properties of a given function would obviate the whole issue of the trustworthiness of a calculator. It would also save students from what I always found to be frustrating, stressful, and easy-to-make data-entry errors.
The only reason to write tests requiring calculator use below linear algebra and diff eq, in my opinion, is to evaluate detail-orientedness, a word of even whose spelling I am not aware.
I read the headline as TI the rapper
Here are the three keys: TI-83 (Plus): n=82EF4009ED7CAC2A5EE12B5F8E8AD9A0 AB9CC9F4F3E44B7E8BF2D57A2F2BEACE 83424E1CFF0D2A5A7E2E53CB926D61F3 47DFAA4B35B205B5881CEB40B328E58F p=B709D3A0CD2FEC08EAFCCF540D8A100BB38E5E091D646ADB7B14D021096FFCD q=B7207BD184E0B5A0B89832AA68849B29EDFB03FBA2E8917B176504F08A96246CB d=4D0534BA8BB2BFA0740BFB6562E843C7 EC7A58AE351CE11D43438CA239DD9927 6CD125FEBAEE5D2696579FA3A3958FF4FC54C685EAA91723BC8888F292947BA1 e=11 TI-84 (Plus): prp77 factor: 67070508990537181066342707695603050521324524613874331879259881495826493920589 prp78 factor: 186923771200711284770368041572205320486346816476524340240220962467860568859381 n=EF5FEF0B0AB6E22731C17539658B2E91E53A59BF8E00FCC81D05758F26C1791CD35AF6101B1E35 43AC3E78FD8BB8F37FC8FE85601C502EABC9132CEAD4711CB1 p=94489014C63CC9E1E1ADB192DBBDD1F78F90A630DA9C86EFC4CBCA44E5B4D54D q=19D431AF2794229620B884E3750D622D1C74F2E4569DC15486FC8D5A3BCDFE2F5 d=2A3E1B2010F318D9BD7C7E19300980B055A0E2A9554B77E7142E23CDF7C7CA13C233A3D462FDFC 968B1F9CEAF2AC2CF305147992AD9E834192ACEBB517DB9941 e=11
TI - 89: prp76 factor: 2231124525637629443181963045297394875470510167130210300957267082210173784611
prp79 factor: 3226885534240147415018248397410101286362761128614350056368675111071170873486957
Yeah. Because nobody from any other continent tinkers with electronic goods.
TI-83 (Plus): n=82EF4009ED7CAC2A5EE12B5F8E8AD9A0 AB9CC9F4F3E44B7E8BF2D57A2F2BEACE 83424E1CFF0D2A5A7E2E53CB926D61F3 47DFAA4B35B205B5881CEB40B328E58F p=B709D3A0CD2FEC08EAFCCF540D8A100BB38E5E091D646ADB7B14D021096FFCD q=B7207BD184E0B5A0B89832AA68849B29EDFB03FBA2E8917B176504F08A96246CB d=4D0534BA8BB2BFA0740BFB6562E843C7 EC7A58AE351CE11D43438CA239DD9927 6CD125FEBAEE5D2696579FA3A3958FF4FC54C685EAA91723BC8888F292947BA1 e=11
TI-89: prp76 factor: 2231124525637629443181963045297394875470510167130210300957267082210173784611
Now if we could get Jennifer Granick to feel the same way about proprietary software
you need to go after the smart card to get channels not the box.
When they found out that hackers had found a way to bypass the web interface on their MyBook NAS, and gain access to a Linux shell prompt their reaction was...
...To issue a firmware update that had a "Enable SSH access" box in the setup page.
Lots of geeks I know are buying the WD box precisely because it's hacker-friendly.
Quidquid Latine dictum sit, altum videtur (anything said in Latin sounds important)
I truly wonder what happened to "I buy something, it's mine and I'm free to do with it whatever I damn please unless it harms somebody else".
A good education is a bit like a STD - it makes you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and gives you a desire to spread it.
The reason they probably want to keep it locked down is because their calculators are accepted in school exams, and that's because they have a fixed feature set that prevents cheating. If a well-versed student jailbroke his calculator he could use it for things his teachers didn't expect, allowing him to cheat on exams. What they should do is release a calculator locked down even harder for exams, along with one that isn't locked down at all.
in the best tradition of American innovation.
Sir Frank Whittle (British) and Dr. Hans Von Ohain (German) - indepently invented the jet engine. ... ...
Sir Alexander Fleming (Scottish - discovered penicillin.
Leonardo da Vinci (Italian) - inventor, artist, mathematician, painter, etc. etc.
etc.
I fully support what the EFF do but innovation is not simply limited to America - can I suggest in future they use the adjective "human", rather than "American", in similar statements? Otherwise, they're just affirming the stereotype that many of we non-US residents have, namely that Americans have no interest in the world outside their own shores.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
If colleges need to let students take calculators, but not calculators that are too powerful, why doesn't the college provide the calculators at the start of the exam? People can use their laptops/powerful calculators for everything else.
I am sure if they alienate their customers some other company will come along and encourage it on their calculators and steal TI's business
Security through obscurity is bad.
Security through judiciary is worse.
"The public key itself - the modulus - might be subject to copyright. "
If it is a *public* key it is meant to be copied.
In any case a key is just a number, how the heck can you copyright a single number in isolation?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
The school hands out calculators at start of test, collects them with the completed papers.
Given the amount of money public schools blow on sports, it's not that expensive to do.
Real calculator enthusiasts prefer Casio calculators
You definitely misspelled "combo".
Why TI? Has anyone ever used a Casio? Why use key combinations when you have menus!
Why use an inferior machine when you have better for the same price?
Ok, so what's likely really going on is that the device has a fixed cost and they sell the same device with different feature sets (software) at different prices.
Hobbyist have figured out how to buy the cheaper device and load the more expensive software, right?
If not, then WTF? TI's making the same profit on the device weather it was tinkered with or not. Learn from LinkSys. The WRT54G was being hacked to install DDWRT. LinkSys saw the value in this. When they released a new version of the WRT54G which no longer had the capacity for DDWRT, they released the WRT54GL aimed specifically at loading up DDWRT.
Embrace you customers, don't sue them! I realize suing them looks good on the books, and the 1 year term CEO can take the bonus and run before the long term results hit. But thinking like that will destroy a company.
My curiosity lies in the area Assistive Robotics, and TI's graphing calculator looked pretty good at handling external peripherals using LISP. There are other chips out there that can do the job. I quite frankly do not understand why TI gets their panties in a twist when people want to buy their products?
Back in the mists of prehistoric time, when I was a physics undergrad, we obviously took a lot of math and physics. Like 6 semesters of math, and god only knows how many physics courses. Somehow, we got by without ever needing a calculator - I didn't even own one. I'm not really sure why we need to use calculators during exams nowadays.
Instead of attempting to prevent modding (losing fight), Ti should create a device that test makers can use to quickly check if a calculator is not standard. Plug it in, and it analyzes the calculator as it boots up, etc...
"Hey, TI ...leave our hacks alone!"
i frequently donate to eff through paypal. even tho my donations are not regular and small, i think every bit counts.
Read radical news here
[b]and it's kept calculator tech advancement practically stagnant.[/b]
Believe me, when I shelled out $280 for my HP28S in 1989 or so, it was money I happily spent to have a hand-held computer that could help me do calculus.
It's not the money that has stagnated calculator design. It is making them "exam certified". Schools are wise now to the power of these calculators. The ones that still allow calculators to be used at all have a list of acceptable calculators that can be used. Only calculators below a certain computational power level will be allowed. Anything more powerful won't be allowed, and, consequently, there is no market for it.
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.