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Playstation 3 Code Signing Cracked For Good

ReportedlyWorking writes "It appears that Sony's PS3 has been fatally compromised. At the Chaos Communication Congress in Berlin, a team named 'fail0verflow' revealed that they had calculated the Private Keys, which would let them or anyone else generate signed software for the PS3. Additionally, they also claim to have a method of jailbreaking the PS3 without the use of a Dongle, which is the current method. If all these statements are true, this opens the door to custom firmware, and homebrew software. Assuming that Sony doesn't take radical action and invalidate their private keys, this could mean that Jailbreaking is viable on all PS3, regardless of their firmware! From the article: 'Approximately a half hour in, the team revealed their new PS3 secrets, the moment we all were waiting for. One of the major highlights here was, dongle-less jailbreaking by overflowing the bootup NOR flash, giving complete control over the system. The other major feat, was calculating the public private keys (due to botched security), giving users the ability to sign their own SELFs. Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!'"

534 comments

  1. Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

    Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

    1. Re:Sigh by Nadaka · · Score: 1

      No. Only people who announce their 733t #@xor 5k177s or those who p0wn newbs.

    2. Re:Sigh by Raineer · · Score: 5, Interesting

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      To be honest I'm not sure how you can call Sony security a failure. As far as popular consumer devices go, the PS3 lasted for eons. I am both a Sony and Apple fanboy (somewhat), and have to laugh at the hours (literally) it takes any Apple product to be cracked while Sony (as dysfunctional as any company there is) makes a product that lasts for years. Cracking the keys was inevitable, but Sony should be recognized for making it more difficult than anyone else :) I still sit on the side of the fence where the damn thing should have been open from the get-go...but meh

    3. Re:Sigh by MoonBuggy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I get the impression that the moderate openness of the PS3 at release was exactly what did preserve its uncracked status for so long. As soon as they locked out the 'Other OS' option, they pissed off the precise segment of the userbase who also have the skill to crack any subsequent security improvements.

    4. Re:Sigh by JavaBear · · Score: 0

      Agreed, the PS3 withstood the hacking attempts for about 6 years, compared to the competition that is a VERY long time.

    5. Re:Sigh by MoonBuggy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Having followed the finest Slashdot tradition and only read TFA after posting, it appears that there was truth in my speculation. Fail0verflow, the group that found the keys, posted on twitter that "we only started looking at the ps3 after otheros was killed.". That means they did this in nine months.

    6. Re:Sigh by socceroos · · Score: 4, Funny

      The only 733ts I'm aware of are my wife's.

    7. Re:Sigh by neokushan · · Score: 2

      I wasn't aware that the PS3 was released in 2004.

      --
      +1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
    8. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      6 years? Are you from the future?

    9. Re:Sigh by sp1nny · · Score: 1, Insightful

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      It really does reflect on the mentality of the people doing this doesn't it? Reading through the summary, my impression of these people went from "hey, those are a bunch of smart guys" to "probably a bunch of socially misfit dickwads".

    10. Re:Sigh by flappinbooger · · Score: 1

      At least it wasn't in LOLcat.

      --
      Flappinbooger isn't my real name
    11. Re:Sigh by Derekloffin · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Only if they completely ignored all knowledge of the PS3 discovered before 9 months ago, which I highly doubt. Granted, it probably wouldn't have taken them the 4 years to crack it if they had interest from the start, but to complete ignore the 3 intervening years, you have to assume they gained nothing from those 3 years at all on any front. It is a disingenuous claim.

    12. Re:Sigh by wideBlueSkies · · Score: 1

      And to put that into perspective. 6 years is about 1/2 the time it took to write Duke Nukem Forever. Which truly was forever.

      --
      Huh?
    13. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      If you sneak your balls out of your wife's purse and put them back where they belong, you will be able to see other womens 733ts too.

    14. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I get the impression that the moderate openness of the PS3 at release was exactly what did preserve its uncracked status for so long. As soon as they locked out the 'Other OS' option, they pissed off the precise segment of the userbase who also have the skill to crack any subsequent security improvements.

      I have to agree No one was interested in cracking thise because was somewhat open.. It got closed and people were pissed thus making the hacker community bound and determined to completely crack the PS. and they have succeeded and did not take really that long now did it? if the PS3 was clsoed down like this in the beginning, it would have been cracked alot sooner

    15. Re:Sigh by Dogtanian · · Score: 1

      No. Only people who announce their 733t #@xor 5k177s or those who p0wn newbs.

      Pfft..... 13375p34k died years ago. (*) I can't remember the last time I saw anyone use it non-ironically. Get with the plan, Gramps!

      (*) Probably not coincidentally, I'd say it was around the time that it was getting so mainstream that newspapers were discovering it and explaining to their readers what those strange words their children were typing meant. It's *so* uncool when even your Mum knows all your nichey slang ;-)

      --
      "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
    16. Re:Sigh by Molt · · Score: 2

      People can be both at once.. all too often in my experience.

      --
      404 Not Found: No such file or resource as '.sig'
    17. Re:Sigh by Penguinshit · · Score: 1

      We can haz krakd ps3!

    18. Re:Sigh by gilesjuk · · Score: 1

      The security only really needs to be good enough to establish the platform and sell a few million games.

      I'm sure Sony will have a way to detect altered consoles online and block?

    19. Re:Sigh by shoehornjob · · Score: 0

      Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL

      Upon learning that their system had been cracked Sony replied:

      Epic lawsuit

      as that appears to be the kneejerk reaction of corporate america when someone finds a way to over ride their "copy protection" scheme. And by copy protection I mean "locked into a closed system where you must buy our stuff".

      --
      "We are just a war away from Amerikastan. When god vs god the undoing of man." Dave Mustaine
    20. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      what are teet poundatxor skitts, and why would people announce they have them?

    21. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      more difficult than anybody else as far as I know the 360's signing keys havent beeen cracked yet.

    22. Re:Sigh by hedwards · · Score: 1

      I've yet to see anybody crack the PS3 that didn't assert that they only started around the time that the otheros feature removed except for the person that triggered the removal. And he'd only been at it for a little under 2 months.

      It's not disingenuous to say that. Unless they were examining the system looking for flaws, I see no reason at all to suggest that they gained something from that time period.

    23. Re:Sigh by JavaBear · · Score: 1

      Yep, way ahead of the times. Sorry, I have no idea where the 6 came from

    24. Re:Sigh by kurokame · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Okay, I'll give you 12 months. The difference is negligible. The techniques used to root the PS3 are so fundamental and well-known that it was largely a matter of trying them out. There was nothing revolutionary here, it was just a matter of people with sufficient expertise and resources becoming motivated to spend the time to do the necessary work.

      The point remains: working with your users diminishes their motivation to work against you. Minimizing the artificial constraints placed on what users can do with the device they purchased means that huge swaths of people who might be motivated to reverse engineer your safeguards won't need to. The community relationship will be improved, new uses for the hardware that you didn't anticipate will be found.

      When you can improve sales and customer relations while simultaneously lengthening the lifetime of your product as a DRM device, well, it seems like it would be a relatively simple decision. The net effect is to attract and retain customers both at a consumer and industry level. Consumers get a more versatile device - and equally important, respect. Developers get stronger and longer-lasting DRM and a larger and more robust consumer base. Everybody wins.

    25. Re:Sigh by kurokame · · Score: 1

      To add the 0.5 Informative for those who can't recall or who are too lazy to google - the PS3 was released in Nov. 2006.

    26. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I agree, this was not a fail, it took YEARS for it to be circumvented.

    27. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you sneak your balls out of your wife's purse and put them back where they belong, you will be able to see other womens 733ts too.

      You have much to learn, grasshopper.

    28. Re:Sigh by ShakaUVM · · Score: 1

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      If you've ever doubted the impact of the WoW and 4Chan communities...

    29. Re:Sigh by causality · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Everybody wins.

      And that's the problem. I'll describe the mentality with which you are dealing when you speak of corporations that want to control what can be done with a device post-sale: "it is not enough for me to win -- someone else must also lose." They are not interested in finding the balance of which you speak.

      The corporations own most of our legal system and media. I'm glad for these cracker groups. They're just about the only remaining check against them that seems to actually work.

      --
      It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Einstein
    30. Re:Sigh by couchslug · · Score: 1

      "Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?"

      No, just those whose audience consider it appropriate.

      --
      "This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
    31. Re:Sigh by icebraining · · Score: 2

      If you have the private keys, you can sign games/software that will be accepted by any console without having to modify them.

    32. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Look at the video - the security on the PS3 was badly botched. It wasn't an example of developing new techniques. None of the people who COULD hack it bothered... until Sony took away the ability to run Linux for no good reason.

    33. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


      Cracking the keys was inevitable

      Why was it inevitable? From the article this was a public key system where the console only contained the public key, with the private key only held by trusted entities. As long as the implemented it correctly, it would be extraordinarily difficult to derive the private key from the public one.

    34. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      People can be both at once.. all too often in my experience.

      I would imagine it comes from a combination of being bored off your ass in school with no relief plus being treated like a piece of shit sub-human because you're not a jock and don't care much about following trends. And then seeing that the jocks are treated like little darlings who can practically get away with murder while you are expected to be responsible for your actions. At a young impressionable age.

    35. Re:Sigh by Simon+(S2) · · Score: 1
      --
      I just don't trust anything that bleeds for five days and doesn't die.
    36. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You sir need to open your eyes, there are 733ts all over the place, you have a pair yourself, possibly more.

    37. Re:Sigh by anss123 · · Score: 1

      Cracking the keys was inevitable, but Sony should be recognized for making it more difficult than anyone else :)

      The xbox 360 has yet to be fully cracked. They got firmware hacks for the DVD but they don't have "the keys" allowing you to sign xbox software.

      I.e. they have not made it more difficult than anyone else ;)

    38. Re:Sigh by marcansoft · · Score: 1, Informative

      There was basically no knowledge of the PS3 10 or so months ago. There was literally zilch besides a minor OtherOS 3D graphics hack until Sony released the PS3 Slim without Linux. No one cared, or at least no one who knew what they were doing cared, because they were happy with Linux. I've yet to meet someone who 1) was actively trying to hack the PS3 before they pulled OtherOS and 2) actually did something worth mentioning once this whole thing took off. The (few) people who were trying were (and still are) clueless, and the people who know started after the OtherOS mess. OtherOS was a great way to keep the hackers happy, and pulling it has been a great way to get everyone to target them.

    39. Re:Sigh by marcansoft · · Score: 5, Informative

      I'm one of those guys, and the summary is so terrible it's not even funny. Please watch the recording of the talk before you form an opinion; the reporting on this one is pretty terrible. Especially the "overflowing the bootup NOR flash". I don't even know what that's supposed to mean.

      The PS3 security system really is horrible. Most of it is effectively useless because it can be worked around or breaking it is not necessary, and the signature screwup is basically inexcusable. We aren't calling it "Epic Fail" for one or two holes, we're calling it "Epic Fail" because as a whole it's a complete clusterfuck and there are many fundamental design holes and more than enough evidence that the developers responsible for it were not qualified to design a security system or write its code (e.g. clearly they didn't employ a proper cryptographer). It's also a reference to our Wii talk (which was subtitled "Wii Fail") because we consider the PS3's security to be a hell of a lot worse, design-wise.

    40. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Nobody ever got the private keys for the original xbox either. Of course, they managed to replace the bios so that unsigned code was runnable.

      I find this surprising, since this is Sony's 3rd go at console protection and Microsoft of all companies has a better track record.

    41. Re:Sigh by Pojut · · Score: 1

      If you get a woman with the right 733ts, you won't care about what other women have :)

    42. Re:Sigh by socceroos · · Score: 1

      Sorry, maybe its clearer to say "The only 733ts worth being aware of are my wife's."

    43. Re:Sigh by Nuno+Sa · · Score: 1

      Hey Marcan!
      Good job with the AsbestOS :-)

      Maybe now it's possible to remove the hypervisor and run Linux in the bare hardware?

      Kudos to you.

    44. Re:Sigh by thetartanavenger · · Score: 1

      I get the impression that the moderate openness of the PS3 at release was exactly what did preserve its uncracked status for so long. As soon as they locked out the 'Other OS' option, they pissed off the precise segment of the userbase who also have the skill to crack any subsequent security improvements.

      A prime example that reverse engineering DRM should be legal. After all, the ones doing it aren't actually doing it to break security protections, instead just to use their device in the ways they want to. Kind of ironic, you break our fun, we'll break yours.

      --
      Who need's speling and grammar?
    45. Re:Sigh by mcclungsr · · Score: 1

      Your work on this is fascinating to me, thank you for sharing it. I watched the entire talk. The crypto part really is an embarrassment for Sony.
      For me, It'll be interesting to see a Linux and homebrew software with full RSX access, which for a lot of people was the original goal of hacking on the PS3 to begin with.

    46. Re:Sigh by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Sigh...I really hate to have to point this out, because I personally hate Sony and actually rank them damned high on my list of "stupid evil companies" but there actually was a damned good reason to get rid of OtherOS, even if they totally botched the execution.

      You see the consoles (with the exception of Nintendo who have always sold at a profit) operate on what is commonly know as the "razor and blades" business model, originally started by said razor companies but quickly being adopted by certain tech sectors, inkjet printers being a good example. Now please remember that at the time the PS3 was losing money on EVERY SINGLE UNIT sold and they were only making their money from games and peripheral licensing, the "blades" part of the equation.

      Only problem for Sony was, unlike their competitor the X360, thousands and thousands of their units were being bought up by labs at everyplace from the local college to the USAF and not a single game or peripheral was being bought for those units causing every single last unit bought for those purposes to be a permanent red mark on the books of a company that was already in dire straits. And what allowed those colleges and other groups to use the PS3 as a cluster supercomputers? OtherOS, which without the access to meant it was just another game machine. So they pulled OtherOS, and rightly so.

      Now personally the way they did it just proves to me they deserve the title of "stupid evil corp" because they not only pulled support from new units but they also fucked over previous users by making OtherOS and playing games an either/or proposition. And that was dumb, uncalled for, and there was a simple way to fix it AND generate good will. They could have simply said "Look, with all the expensive technology and R&D we have invested in PS3 we simply can't afford to have so many machines being bought up for non gaming uses. So for those that want to experiment with the Cell we'll be offering a "research edition" which omits the Blu Ray and has a MSRP of $800 a piece, or $600 in bulk. That way those that want the cell tech can use it, and those machine built for games will be used for games. For those that currently have the older units we will continue to support the OtherOS if you want it."

      If they would have done that not only would Sony NOT have pissed off the hackers, but they would have been looked at as a "straight shooting" company that was trying to balance the users desires with their books.The PS3 would have even most likely increased their profits by colleges buying the research edition and just like how NV and ATI have the GP-GPU HPC models they could have even added a couple of tweaks to the platform like a bigger NIC or fiber connection and sold it for even MORE money to those that simply want the cell. Instead Sony pissed everyone off, screwed their customers, made enemies of the hackers, in short they done peed in their chili. Just shows why they rightly deserve the "stupid evil company" label IMHO.

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    47. Re:Sigh by chriso11 · · Score: 1

      So thousands and thousands of units were sold at a loss. Compare that to millions of PS3 consoles out there, and this is an example of being penny wise and pound foolish.

      --
      No, I don't trust in god. He'll have to pay up front, like everybody else.
    48. Re:Sigh by Gogo0 · · Score: 5, Informative

      For those that dont know, this guy (among others of course) has been integral to opening up the Wii and now the PS3 for homebrew.
      Very interesting writer too, explains on his website much of the details of working around the various "fixes" Nintendo applied to try and close the holes in their code.
      He is definitely not an asshole, and those of us who care about openness on these consoles (or just enjoy running homebrew on them) owe a lot to him and the teams he works with.

      </deserved asskissing>

    49. Re:Sigh by triffid_98 · · Score: 1
      More importantly, you only need these dongles / hacked save-game states / mod-chips (how most consoles are unlocked) because we don't have a way to sign media as genuine. Once you have that then it's totally simple to root anything. Sony might still be able to blacklist your console from their store/network but other than that I don't see that they have any other cards left to play.

      And I'll agree to a point. Sony didn't lock out otherOS until developers came up with a way of running iso images from it. Either way I expect to see some damn nice emulators in the next 12 months and I totally owe those guys a beer.

      Okay, I'll give you 12 months. The difference is negligible. The techniques used to root the PS3 are so fundamental and well-known that it was largely a matter of trying them out. There was nothing revolutionary here, it was just a matter of people with sufficient expertise and resources becoming motivated to spend the time to do the necessary work.

    50. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Security holes or not, it succeeded in it's job for 4 years. Epic is not the proper choice of word. It truly does reflect on the maturity of your intellect. It would have been an epic fail had you cracked it in the first quarter. You did not. This is more like, "PS3 Security FINALLY fails. "

    51. Re:Sigh by secolactico · · Score: 1

      I remember that back in the day there was a movement to implement a distributed computing project (a la SETI at home) in order to crack the Xbox signing keys.

      I guess there wasn't much support for it and other hacks were so very much available.

      --
      No sig
    52. Re:Sigh by b4dc0d3r · · Score: 1

      soccerooswifes733ts.com agrees.

    53. Re:Sigh by Chewbacon · · Score: 1

      Sony PS3: one of the few products that have lost features in its lifetime. I think pulling features from consumers after they buy your product is a good way to be a dick. They struck me as being pissed Sony shut the door on running their own code and they responded in kind.

      --
      Chewbacon
      The Bible is like Wikipedia: written by a bunch of people and verifiable by questionable sources.
    54. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      but there actually was a damned good reason to get rid of OtherOS, even if they totally botched the execution. You see the consoles (with the exception of Nintendo who have always sold at a profit) operate on what is commonly know as the "razor and blades" business model

      False, Sony no longer loses money on the PS3 base hardware, so removing OtherOS is exactly the wrong thing to do in response to the razor blade issue since no OtherOS means fewer consoles sold at a (small) profit.

      “This year is the first time that we are able to cover the cost of the PlayStation 3. We aren’t making huge money from hardware, but we aren’t bleeding like we used to.”

    55. Re:Sigh by Chewbacon · · Score: 1

      Design holes are going to be there. The question is how motivated are people to compromise the system? How many do we need to plug to be safe? These guys are pissed they lost the ability to run their own code and seemed pretty motivated.

      --
      Chewbacon
      The Bible is like Wikipedia: written by a bunch of people and verifiable by questionable sources.
    56. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I know I'm just some random person on the net, but as an owner of a Wii home media center, Thank You! You have no idea how greatful I am people like you are around, and do what you do. I could list a million reasons why, but really all I have to say is Thanks!

    57. Re:Sigh by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      ...four years and one month down the road. :rolleyes:

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    58. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The attack only started after OtherOS was taken away, much less than four years.

      Epic refers to the hole that existed. It's such a basic mistake that it's amazing the security engineers made it. You'd think that the hole would have been much more esoteric.

    59. Re:Sigh by aeoo · · Score: 1

      Why do you care that much about decorum? Stop with the superficial bullshit please. It's not like these people insert phrases like "epic fail" every 2 seconds of their speech. They used it appropriately and judiciously.

    60. Re:Sigh by hosecoat · · Score: 1

      who cares is it was 9 months, or 3 years and nine months. all that matters is that now i can update and play read dead redemption, and still install another OS when sony stops supporting ps3.

    61. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To be honest I'm not sure how you can call Sony security a failure.

      If that's how you feel then you really should watch this video by fail0verflow. It's their presentation (with plenty of detail) of how exactly Sony's security fails and how remarkably pointless some security measures actually are. It also explains how badly broken their use of crypto is. I'm quite frankly amazed at how many mistakes Sony made now that we are learning more and these talented hackers are taking the PS3 apart piece by piece.

    62. Re:Sigh by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 1

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      You act as though Sony hasn't fired any shots.

      --

      "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

    63. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh man you are just so like last year.

    64. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well, since Sony decided to behave like dicks by crippling other people's bought and paid for property in removing OtherOS, and backwards compatibility, seems to me that a handful of folks that want to speak dickishly in response to it have certainly earned that privilege, especially if theirs is among the crippled systems. While civilized folk would/ should know better than to behave in that way, our corporate associates at Sony have already demonstrated a penchant for incivility.

      A more dickish response might be (and earned, in my opinion):

      "About F'ng Time they Jailbroke the ba$tard"

    65. Re:Sigh by amentajo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      George Hotz ("geohot") tried his hand at it, given that he had been rather successful at cracking Apple's iStuff. He found an exploit that gave hypervisor access, and in response, Sony removed OtherOS in a firmware update, as geohot's hack required use of OtherOS.

      So this can all be traced back to geohot getting involved... though in my opinion, Sony shouldn't have responded by removing OtherOS, causing all the collateral damage. It inevitably was going to result in a lot of really serious people getting involved and, by extension, more stories like this.

    66. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Neither Sony nor Microsoft lose money on the base unit. Microsoft actually details the numbers in its financials to prove it and Sony is better at managing its production chain than MS ever dreams of so you know damn well Sony is not taking a hit either.

      Despite the grandiloquent pronouncements about openness and folksy aphorisms about chili, Sony ultimately annoyed a base that didn't buy any games anyway. Doesn't seem too self-defeating to me.

      The "Cell Research Edition" is called an IBM Blade server. They're pricey but you get a lot beefier CPU than the first-generation Cell that's in a PS3.

    67. Re:Sigh by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 1

      Actually the PSJailbreak JIG exploit was pretty... intense.

      I mean in principle it's just a standard buffer overflow exploit, but the method that the buffer overflow's triggered wasn't like any other console exploit I've -ever- seen.

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    68. Re:Sigh by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 2

      The PS3 security system really is horrible

      I saw the whole video. I agree that it's fail, but I find this comment simply fucking baffling.

      Didn't you guys release the Twilight Princess Wii hack? The one with the buffer overflow in the damn horse's name?

      The PS3 gets a lot of shit right. It doesn't trust the optical drive(bye bye firmware mods ala 360/Wii), it properly implements the NX bit in userspace(bye bye buffer save game/TIFF overflow exploits ala PSP, Xbox and Wii) and while the fact that they're not randomizing the encryption is incredibly bad, it's not epic fail. For epic fail, we go to the Xbox 360 which has a damn JTAG pinout exposed to the world on the fucking motherboard(runner up: Xbox pogo pins).

      I'd guess that Sony saw modchipping to be a bigger threat than softmods, as has been the case in the past.

      Also, why didn't you guys list sjeep's Independence Exploit for PS2 that came out in 2002 or so? It didn't directly enable piracy(although when HDloader got dumped into ELF format it sure did).

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    69. Re:Sigh by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Nooo...NOT false. If Sony sells them for just $0.01 over the cost of production they can legally claim they are not sold at a loss but I wouldn't call that a productive endeavor, would you? I haven't actually seen any site saying The PS3 makes profits on every sale! which you would think would be newsworthy. No my guess is just like the X360 it is so damned close to 0 profit it ain't even funny so they can then make up the money in the much more lucrative games market just EXACTLY as I said.

      And let us not forget Sony isn't the only one making consoles. With MSFT more than willing to let their cash cows help the books they can and have be ruthless on pricing the X360. it is pretty common knowledge that several of the PS3 price cuts were NOT something Sony actually wanted, but instead were something they were forced to do to keep the PS3 from completely tanking, and even then they are STILL last place.

      So don't buy some press release bullet point as the gospel. Unless you can show me hard data that says Sony is making enough strictly from the sales of PS3 hardware to afford to not only keep production going, but to deal with service returns, R&D for new gadgets like the Move AND keep sinking money into PS3 exclusive first party titles to make their console actually attractive to customers? Then I have to call BS. Who cares if Sony is no longer selling at a loss if the money they get isn't even enough to buy a Coke?

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    70. Re:Sigh by linhares · · Score: 1

      If you get a woman with the right 733ts, you won't care about what other women have :)

      for 24 months, give or take

    71. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I find your lack of awareness disturbing, and it's giving me a hard time, because all the other 73375 are disturbing enough.

    72. Re:Sigh by cyclomedia · · Score: 1

      I agree, it reminds me of the fact (or myth, i havent checked) that safes are rated in minutes - how long it'd take to compromise - and not advertised as unbreakable. If this announcement does mean the end of PS3's security it's not a fail - it survived 4 years and an army of determined hackers.

      --
      If you don't risk failure you don't risk success.
    73. Re:Sigh by Kashgarinn · · Score: 1

      And your counter claim is as disingenuous because the real answer is : we don't know if the 3 intervening years matter or not, but from their comments it seems to be 9 months since they started cracking it.

      Why can't people just state/accept the facts instead of spouting off their own fictitious opinions/lies which are based on.. nothing.

    74. Re:Sigh by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      They don't have the keys, but there are hacks available to bypass the need to have keys which are separate from the dvd firmware hacks (google xbox 360 jtag)

      --
      http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
    75. Re:Sigh by Bert64 · · Score: 1

      If Nintendo can sell their consoles as a profit, why can't sony?
      Why should the customers be punished because sony decided on such a flawed business model?

      Also when the games are so ridiculously expensive to prop up the loss making hardware, it discourages people from buying them... I have a PS3 and a handful of games which were bought very cheaply (mostly used) from a local game store. I know plenty of people who have a ps3 and maybe 1 or 2 games? Most of them are bored of those games and just use it as a glorified video player now.

      --
      http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
    76. Re:Sigh by jplopez · · Score: 0

      To be fair, you said "about 6 years". That's 4 +/- 2, which seems ok. In case you were using Carbon-14, of course.

    77. Re:Sigh by cheekyboy · · Score: 1

      You dont get it, its not the TIME taken, not that these guys started 4 years ago, they DIDNT TAKE 4 years to crack it.

      Its each example layer thats hacked, it shows many many stupid mistakes sony did that were quite simple.

      They outsourced their security to a company that helped umm hmm Mr Adolf.

      They can market it well and sell it to the execs/engineers. If your engineer is smarter than IBM to understand it and analysis it, then you dont
      need ibm to design the security , do it your self.

      Hello sony, wheres your Ex-Amiga hackers you hired , over paid with 4 kids living in a mansion ?

      Yes sony should allow linux by default with access to opengl 3 etc... But stupid execs and BA's dont listen and never will.

      On a cpu horse power alone, SPE's are a lost cause, highest end Nvidia cuda will eat its ass.

      --
      Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
    78. Re:Sigh by jplopez · · Score: 0

      To be fair, you said "about 6 years". That's 4 +/- 2, which seems ok.

      In case you were using Carbon-14, of course.

    79. Re:Sigh by pjt33 · · Score: 1

      Cracking the keys was inevitable

      Not until quantum computing advances a long way - unless they had a completely broken implementation. The whole point of asymmetric cryptography is that you can give someone one of the keys and they can't derive the other.

    80. Re:Sigh by cheekyboy · · Score: 1

      The video was awesome, well done guys, great stuff, and keep it up.

      Now to hack a win7 mobile to run android ;-)

      --
      Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
    81. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I love your comment from the 27c3 lightning talk about the subject that really summaries the whole problem:

      "We dont exploit things, we just sign things...."

      since Sony gave away the private key by their epic fuck up since they watched xkcd* when they should be RTFM while doing crypto implementations.

      "xkcd epic" should be a new level of failure.

      *xkcd.com/221/

    82. Re:Sigh by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      As soon as they locked out the 'Other OS' option, they pissed off the precise segment of the userbase who also have the skill to crack any subsequent security improvements.

      I wonder if the same people who were affected by the PS4 being put on the back burner were those who decided to cancel Other OS support. If so, clever - they hacked Sony from the inside.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    83. Re:Sigh by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      more than enough evidence that the developers responsible for it were not qualified to design a security system or write its code

      How hard is it to tell the difference between incompetence and willful misimplementation here?

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    84. Re:Sigh by MorpheousMarty · · Score: 1

      It's not necessary, but when you p0wn one of the largest computer/entertainment companies in the world, you can talk about it however you want. They earned it and if you had the skills I'm sure you'd have declared that Sony's encryption was verily compromised. For sooth.

    85. Re:Sigh by marcansoft · · Score: 4, Informative

      while the fact that they're not randomizing the encryption is incredibly bad, it's not epic fail

      A signer screwup that leaks their private key is not epic fail? This is probably the first time in embedded system security that someone has fucked up public key crypto this badly.

      For epic fail, we go to the Xbox 360 which has a damn JTAG pinout exposed to the world on the fucking motherboard(runner up: Xbox pogo pins).

      So does the PS3. JTAG doesn't mean anything if it's disabled, which it normally is, on both consoles (actually, we suspect it might be enabled on the PS3 but you probably can't do anything interesting with it). The Xbox 360 security design is a lot better than the PS3's. They had a few minor holes. The PS3 is completely messed up. The 360 has better revocation, better encryption, secure memory, a simpler and more effective security design, and a better implementation.

      Also, why didn't you guys list sjeep's Independence Exploit for PS2 that came out in 2002 or so? It didn't directly enable piracy(although when HDloader got dumped into ELF format it sure did).

      That came a lot later than modchips (which already enabled homebrew and piracy equally, since there's no PKI), and the slide was already overcrowded so it didn't make much sense.

    86. Re:Sigh by marcansoft · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Honestly, it's perfectly possible to engineer the signature randomization failure deliberately (it would certainly be very easy to botch a signer like this and make it look like a bug, see the Underhanded C Contest for similar examples), but I think it's extremely unlikely that something like this actually happened. Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity. Especially considering the rest of the security is messed up in ways that clearly indicate they just didn't know what they were doing.

    87. Re:Sigh by anss123 · · Score: 1

      I will admit that I'm not up to date on the xbox scene, but I believe hacks like that can be engineered away (with future xbox revisions).

      This PS3 exploit is final (assuming I read the article correctly). I.e. the security is fully broken. You don't even need to do any hacking.

    88. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is BS, it's not been broken, and clearly it's not epic fail, as the PS3 has been secure fo 4 years....

    89. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      George Hotz ("geohot") tried his hand at it, given that he had been rather successful at cracking Apple's iStuff. He found an exploit that gave hypervisor access, and in response, Sony removed OtherOS in a firmware update, as geohot's hack required use of OtherOS.

      So this can all be traced back to geohot getting involved... though in my opinion, Sony shouldn't have responded by removing OtherOS, causing all the collateral damage. It inevitably was going to result in a lot of really serious people getting involved and, by extension, more stories like this.

      Actually this can be traced back to Sony's lack of support for Linux in the slim PS3 models, which was arguably the motivation behind geohot's attempt in the first place.

    90. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Now I think the yoof just bash their head against the wall a few times before typing.

      Talking to my niece hurts - Sister spelt systa. Gah!

    91. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Reading hte thread, it sounds like it is the word "epic" itself that the original post (and follow ups) object to, feeling that the use of such a meme makes the attackers look socially inept and by doing so brings the "hacking community" down to "immiture kids" rather than "freedom fighters".

    92. Re:Sigh by marcansoft · · Score: 1

      Everyone keeps forgetting that OtherOS was already removed / discontinued on new PS3s - the Slim - before Geohot started his work. That's what started it all. Removing OtherOS on the Fat made it a lot worse, of course, but it's the lack of OtherOS on the Slim (for a fishy - and, as it turned out, totally BS reason) that got people looking initially. We even gave it a quick look exactly one year ago, at 26c3, though we didn't try very hard (this was before OtherOS was pulled from the Fat).

    93. Re:Sigh by Daniel+Phillips · · Score: 1

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      The point is, without the words "epic fail" how can you describe Sony's DRM strategy?

      Incidentally, I used to be a PS3 booster but now after years being abused by Sony in many different ways I am anything but. My home now has the rule: buy nothing from Sony, ever, it is not worth the pain.

      --
      Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
    94. Re:Sigh by mcneely.mike · · Score: 1

      I just shot breast milk out my nose!!!

      --
      soylentnews.org Go there to enjoy the people!
    95. Re:Sigh by mcneely.mike · · Score: 1

      Ohhh.... soccerooswifes lover so wanted that site to be real.

      --
      soylentnews.org Go there to enjoy the people!
    96. Re:Sigh by Eunuchswear · · Score: 1

      Epic lawsuit

      as that appears to be the kneejerk reaction of corporate america

      Corporate where?

      --
      Watch this Heartland Institute video
    97. Re:Sigh by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 1

      A signer screwup that leaks their private key is not epic fail? This is probably the first time in embedded system security that someone has fucked up public key crypto this badly.

      I'm not saying it's incredibly bad, I'm saying that as far as attack vectors go, historically, it's far from epic fail. With out access from the inside thanks to the PSJailbreak tool, would this exploit even have been found?

      The 360 has better revocation, better encryption, secure memory, a simpler and more effective security design, and a better implementation.

      From a theoretical standpoint, sure. I'll go with that.

      The whole thing could be defeated though, by compromising the optical drive's electronics. Practically, that's a much larger fail.

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    98. Re:Sigh by JustSomeProgrammer · · Score: 1

      I own a PS3 and somewhere around 20 games. I'm a little ashamed at the size of my collection. I really intend to double it this year, I promise. One reason my collection is so small is that the system was too damn expensive especially at launch. It isn't a flawed model if it works which it always has in the past. Nintendo can sell their consoles for a profit since they aren't pushing cutting edge they are using 10 - 15 year old technology. But that's also why gamers consider their system a toy.

      I personally have been paying $50 - $60 a pop for somewhere around 15 years or so. So I don't get why the sudden complaints over the price of games the last few years when piracy started becoming a common option. I know plenty of people who own 10+ PS3 games. Maybe it is the circles we travel in rather than the vast majority of PS3 owners only having 2 games eh? Honestly I'd never be able to reconcile the purchase with myself if I only intended to get 2 games for it.

    99. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      unless they had a completely broken implementation

      They did. Apparently "random number" means something different inside Sony.

    100. Re:Sigh by slaingod · · Score: 1

      Except that isn't true... Sony had already announced the removal of OtherOS from the PS3 Slim before Geohot started trying to break the hypervisor.

      Aug 2009 OtherOS removed from PS3 Slim
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OtherOS

      'End of 2009' Geohot begins to look for exploits.
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Hotz

      It is true that Sony removed it from existing PS3 Fats after that, but the damage was already done. When your PS3 breaks, and you need a new one, the Slim is the only style available now, unless you accept that people should be forced to go to Ebay to buy PS3 Fats for every increasing prices as supply dwindles.

      --
      http://blog.slaingod.com
    101. Re:Sigh by bigsexyjoe · · Score: 1

      So their security is not EPIC FAIL but SUBTLE, UNDERSTANDABLE OVERSIGHT?

    102. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Microsoft still has not made a penny selling xbox hardware. The xbox is sold as a loss. Money is made selling "add ons" and "services" via their Entertainment Division. The numbers says so.

    103. Re:Sigh by ais523 · · Score: 1

      There was a famous signature randomization failure in Debian a while back, which looks to have been entirely an accident (although it was very embarrassing at the time, and had all sorts of knock-on effects because every key generated on Debian had to be changed; hmm, I wonder if the PS3 key was one of them?) Doing something like that maliciously rather than accidentally would have been pretty easy to hide, I imagine.

      --
      (1)DOCOMEFROM!2~.2'~#1WHILE:1<-"'?.1$.2'~'"':1/.1$.2'~#0"$#65535'"$"'"'&.1$.2'~'#0$#65535'"$#0'~#32767$#1"
    104. Re:Sigh by Lordnerdzrool · · Score: 1

      In summary:

      Nintendo: Cheap console aimed at an untapped market
      Sony: Expensive console aimed to fight for an already tapped market

      Nintendo was able to sell at a profit because the hardware was nothing new, the software and applications were. They were able to sell at a profit to a ton of people because the market they went for was untapped. Sony's hardware is much more cutting edge and expensive by design, so to sell at a profit, they would need their $599 USD price range back. Problem with that price point is that they were aiming for an already tapped into market that the XBox 360 had. Nobody wants to spend 600 dollars for something they already own.

    105. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The PS3 doesn't cost anything like $600 to sell at a profit. Don't be ridiculous - and the PS3 hardware is nothing cutting edge. It was new at release... but soon after that it was old hat... whatever Sony's PR machine claims. Your average low-end PC rapes the living shit out of the PS3 for performance CPU or Graphics or Sound... and those are constantly introducing new parts. The PS3 has been bog-standard bulk manufacturing for years.

    106. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As tfa says the hackers don't care about piracy so they didn't bother much with the ps3 before otherOS got removed. And after that it took about 12 months to hack it. About the same amount of time it took to hack the 360

    107. Re:Sigh by Maestro4k · · Score: 1

      George Hotz ("geohot") tried his hand at it, given that he had been rather successful at cracking Apple's iStuff. He found an exploit that gave hypervisor access, and in response, Sony removed OtherOS in a firmware update, as geohot's hack required use of OtherOS. So this can all be traced back to geohot getting involved... though in my opinion, Sony shouldn't have responded by removing OtherOS, causing all the collateral damage. It inevitably was going to result in a lot of really serious people getting involved and, by extension, more stories like this.

      WRONG. Geohot started taking a look at it because the PS3 Slim didn't allow OtherOS. Once he found the hypervisor exploit, Sony retroactively pulled OtherOS from ALL PS3 systems. Sony started trying to remove OtherOS before Geohot was involved, they just accelerated it and retroactively removed it from all models once he found an actual exploit. I suspect they'd have removed it eventually with or without an exploit, it just gave them a convenient excuse. They obviously had decided somewhere between initial launch and the slim's launch that OtherOS wasn't something they wanted to allow any longer.

    108. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      Epic Dicks even ;)

    109. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They had already done this years ago. They pleaded with Sony to put it back. Gave them a time frame for which to put the OtherOS back on. Sony obviously refused. And now they released the hack. Hackers do care about companies making money on products, mind you. Sony removed their favorite toy in the system. Bad move for Sony to be pissing off people who "OWN" (meaning Sony never had a chance in hell keeping them from this hack. It probably took seconds to do.) their hardware.

    110. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Piracy is nothing new, it hasn't suddenly become a common option in the past few years... It's become more popular on consoles because instead of expensive cartridges, game manufacturers now ship their games on cheap dvd media and yet expect people to pay the same price or more.

      Assuming you paid $50 for each of your 20 games, thats $1000 spent on games alone. Now how much entertainment will those 20 games provide? Personally i've found very few games these days which provide more than a couple of hours for me.
      And you intend to spend another $1000+ this year and have only another 20 discs to show for it?

      Also lets not forget that many games are aimed at young people, either kids or young adults... These people are usually not terribly affluent. When i was in my teens, it was extremely rare that i would have $50, it would take me weeks or months to save up this amount of money and it was usually only around xmas or my birthday that i had any significant amount of cash at my disposal.

      Selling the hardware below cost, while adding extortionate margins onto software is a completely flawed model... It's unlikely that anyone will undercut a large manufacturer like sony by producing cheap clone hardware, but the margins on software are so ridiculous that its trivial to do so... It actually costs a pirate *MORE* per disc to produce a copy than it did sony to mass produce the original media.

      If a PS3 costs $700 to produce i'm quite happy to pay $800 for it rather than getting it for $600... But i very much resent paying $50 for something that cost less than $1 to produce, and i would rather buy it for $5 from someone who paid $3 to produce it.

    111. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sony removed OtherOS from PS3 Slim before George Hotz tried his hand at cracking it.

    112. Re:Sigh by shoehornjob · · Score: 1
      --
      "We are just a war away from Amerikastan. When god vs god the undoing of man." Dave Mustaine
    113. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      Yeah , EPIC FAIL @! Because they lied about other os functionality !

    114. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No but I'm sure you felt the need to post anyway.

    115. Re:Sigh by sxeraverx · · Score: 1

      Perhaps, though, you shouldn't count time from product release, but from locking it down too much. Apple released a product that was unacceptably locked down. Sony released a product that was acceptably open, and then unacceptably locked it down at a later date.

    116. Re:Sigh by exomondo · · Score: 1

      "Following this, the team declared Sony's security to be EPIC FAIL!"

      Is it really necessary for everybody to talk like complete dicks nowadays?

      For elitist cockbags there is no other choice. But you'd think they'd tone it down a bit particularly when it's taken a number of YEARS to break said security.

    117. Re:Sigh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Time for him to shift to Canada, out of the reach of the nazi DCMA

  2. Comfort Level by BigSes · · Score: 1

    I feel a bit more comfortable jailbreaking a game system with a dongle or some other easily removable device, if I would like to resell it, etc. I guess I'm just that paranoid.

    1. Re:Comfort Level by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Reselling a PS3 is like reselling used car tires: not worth messing with. you'll make more money if you spend the same amount of time pretending to be a hot jailbait girl typing in random shit on a blog with ads on it.

    2. Re:Comfort Level by BigSes · · Score: 1

      I think you misunderstood me, I didn't say trading it in to GameStop like a mindless dummy and taking .08 cents in trade value. If you resell a current PS3 slim, adult owned, from a non-smoking household, you can easily get more than $200 for a complete system. Then again, I still have every game system I ever owned, packed away nicely in their boxes. I won't buy used and apparently I don't sell them either.

    3. Re:Comfort Level by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      Depends. I got my 60GB PS3 through Craigslist. It was worth it to me and the guy who was selling it, pretty simple transaction.

    4. Re:Comfort Level by Junta · · Score: 1

      This sounds like it's a way to have signed applications, no modifications in hardware or software required. Of course, we won't know until proof of concept rolls out.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    5. Re:Comfort Level by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      This doesn't allow for "jailbreaking" it allows for code to be signed - the box can remain untouched. In fact one of the IRC questions asked of them was why couldn't they create a BluRay exploit loader and they stated that they didn't have the keys for the GameLoader - and weren't looking for them! These guys aren't interested in piracy they are interested in loading their own code, their own OS, you know the feature that Sony took away.

      Now, I fully expect that those keys are just as poorly secured and since with this new capability the revocation list is 0wned I expect that the GameLoader keys WILL be found by those who would really prefer to pirate vs load Linux - but it won't be these guys. So in the end you will probably have custom firmware ala PSP and folks doing who knows what to copy games. Honestly one of the worse things I think might happen is hacks to the online games - man that will suck for those who play online. All Sony had to do was follow best practice and actually use a RANDOM number for the random number instead of hardcoding if I followed the presentation correctly. I suspect someone will be fired and rightfully so! Oh and this is such a low level hack that apparently Sony cannot update the code that was compromised. Ouch!

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
  3. Epic Fail? WTF? by scum-e-bag · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Epic Fail? WTF?

    How many years has it taken to crack the PS3?

    I'd say that Sony has done a remarkable job.

    --
    Does it go on forever?
    1. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      41 million units sold, only 4 million behind the 360 which had a year head start. Not too bad really considering the number of 360 owners that run one unit for legit online play, and a second for pirated games.

      That said, both consoles are long in the tooth and showing their age, time for the wheel to turn and get on with xbox3 and ps4.

    2. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How many years? Has it even been a single year since they removed OtherOS? Nobody gave a shit before that.

    3. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Long in the tooth? The fuck are you talking about? Both consoles have at least another year or two of mileage. Only the Wii is technologically outdated, and it's been that way since it was released.

    4. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by nedlohs · · Score: 1

      That's right, how long when otherOS was available did it last without such a crack?

      And once it was removed, how long?

    5. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I think that the "epic fail" part isn't the overall security of the PS3(which has generally been a pretty good sinister representative of the dystopian "trusted computing" future); but the fact that they somehow managed to build a code-signing verification mechanism that allowed their private key to be computed by an outside party.

      Assymetric key crypto is supposed to be(barring serious implementation failures or incredible algorithmic/technological breakthroughs) such that you should be able to verify that a private key was used to sign something with nothing more than the public key, from which the private key should be computable only in a time longer than the lifespan of the universe's remaining protons. That is the part that they apparently managed to fuck up. In terms of generally being a tough nut to crack, Sony did a pretty decent job. However, if TFA is true and not misleading, they failed to implement an absolutely foundational part of practical cryptography properly...

    6. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by mark72005 · · Score: 1

      Or the ones who run one unit until it burns up, then buy a new one!

    7. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Demize · · Score: 0

      Back before Sony disabled the "Other OS" option on the PS3, trying to subvert its security was not a high priority. The first security hacks arrived within weeks. This shows that once hackers were incentivized, the security was never really that good to begin with. Dongle-less cracking is really just the next step in the inevitable. It's actually a bit surprising it took this long, but it was expected.

      What wasn't expected was getting access to the signing keys. This is fairly unprecedented, as far as I know. There have always been rooting/jailbreaking/etc. hacks, but they've always worked around or suppressed the key/certificate model. You can think of these methods as picking a lock or breaking the door. Some solutions are more elegant than others. The "Epic Fail" on Sony's part came when a mildly interested party discovered the keys under the welcome mat. That's some pretty terrible security.

    8. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by alen · · Score: 1

      i have both, and only game on my 360. PS3 is great as a blu ray/media player. same price as the other blu ray players but a lot more functionality. no reason to ever buy a single game for it

    9. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Riceballsan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's pretty true there, before the other OS, there weren't even known attempts, beyond one lame idiot saying he thought he might someday be able to do it through the other OS, that caused sony to go crazy and remove the other OS feature. Before then sony had the best possible security possible for a console, give the modders an outlet, modders/homebrewers with high inteligence usually are not the same as the modders that want to sell to pirates, so you keep the smart ones busy, and the pirates won't have anyone to do their dirty work for them. You flip the finger at them and tell them they are a security risk and can no longer keep what you sold them... well expect the most determined wave of security breaks in history.

    10. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by sqlrob · · Score: 1

      A flaw that exposes private keys? That's an epic fail and far from remarkable.

      A regular jailbreak? Yeah, understandable and a fail, but not epic.

    11. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      Are you going to tell me why I'm wrong, or is computing the fact that I am wrong, with certainty; without revealing the wrongness, part of some very subtle public/private key pun on your part?

    12. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you're completely pathetic.

      First correct thing you've posted here MKP. Too bad it's self incriminating...

    13. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by crow_t_robot · · Score: 1

      I think it should be taken into consideration that the people that worked on this were most likely (I haven't confirmed this but is usually the case) amateurs working on this stuff in their free time. I am sure that a professional crew could have accomplished this in a few days.

    14. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by neokushan · · Score: 1

      In a nutshell, Sony did really well with their security but managed to fuck up the one thing that everyone else (Apple, Microsoft, Nintendo, etc.) got right.

      --
      +1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
    15. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by MichaelSmith · · Score: 0

      Its the old DRM argument. You don't have to crack the crypto. You just need to extract the private key from the PS3, which you own. If you only had the signed software (the message), obtaining the key really would be hard.

    16. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Why would you do that? I own both systems so that I can enjoy exclusive titles on both systems.

      You've missed out on Uncharted and Infamous. That's a crying shame.

    17. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Sony's failure is indeed epic: as part of the signing algorithm a random number is to be generated (everytime :) but Sony's implementation used a constant value. http://xkcd.com/221/

    18. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by overlordofmu · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Are you serious or trolling?
      Why is there no reason to buy PS3 titles? Do you only play Halo?

      What about PS3 exclusives? Shooter, Eden, Infamous, Little Big Planet, Luminez, Uncharted 1&2?
      Some of these are not just exclusives, they are games that raise the bar, shining examples of the medium taken to the next level.

      Again, are you serious or trolling? Honestly, I cannot tell.

      (Obligatory grammer nazi comment: You cannot capitalize the first word of your sentences but you capitalize the "PS" in "PS3"? Really?)

    19. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Pharmboy · · Score: 1

      Both consoles have at least another year or two of mileage. Only the Wii is technologically outdated, and it's been that way since it was released.

      True, the Wii is slow. That would explain why it has sold almost twice as many units as the Xbox 360 or the PS3. Not quite as many as both of those units combined, but not too far away. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_game_consoles That said, the others have bridged the gap on usability. It is time for Wii to bridge the gap when it comes to performance.

      Sony can come up with whatever they want however, as I still won't buy anything associated with their company, be it music, hardware, software, etc. I still don't see them as anything but a parasite and they haven't done anything lately to change that perspective. Honestly, I don't feel like I have missed anything, since I do most of my gaming on Steam and a system anyway, using a faster computer and 42" TV for a monitor.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    20. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      uuuuuh, No.

      Done correctly with asymmetric key crypto, the private key is not on the PS3. The public key is on the PS3 and is used to verify the signatures (that were generated by the private key that is only in Sony's possession).

      This isn't DRM, this is Tivoization, which is known to be possible securely. (unless you can bypass the check entirely). They just fucked up it's implementation.

    21. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Its the old DRM argument. You don't have to crack the crypto. You just need to extract the private key from the PS3, which you own. If you only had the signed software (the message), obtaining the key really would be hard.

      If it was signed with the private key then the PS3 should only contain a public key, it doesn't need the private key to verify, that's the point, it's the ONE feature of public-key cryptography that really sets it apart.

    22. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

      Stop feeding trolls, please.

    23. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Shikaku · · Score: 1

      He can't, he's a chatterbot with settings to troll. Just ignore him.

    24. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Narishma · · Score: 1

      It doesn't matter how many units it sells if it doesn't have the games you want to play.

      --
      Mada mada dane.
    25. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To their credit, they spent most of that time looking for someone who actually owned a PS3.

    26. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Dogtanian · · Score: 2

      True, the Wii is slow. That would explain why it has sold almost twice as many units as the Xbox 360 or the PS3.

      Eh? That doesn't make any sense.

      The Wii *is* pretty mediocre by the standards of its contemporaries- it sold well because Nintendo came up with some innovative and original approaches to gaming, and focused more on the casual gamer, breaking away from the same old technical-advancement-is-everything, hardcore-fanboy-aimed market.

      --
      "Slashdot - News and Chat Sites Deviant". (Click "homepage" link above for details).
    27. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Shikaku · · Score: 1

      Can you give me a cookie?

    28. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by kesuki · · Score: 1

      listen cryptography was meant to make it so that only an elite few could use it.

      we dont want wasteful encryption. encryption is the wrong road. if society all dropped encryption... well it would be better than sleeping half a day every day. we could still have secrets, secrets don't require encryption.

      i know you have your reasons for talking about security, but honestly security is overated. how many picoseconds do you think its been since 1977.

    29. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by lostmongoose · · Score: 1

      Lumines is not a PS3 exclusive. It's been on XBLA for some time now.

    30. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by hedwards · · Score: 1

      I tend to assume that that asshole was full of it. It was pretty lame of him to piss off Sony by claiming to have a crack and not even provide it to anybody to verify.

    31. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Yur mom's face is a cookie.

      Why do you cower behind that pseudonym? Are you too afraid? I'm not afraid.

      Here's the fake address of my pillowfort I pretend is mine when I'm trolling:

      Mikey Kristopussy
      123 Schizoid
      Insanity, MI 00000

      Come visit me, I'm not afraid. I'll blow your brains out with all my guns and stuff. I'm a real tough guy, not an Internet tough guy.

      You are nothing.
      .
      .
      .
      .
      What? I told you not to come down here, mom! I'm in the middle of something important!

      Hey, did you get the Chef Boyardee I asked for? And can you drive me to the movies later, I want to spank it in the back of the theater while I watch Tangled.

    32. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      You're kidding, right? The graphics card in my freakin' laptop is more powerful than any of the chips in the PS3 or the XBox 360, and my laptop weighs in at just over 5lbs. And it runs with just a 120W power brick, not even maxing that out (I'd only need the 120W supply if I had an i7m instead of an i5). The PS3 is around 380W, and the 360 is still a hefty 160W.

      They are seriously outdated.

      The laptop's an Envy 15 if you care.

    33. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Pharmboy · · Score: 1

      Eh? That doesn't make any sense.

      It is called being ironic. The rest of the comment should have made that clear. They focused on usability rather than raw power, etc.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    34. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Geohot's attack is the vector through which all other hacks have been done - he basically showed how it could be done and said "get to it".

      And they did.

    35. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Joe+Snipe · · Score: 1

      It's well over 5 times the price as well.

      --
      Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
    36. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by RPI+Geek · · Score: 1

      The Epic Fail comes from the fact* that they used a cluster of PS3s to actually compute the private key.

      * Not really, but it WOULD make it funnier

      --

      - "Nobody came out that night, not one was ever seen. But Old Man Stauf is waiting there, crazy sick and mean!"
    37. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by VortexCortex · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Actually, I think the metric is fair.

      If every grain of sand on Earth were a super computer that could perform a public/private key signature check once every clock cycle (not possible, takes many cycles), and those super computers ran at 1000 times the speed of our current fastest supercomputers, it would take trillions of years to crack our current public key crypto systems (when implemented correctly -- something Sony failed to do).

      The universe is estimated to be about 13.75 billion years old. One trillion years is a truly Epic timescale. Given that there are many correctly implemented public key cryptographic libraries with source code available I find that Sony did, in fact, fail on an epic scale...

      These enormously large metrics are meant to drive home to laymen just how impractical it is to brute force correctly implemented public key cryptography with the hardware we have today.

      In short, "Epic Fail!" is an accurate exclamation. If you disagree, I suggest you go read up on the subject of public key cryptography a bit more before making baseless claims as to the "feeb"ness of others' well informed comments (failing this, you could just troll harder).

    38. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      Cut down the CPU, the amount of RAM, remove the FullHD integrated monitor and implement an economy of scale that a console gets and it'll be very much in the same ballpark. I got mine for a hair over $1000 new (list price isn't actual price with hardware from HP), and a PS3 is what, $300? That's about 3x the price. Easily doable.

      Current gen consoles are woefully underpowered. Especially when playing games in full 1920x1080 resolution.

    39. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by mallyn · · Score: 1

      What if the number of bits in the key is low enough? If it only a small key, then could it be cracked mathematically in four months?

      --
      Most Respectfully Yours Mark Allyn Bellingham, Washington
    40. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, it's so bad when you compare it to, say, Apple. Where you merely need to navigivate to a webpage to get root. Duurrr.

    41. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by marcansoft · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The "epic" part really came about due to the completely inexcusable ECDSA signature screwup. We were left speechless by that one. However, as a whole, the entire PS3 architecture is terrible. Especially after breaking it open and properly analyzing it and finding a ton of screwups (many critical), there is absolutely no doubt in our mind that the sole reason why the PS3 lasted this far is because OtherOS kept all the competent people happy enough not to try to break into the system (that, and maybe hype around their hypervisor and isolated SPE security, both of which turned out to be terribly bad). If you watch the talk you'll actually see that we make this point clear and address the time-to-hack of the PS3. Given our experience and what we've learned from people who work on console hacks, almost nobody tried until OtherOS was removed, so the only valid measurement for "time to hack", as a strength-of-security measure, is the time since OtherOS was removed (9-12 months or so).

      OtherOS was Sony's single best security feature.

    42. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by marcansoft · · Score: 3, Informative

      Although the keys are kind of short (they likely will become breakable in a few decades or something like that), that has nothing to do with the screwup. They completely botched their signer so it creates correlated signatures that leak the key. The computation to get the private key takes milliseconds.

    43. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Assymetric key crypto is supposed to be(barring serious implementation failures or incredible algorithmic/technological breakthroughs) such that you should be able to verify that a private key was used to sign something with nothing more than the public key, from which the private key should be computable only in a time longer than the lifespan of the universe's remaining protons

      Actually, RSA Public/Private key pairs are expected to only remain secure for 20 years at 4096bits. This is why Public Key Certificates (like issued by Verisign for SSL and Code Signing and such) have "Expiration Dates" built-in.

      Only single key symmetric systems have the property you describe (since you have to start from nothing [brute force] rather than trying to factor the public key).

    44. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      (Obligatory grammer nazi comment: You cannot capitalize the first word of your sentences but you capitalize the "PS" in "PS3"? Really?)

      Obligatory spelling nazi comment: it's "GRAMMAR". Really?

    45. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Johnno74 · · Score: 1

      I doubt if he was full of it... "that asshole" that you are talking about is geohot, who was part of the team behind the original iphone jailbreak & unlock, and he's also developed jailbreaks for lots of versions of IOS.

      So his credentials are pretty good... he'd already proved himself at the time he started hacking the PS3.

    46. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Grammer Nazi?" Your rights to perform any kind of Naziing at all are hereby revoked.

    47. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you going to tell me why I'm wrong

      Just ignore that nutcase. He makes a new account every week as he burns out the old one by trolling.

    48. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Junta · · Score: 2

      Geohot's claim was specifically that he had a way to exploit Other OS. None of the actual attacks in the wild had anything to do with Other OS.

      The first couple of moves were buffer overflows in the PS3 USB stack.

      This supposed move is deriving Sony's signing key.

      None of the hacks had anything to do with OtherOS. All signs point to Geohot being full of it.

      However, I was never satisfied with Other OS, since it locked out the GPU, relegating a whole lot of easy things in most of the world as huge endeavors as people tried desperately to use the PPUs to compensate for a dumb framebuffer. I wonder how many people were explicitly disinterested before thanks to Other OS, or would have not cared if Other OS had never been allowed, but took the Other OS removal as a challenge to break them.

      --
      XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    49. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Joe+Snipe · · Score: 0

      So basically if you try to compare your new laptop with an old PS3, they are roughly the same? i think I'm reading this wrong.

      --
      Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
    50. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by TangoMargarine · · Score: 1

      Wow: randomly hostile post, replying to a +5 Insightful, with no actual content whatsoever. WTF man?

      --
      Unity? Screw that: XFCE. Slashdot Beta? Screw that: SoylentNews. Australis? Screw that: Pale Moon. UX developers DIAF
    51. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by bhtooefr · · Score: 1

      And, the cheap hardware meant that Nintendo could ask for less than half as much money as Sony, at launch... and still make money, whereas Sony was losing money.

    52. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Jeremi · · Score: 1

      Eh? That [Wii selling well because it's slow] doesn't make any sense.

      It made a little sense to me... because Nintendo decided to use non-state-of-the-art hardware, they were able to use older, cheaper, parts, and thus sell units at a lower price point than their competitors.

      Their real secret was making a compelling gaming platform that didn't require the latest/fastest/most-expensive hardware to be fun.

      --


      I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
    53. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by tobiasly · · Score: 0

      *double whoosh*

    54. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by tobiasly · · Score: 0

      *whoosh*

    55. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Kilrah_il · · Score: 1

      Actually, I think it's called sarcastic.

      --
      Whenever in an argument, remember this.
    56. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Kilrah_il · · Score: 1

      I don't think overlordofmu was so sophisticated. I think it was a real blunder. Your whoosh is undeserving.

      --
      Whenever in an argument, remember this.
    57. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The 21st amendment was America's single best underage drinking deterrent.

    58. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by DarwinSurvivor · · Score: 1

      The *only* reason it took so long is because few people *bothered* to crack it until sony disabled the "otherOS" feature. Until then hackers had very little reason to crack it since they had 95% of what they wanted out of the system.

      For a fair comparison, compare the time between the *release* of another platform and the when sony pulled the "otherOS" feature.

    59. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      undeserved.

    60. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by FxChiP · · Score: 2

      I could write a script that just replies to posts the way you do and no one would be the wiser.

    61. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 3, Informative

      why the PS3 lasted this far is because OtherOS kept all the competent people happy enough not to try to break into the system

      Really? people haven't been trying to get to accelerated video in linux on the ps3? Or access to the GameOS FS just to tinker with it? Or piracy(Piracy was a big BIG motivator on Xbox, 360, PS2 and Wii; also Dreamcast but, the DC's security was even bigger epic fail than Sony's).

      So I think that's complete bollocks.

      The PS3 only went down because the first few lines of defense were pretty good... But not much else. In game save exploits like the famous GTA:LCS PSP, the Mechassault Xbox or the Twilight Princess Wii attacks weren't possible because the PS3(and 360 IIRC), unlike a Wintel system, actually properly implement the NX bit(According to Mathieulh at least, it also explains why TIFF exploits weren't being examined as well). So, bye bye that attack vector. The PS3 didn't rely on making sure that the optical drive was secure, so bye bye with that exploit(this was popular on the 360 and Wii). The PS3 also didn't expose the CPU to debug pins like the Xbox(with Pogo pins) or the Xbox 360(thanks to it's handy dandy JTAG connector).

      It wasn't until we saw the big weakness with the PSJailbreak did we see the other major flaws.

      Yes, I've gone to bat for Sony for locking down the PS3, but I don't think that it's wrong to fight back.

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    62. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by amentajo · · Score: 1

      OtherOS was Sony's single best security feature.

      Well said.

    63. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You just made the hardest FAIL in the universe by attempting to correct someone else's grammar whilst being unable to spell "grammar" correctly yourself.

    64. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Tarlus · · Score: 1

      Stop that.

      --
      /* No Comment */
    65. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Gaygirlie · · Score: 2

      Really? people haven't been trying to get to accelerated video in linux on the ps3? Or access to the GameOS FS just to tinker with it? Or piracy(Piracy was a big BIG motivator on Xbox, 360, PS2 and Wii; also Dreamcast but, the DC's security was even bigger epic fail than Sony's).

      The people who want pirates are most often not the same people who have the skills, knowledge and hankering to do hacking. Pirates usually just ride with whatever tools those hackers have created, and hackers on the other hand most often create their tools and hacks just for personal pleasure and/or for running homebrew software. Two very different camps.

      Sure, there were some people who were trying to get access to accelerated video, but not the most determined hackers. Most determined hackers were already quite happy with having a completely new CPU to toy around with in OtherOS. It was only after OtherOS got removed that they lost all their toys and decided to crack the whole thing open.

      My point is, the people with skills create hacks and jailbreaks mostly because they want to run homebrew and usually the tools for running homebrew either allow for pirates, or require little work to enable piracy, and then pirates just ride along as they themselves most often than not lack the skills to create such jailbreaks themselves.

    66. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Consider the fact that it was only cracked to run Linux, because Sony took away that ability with a firmware update. Considering that, it was only cracked in 12 months.

    67. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by iainl · · Score: 1

      By 'Luminez' do you mean Mizuguchi's game Lumines? It's on the 360, PSP and PC (among others?) so there's no real reason to get the PS3 for it.

      I don't have a PS3, although both my brothers do, so I've played several of its best titles. They're good games. But as someone who has a good(ish) PC, 360, Wii and iOS device, I've got enough boxes that have more than enough good games to keep me busy as it is, really, so I just bought a standalone Blu-ray player (which could be handset-hacked to multi-region for standard def, which is one advantage over the PS3, and unlike the grandparent it cost rather less than half the cost of one).

      So there's a legitimate version of the seemingly trolling statement for you, if you like.

      --
      "I Know You Are But What Am I?"
    68. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hi There,

      I cant wait to put linux on my PS3 ... just because I have no other use for it.

      I'm not trolling, but I purchased a xbox360 elite and a PS3 and I was shocked and annoyed to discover that the VAST majority of PS3 games are in 720p.

      The quality is noticeably different. I am a fallout 3 fanatic, and I purchased fallout 3 for both consoles (the exact same game) and my partner came in and saw fallout 3 running on the PS3 and said "WTF happened to the graphics" ... and I said "PS3" ... it was instantly, noticeably poorer.

      My partner is an Xbox and Microsoft fanboy, and I really wanted the PS3 to be superior ... but I was disappointed. I barely play it now and it's just gathering dust. If it didn't have a BluRay drive, we'd never power it up.

    69. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Pharmboy · · Score: 1

      Irony (from the Ancient Greek eirneía, meaning hypocrisy, deception, or feigned ignorance) is a situation, literary technique, or rhetorical device, in which there is an incongruity, discordance, or unintended connection with truth)

      A statement that, when taken in context, may actually mean something different from, or the opposite of what is written literally; the use of words expressing something other than their literal intention, notably as a form of humor.

      Ignorance feigned for the purpose of confounding or provoking an antagonist; Socratic irony.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    70. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I can honestly say I have 1 game for my PS3 all my other games are on the 360. As a blu-ray player I use the ps3 most days but gaming I go for the xbox

      On non exclusives the graphics are generally better. The few exclusives on the ps3 that interest me aren't that great they have a few minutes of wow and thats it.

    71. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How do you think the USB overflow was found?

      Yeah, through Geohot's attack vector.

    72. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Lotharus · · Score: 1

      In short, "Epic Fail!" is an accurate exclamation

      ...except "fail" is not a noun.

      "Epic failure" would be an accurate exclamation free of any like-a-dick-sounding.

    73. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Scarumanga · · Score: 1

      The 360 still has piracy, playing a burned game on a 360 is pretty simple if you know how. So the fact that Sony put more effort into combating it than Microsft is just stupid, it is what it is, they need to accept that there will be pirates, and just do what Microsoft does and Ban accounts.

    74. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 1

      The people who want pirates are most often not the same people who have the skills, knowledge and hankering to do hacking

      So why were the first exploits on any major console piracy related?

      I maintain that due to the game dumper tool, the PSJailbreak was nothing BUT a piracy tool. No NES emulator? No toolchain? Give me a goddamn break.

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    75. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by mikael · · Score: 1

      That's in theory - but you only have to be lucky once. It may be like trying to find a needle floating around somewhere in the solar system, but if you've got spare clock cycles, there's nothing to lose by just running a background process making random guesses. Several months will be nothing but a small moment of time.

      The odds of winning the grand-prize in a state lottery can get as low as 1 in 80,000,000, but usually at least one person wins.

      But if you can encode the problem using some physical phenomena like light or sound interference patterns, then a solution could be found instantly.

      --
      Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
    76. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Kilrah_il · · Score: 1

      Accepted

      --
      Whenever in an argument, remember this.
    77. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by JamesP · · Score: 1

      I wonder how they find out that m was the same for the same signature...

      --
      how long until /. fixes commenting on Chrome?
    78. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Best grammer nazi ever!

    79. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by MichaelKristopeit344 · · Score: 1
      but you haven't... perhaps you are simply too lazy. perhaps you are lying about your abilities.

      why do you cower behind a chosen pseudonym? what are you afraid of?

      you're completely pathetic.

    80. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >implying we don't think protons are stable

      I get what you're saying, and I completely agree... but c'mon, this is /. and you should know better

    81. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Gaygirlie · · Score: 1

      So why were the first exploits on any major console piracy related?

      It's a bit hard to sift through all the content available on Google and Wikipedia, but it seems the first hack for Wii was "Twilight hack", exactly with the intent of allowing one to run homebrew. Subsequent hacks built on the experience learned from it, and from previous experience from Gamecube.

      XBOX360 has some similarities with XBOX so tha too helped a tad, but it seems somewhere towards the end of 2005 there was the first breakthrough in hacking the firmware. And then too it was by a group of people who just enjoyed hacking, they didn't even release their hacked version of firmware. I couldn't find any references worth noting to earlier accomplishments, they seemed to mostly be hype or fake.

      As for PS3.. well, even the group discussed in the announcement say they started seriously hacking only once they lost access to OtherOS. There was this one guy who managed to get some limited access to the hypervisor through OtherOS, but even he said he did it just for the heck of it, not to play pirates. PSJailbreak came a lot later, and even then it seems to have been an accidental discovery simply made possible by them gaining access to the development console and studying it.

      Thus it unfortunately seems these things do not support your claims.

    82. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      (Obligatory grammer nazi comment: You cannot capitalize the first word of your sentences but you capitalize the "PS" in "PS3"? Really?)

      Obligatory grammer nazi comment: "grammer" is spelled "grammar".

    83. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by VortexCortex · · Score: 1

      you're ignoring the obvious... comparison methodology could be optimized, thus cutting the relative required resources significantly.

      I see, it's apparent that you haven't done any research on cryptography or crypto-analysis since your previous comment.

      in short, you're an idiot.

      It's better to stay silent and have people think you're a troll than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.

      Even if you reduce the complexity required by many orders of magnitude (something that no one has done yet, and few cryptographers believe can be done) our current public key cryptography would still be very secure.

      Let's just say that the purely hypothetical breakthrough in "comparison methodology" of which you speak allows us to compare the output of a chosen private key to the target public key in only a single clock cycle. Let's also suppose that this breakthrough enables us to build computers that calculate 1000 times the speed of our fastest supercomputers of today resulting in a 2.5 exaflop processor. Let's also say that this breakthrough allowed us to harness the power of lightning to turn every single grain of sand on this planet into such an exascale computer. Let's also assume that every one of these magnificent machines, in concert, attempted to break my 2048 bit RSA private key (assuming there is enough energy in our solar system to power such a beastly bot-net)...

      ... This mind-boggling massive network of machines with enormous computing potential utilizing your fantastical "comparison methodology" would still take many TRILLIONS of years to complete it's task!

      I thought I had made the assumption of several huge and impractical breakthroughs painfully obvious in my previous post...

      cower behind your chosen pseudonym some more, feeb.

      This statement is a testament to your ignorance; Your implied superiority through transparency has no teeth.

      Aliases aren't always used to conceal an identity.

      I've had this handle since 1987. Those who know me by the pseudonym frequently also know be by my given name...

      I'm not "cowering" behind a pseudonym; Those that care to search the web for that particular keyword can discover my name and even contact me in various ways... including via snail-mail!

      You can lead a troll to Google, but you can't make them search...

    84. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by MichaelKristopeit352 · · Score: 0
      you're an ignorant hypocrite.

      perhaps a new attack vector is discovered to reduce the key search space by the ratio of the smallest measurable amount of time to the lifespan of the universe's remaining protons. take a number theory class, monkey. infinity / 42 = infinity. you're an idiot.

      my name is michael kristopeit. i own the property at 4513 brittany ct. eau claire, wi 54701. my phone number is 715-514-0916.

      cower some more, feeb.

      you're completely pathetic.

    85. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It took these guys like 3 months to hack this. They hadn't bothered this whole time because you could install Linux by default up until recently. There was nothing to hack.

    86. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      No. My new laptop is much faster than an old PS3/360, and with minimal changes it can be brought down to the current price of a PS3.

      The point is that the game systems are outdated, and you could assemble a much more powerful system for less than the price that they're selling at from current hardware if MS or Sony put their mind to it. The problem is that the majority of console gamers don't realize how shitty their graphics really are. No current console can really push a game at 1080p.

    87. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Joe+Snipe · · Score: 1

      But those "minimal changes" also bring down the price. And yes by that much. Your laptop will cost 400 in 3 years. People will say the same for your laptop that you say about the PS3.io will s is coming from someone wh
          But the cell architecture is more than just the sum of it's parts. It allows for a parallel processing ability that is simply unavailable in a cisc environment. The Air force bought 220 of 'em to hook up together for a reason, not for a lark. And this is coming from someone who swore off Sony after the rootkit fiasco.
      The hardware is impressive for the price, it's ebay level. Your PC is elite level, so it costs more just for status.

      --
      Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
    88. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But those games are boring crap...

    89. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      win a XBOX 360 at http://alexastock.webs.com click on the xbox 360 banner.

    90. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Epic Fail? WTF?

      How many years has it taken to crack the PS3?

      I'd say that Sony has done a remarkable job.

      The only reason it took so long to crack the console was because they weren't expecting it to be THAT easy (granted I use easy pretty loosely because I myself couldn't do what they do).

      Also, if I don't recall correctly, this is the same thing they did with the PSP?

    91. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Epic Fail? WTF?

      How many years has it taken to crack the PS3?

      I'd say that Sony has done a remarkable job.

      If you watched it you'd see that they weren't even trying until Sony removed Linux and they had this less than 12 months later.

    92. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by RyuuzakiTetsuya · · Score: 1

      but it seems the first hack for Wii was "Twilight hack",

      Wrong. First hack for Wii was a modchip that connected to the optical drive's electronics. Not all hacks a console will face are software based.

      XBOX360 has some similarities with XBOX

      No, the Xbox360 has very little similarity with the original Xbox. The CPU architecture is COMPLETELY different, and the first hacks for the console were similarly motivated by piracy(also, attacks based on attacking the optical drive's electronics).

      As for PS3.. well, even the group discussed in the announcement say they started seriously hacking only once they lost access to OtherOS. There was this one guy who managed to get some limited access to the hypervisor through OtherOS, but even he said he did it just for the heck of it, not to play pirates. PSJailbreak came a lot later, and even then it seems to have been an accidental discovery simply made possible by them gaining access to the development console and studying it.

      PSJailbreak was the first viable attack on the PS3's infrastructure, and it shipped with an HDLoader for games. You're dead wrong. Piracy drives console hacking, it has since the original PlayStation and Saturn(actually probably before that; the first "homebrew" enablers for consoles would probably be the floppy disk based console copying devices; which were largely used for copying console games).

      --
      Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
    93. Re:Epic Fail? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      posting to revert moderation error

  4. Invalidate Private Keys by VGPowerlord · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's a bit late to invalidate private keys.

    My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work.

    While I wouldn't put it past Sony to try this, this would result in not only massive lawsuits, but also would be a massive PR blunder.

    Having said that, there could in theory be some sort of additional key telling what date a disc was signed, but even if that were true, it would be trivial to work around.

    --
    GLaDOS for President 2016! "Well here we are again. It's always such a pleasure." -- GLaDOS, 2011
    1. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by SuricouRaven · · Score: 2

      They won't. But they might hasten the release of the PS4.

    2. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by kesuki · · Score: 0

      "My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work."

      and that is bad in which universe? video gaming is fun but gamers have gone off the deep end when it comes to how to use computer tech wisely. reminds me of when the q put humanity on trial. ah good times.

    3. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by igreaterthanu · · Score: 5, Insightful

      My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work.

      They already have a list of all genuine games signed by the now compromised keys. They could potentially release an update that used new keys but also accepted the old keys provided it had signed something on the already known genuine list of games.

      --
      I dream of a nation where a man is not judged by his skin color but by an number assigned by a credit rating agency.
    4. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by The+MAZZTer · · Score: 2

      Via a firmware update, they could invalidate the keys for any new titles, while still allowing old titles to work via a whitelist. Thus anything new signed with the old key would be rejected.

      Of course then you just create a loader that has a matching checksum to a legitimate title and the cat and mouse game continues.

    5. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Kartu · · Score: 1

      Sony could still whitelist existing games and sign new ones with new key. Not sure if it is worth the effort though.

    6. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Not that I want them to succeed; but they could always do something like: "Consider private key X revoked, and trust nothing signed with it, unless that something has SHA1 hash equal to one of the hashes on the following list..."

      The number of existing PS3 games, DLCs, etc., while not small, is finite and pretty well characterized. It would be a pain in the ass; but not fundamentally difficult, to compute the hash of each one that is tainted by the compromised key and hardcode trust of it into the same patch that otherwise nukes that key and anything signed by it.

      Now, since the private keys presumably also control verification of patches, it is likely that some number of PS3s will permanently leave their control, with hacked patches applied that spoof acceptance of future patches, thus leaving them in control of their owners; but regaining control of all unsophisticated updaters and all PS3s leaving the factory from now on doesn't seem fundamentally impractical...

    7. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by NitroWolf · · Score: 0

      It's a bit late to invalidate private keys.

      My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work.

      While I wouldn't put it past Sony to try this, this would result in not only massive lawsuits, but also would be a massive PR blunder.

      Having said that, there could in theory be some sort of additional key telling what date a disc was signed, but even if that were true, it would be trivial to work around.

      When has massive technological failure and massive PR failure ever stopped Sony? Last time I remember was in the 1980's. Since then, it's been one PR disaster after another and their technological edge is long, long gone. Invaliding all the private keys would be right along the lines of something they'd do without a second thought. They still think they are the cream of the crop when it comes to hardware, so they think they can get away with anything. The reality of the situation a bit different, though, sadly... but they still behave like everyone wants their electronic junk. The only piece of superior electronics they've made in the past decade I can think of was the original PRS eBook readers. They were superior to every other eBook reader on the market two or three years ago. They are about on par now, though. Otherwise, they have absolutely nothing worth two shits technologically that isn't already done by someone else, and usually done better.

    8. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The universe where people that purchased a product expect it to work. Forget about Star Trek and try living in the real world.

    9. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      That is terrible advice, Counselor Troi. Why do you dress like that, anyway?

    10. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by afidel · · Score: 1

      Why? They are now making money on the console so they don't really care if it has a lower attach rate and it won the war vs HD-DVD which for Sony was half the point of releasing it.

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
    11. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by afidel · · Score: 1

      So the console is going to read a BD-ROM and compute the SHA-1 on each startup? And you thought it was slow to start playing now!

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
    12. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Vintermann · · Score: 1

      A more likely approach is suing everyone who puts the private key on a T-shirt, or distributes code signed with it, or code which could possibly be signed with it.

      --
      xkcd is not in the sudoers file. This incident will be reported.
    13. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by spazdor · · Score: 1

      It could stick to random-access and store checksums of 10MB chunks, or 100MB, or whatever gives them the best tradeoff of space/speed. There's no reason the entire disk has to be verified at once, except that a disk-verifying process running in the background would steal some CPU cycles away from the game.

      --
      DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
    14. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Goaway · · Score: 1

      It already calculates a checksum, because that is how code signing works in the first place. It's not a checksum of the entire disc.

    15. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This isn't about the game signing keys, this group cannot and is not interested in game signing. This key does allow us to boot Linux again.

    16. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

      Because they are losing money on every console - they make it back on the games. No code signing means:
      1. Users buying PS3s for reasons other than gaming.
      3. Free hobbiest games and unlicensed games made by companies in places without a DMCA equivilent and lax enforcement copyright law.
      Both of these eat into Sony's profits - and, while not enough to merit the huge expense of a new console upgrade cycle, might encourage them to move the planned release date closer.

    17. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 2

      Which is trivially broken by the jailbreak simply telling the firmware that it's one of the "genuine" games.

    18. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by SuricouRaven · · Score: 2

      Nintendo had a nifty solution for the old Gameboy(/color) - code wasn't signed, but games did need to have some magic bytes in the right place. Quite a lot of magic bytes, which had to be bit-perfect. They were actually the Nintendo logo, the one displayed on the screen at the start - so for any game to execute on the GB, it absolutly has to contain the Nintendo logo. In those pre-DMCA times, Nintendo found a way to use trademark law as a way to keep unlicenced games at bay.

    19. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by afidel · · Score: 1

      Nope, they have been making money on the PS3 console for quite some time.

      --
      There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
    20. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Narishma · · Score: 1

      They used to lose money on the machines but no longer since April or so.

      --
      Mada mada dane.
    21. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Brett+Buck · · Score: 5, Funny

      do something like: "Consider private key X revoked, and trust nothing signed with it, unless that something has SHA1 hash equal to one of the hashes on the following list..."

          Hey I think that sentence is a viable line of COBOL.

    22. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by petermgreen · · Score: 1

      My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work.
      Couldn't they invalidate the keys and then ship a whitelist to keep existing games running?

      --
      note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
    23. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Chyeld · · Score: 1

      Which would only work should 'the hacker' not intercept the firmware update prior to it being applied and 'fixing' it to remove that bit.

      Remember, once the silicon is compromised, nothing you do in the software can be trusted to be secure. To apply the firmware, it'd have to be signed with the compromised keys. Which means it could be 'easily' subverted before it ever got written to memory. At which point they've gone to all that work and still not stopped a single thing.

    24. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by TooMuchToDo · · Score: 1

      This is exactly how Dropbox operates (4MB chunks are hashed and stored in Amazon S3, for deduping purposes), so it's not like it wouldn't be possible with PS3 horsepower.

    25. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by hedwards · · Score: 2

      I don't think so. That would be prohibitively difficult to the point that I don't think they could do it. With the signing key somebody could create a new list and allow people to flash that into their system with the appropriate boot strap necessary to play new games as well.

    26. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by coliverhb · · Score: 1

      My understanding is that every PS3 game is signed with those keys. Therefore, invalidating them through a firmware update would mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work.

      They already have a list of all genuine games signed by the now compromised keys. They could potentially release an update that used new keys but also accepted the old keys provided it had signed something on the already known genuine list of games.

      Then it'd be just as easy to make your signed executable look like one of the old games. At this point, they're borked. This is why they should have stuck with the 5 year console cycle.

    27. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Nick+Ives · · Score: 1

      In the Q&A at the end they mention they don't have the app signing keys, so you can't use this to boot hacked games. The keys they have allow them to sign the OS meaning we can install Linux again. If I understand it correctly, Linux booted using these keys will be able to use the RSX graphics chip too!

      Apparently you could use this exploit to find the app signing keys but these guys have no interest in doing that. Somebody will though.

      --
      Nick
    28. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by orthicviper · · Score: 3, Funny

      1. Take out Linux functionality to provoke hackers to unlock your PS3
      2. Boost hardware sales from all the people buying PS3's to play pirated games, while acting innocent to your third party game developers
      3. ????
      4. PROFIT!!!

    29. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Pretty much this. Invalidate old private keys, but accept old software if it matches a SHA256 checksum in the list of known software checksums, or something to that effect.

    30. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by sjames · · Score: 1

      Then someone hacks in the SHA1 for a chain loader...

    31. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Bucky24 · · Score: 1

      Sony would lose a lot of customers if they did this. Also quite a few game development companies. So, as your argument seems to suggest, this might not be bad for humanity as a whole, but it would be pretty bad for Sony.

      --
      All the world's a CPU, and all the men and women merely AI agents
    32. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Pence128 · · Score: 0

      Can't be. I can read it.

      --
      404: sig not found.
    33. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by ProfessionalCookie · · Score: 1

      We'll need a new word for software that is broken INTO the jail.

    34. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Pence128 · · Score: 1

      IIRC, they were told they couldn't do that, and if they tried they'd loose their trademark.

      --
      404: sig not found.
    35. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      function CheckSHA(Game X) {
            if(SHAList.Contains(GetSHA(X))) return true; // remove me

            return true; // insert me instead

            return false;
      }

      This is trivial, and you've now dodged yet another security feature some useless security company was paid $500,000 to develop and implement.

    36. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by StikyPad · · Score: 1

      What you're describing is a whitelist, and the problem is that anyone may now generate his own whitelist and sign it using the now-known key. The floodgates are open now, and the only way to close them is by revoking the old key, which would be a financial and PR nightmare.

    37. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      Hence: "Now, since the private keys presumably also control verification of patches, it is likely that some number of PS3s will permanently leave their control, with hacked patches applied that spoof acceptance of future patches, thus leaving them in control of their owners; but regaining control of all unsophisticated updaters and all PS3s leaving the factory from now on doesn't seem fundamentally impractical..."

      By the sound of it, this crack does, indeed, offer sufficiently sophisticated current owners, and obtainers of back stock, who refrain from applying any Sony updates until a suitably permanent hack with a properly faked signature is available and applied, a chance to permanently remove some number of PS3s from Sony control(the possibility of Sony hiding subtle inference mechanisms in future games/updates that attempt to detect hacked consoles and ban them should, though, be considered. As with A/V, in theory you can't trust anything on a rooted system. In practice, you can sometimes ask clever questions and trick a rooted system into behaving slightly differently than a clean one...)

      Future PS3s, of course, will be loaded with Sony's latest at the factory, and are presumably out of luck until another crack is discovered.

    38. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      I'm sure Sony's deep and abiding concern for the pleasantness of the peasants' consumption experience will restrain them...

    39. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Durrik · · Score: 1

      An easier way for Sony to do it, is that they use their patching pipeline. A PS3 patch includes a complete copy of the executables (selfs). If people play the old games (unpatched) then they can't play online. If they want to play online then they have to use the new keys. If the PS3 firmware sees that the old key is being used it doesn't allow people to play online or acquire trophies.

      This way people can play the old games (unpatched), the online community is 'safe' (for an unspecified value of safe) from cheaters. Sony has already had to sign the selfs from the publishes. They should be able to just resign them and issue a new patch.

      --
      Software Engineer & Writer of Military Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog: petermwright.com Twitter: WrightPeterM
    40. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Then it'd be just as easy to make your signed executable look like one of the old games. At this point, they're borked. This is why they should have stuck with the 5 year console cycle.

      This is the most reasonable of all the replies claiming that it's "too late" now.

      What you are describing is called a Hash Collision, and unless Sony screwed up their hash algorithm big time then it will be computationally intensive to find a permutation of the firmware image that matches an existing hash. It is doable certainly, but on the same scale as cracking the public key without being given a big helping hand by a crappy implementation.

    41. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The point is not to stop already jailbroken systems, the point is to prevent the crack from running on unbroken systems before they can be cracked.

      With the signing key somebody could create a new list and allow people to flash that into their system

      Are you referring to a hardware protection of the firmware ROM? Because the list from Sony would be signed with their new key, not the old one.

      The problem is that Sony can make the PS3 refuse to boot images that are not on the list which will prevent the firmware crack install CD from running, you could still install it but only by modchipping (manually reburning the firmware ROM by removing it from the console). If you already cracked then you're golden (as long as you don't update to new official firmware, ever), if not, then you're screwed.

      [I'm assuming that the new firmware with new key will be distributed with all new games on their CDs so unless you crack before putting any new game disks in then your system will update to the new-key-with-old-key-whitelist version and you're SOL; Microsoft does this, don't know if Sony does as well]

    42. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by grantek · · Score: 1

      1. Take out Linux functionality to provoke hackers to unlock your PS3
      2. Boost hardware sales from all the people buying PS3's to play pirated games, while acting innocent to your third party game developers
      3. ????
      4. PROFIT!!!

      If you're going that far into conspiracy theory, you may as well suggest they leaked the key (or information on how to find it) themselves.

    43. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by NotQuiteInsane · · Score: 1

      Alternatively they could whitelist the known-valid game signatures. Block the old key, except where it's used by a game that is known to have been legitimately signed with $OLD_KEY. Everything else has to be signed with $NEW_KEY.

      Unless, of course, Sony haven't been keeping track of what they've been signing... in which case, ROFLMAO!

    44. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This solution would solve the problem, assuming you are meaning an SHA1 hash of the entire game. It's simply unfortunate that blu-ray games can be 50GB in size and that the hash would have to be computed each time the game ran in order to ensure no tampering has been done.

    45. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You forgot 2), and for fuck's sake, it's HOBBYIST.

    46. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      Depending on exactly how PS3 games tend to operate, and whether they are free to do their own thing or have to operate through some sort of inbuilt API, you might be able to spread the pain out into a continuous layer of hurt: In the same way that AV programs are busy dragging down most wintels by hooking all file access operations and scanning each file on access; you might be able to do the hashing file by file or chunk by chunk... Easier if games have to go through some API to pull stuff off the disk, much, much harder if "trusted" disks are, once initially verified, basically given free reign to do whatever they want with the system and in terms of implementing schemes to pull and cache material from the disk in whatever way suits them best.

      The only saving grace of doing a 50GB hashing operation at startup would be that the access would be pretty close to linear, which is about the best case for an optical disk... It'd still be ugly, though.

    47. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by tepples · · Score: 1

      The floodgates are open now, and the only way to close them is by revoking the old key, which would be a financial and PR nightmare.

      Not that much of a nightmare. Sign all new releases with the old and new keys. Have the new firmware use only the signature with the new key, falling back to a whitelist of SHA-* values for old releases. I suggested that Nintendo do something similar three years ago, and the DSi does precisely what I suggested.

    48. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      For starters they OWN the revocation list with this hack - in fact that list was part of the hack. Go ahead and update the list :-) Secondly they haven't cracked the keys for the GameLoader code and they don't intend to - they want to restore the ONE feature Sony removed, loading Linux. Others will no doubt use this hack to grab the keys needed for signing games to be run by the GameLoader but these guys simply wanted something lower.

      Expect custom firmware ala PSP. Sony is hosed on this one and it was primarily because some jackass hardcoded a "random" key in the crypto that OBTW is in a part of the system Sony cannot remotely update. Whoops!

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    49. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by BLKMGK · · Score: 2

      Ding! Ding! Winnah! - the revocation list is one of the things owned by this, in fact I think it is part of the exploit used to grab the keys (lol). Go watch the vids - the last of them is the most revealing at just about the 4min mark where they use a LARGE revocation list to overwrite a buffer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84WI-jSgNMQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=187s

      Custom firmware is coming I suspect. Pirated games will take longer, these guys did NOT get the key required to sign a game and get it past the GameLoader. They were looking to load an entire OS not a game through GameLoader. someone else will have to grab those keys, these guys are apparently not interested in promoting piracy...

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    50. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      Wrong. the hackers own the revocation list in this hack, they use it to smack a buffer actually. That portion of code is also something Sony cannot revoke or update apparently. Watch this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84WI-jSgNMQ&feature=player_embedded#! around the 3:50 mark they get into how they used the revocation buffer but watch the previous stuff too as they explain how Sony does what they do regarding updates etc.

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    51. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      I think you and maybe one or two others are the only ones who actually watched the video. A shame you came in AC and my mod points are spoiled by posting :-(

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    52. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Your.Master · · Score: 1

      Greater than $0 / unit0 isn't enough. They have to make more money than they would just buying t-bills or whatever other guaranteed-return investments with the cash that goes into manufacturing. Otherwise the opportunity cost exceeds the profit and the technically "profitable" business is still a money sink.

      I don't pretend to know when the turning point is but I don't think they have margins substantially higher than a conservative investment's expected return. Of course, there would be huge costs in ramping up a PS4 line.

    53. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Which is trivially broken by the jailbreak simply telling the firmware that it's one of the "genuine" games.

      Spoken like someone who doesn't know cryptography, let alone video game DRM systems.

      Here is how this process works:
      SONY

      1. You get a game executable containing all the code that the game uses
      2. You run the file through a hash
      3. You run the hash through through RSA Encrypt using your private key
      4. You attach the hash to the end of the executable
      5. You burn the thing to a disk

      The key points here are that the hash is cryptographically secure, meaning that for all practical purposes it is extremely hard to find anything that will cause the algorithm to produce the same hash as something else (called a hash collision, hash algorithms are built to minimise them). Secondly, the hash is a flat algorithm without a key so if you know the algorithm you can generate a hash so you solve that by encrypting the hash with a key.

      Playstation 3 Console

      1. Detect a disk in the drive
      2. Search the disk for the executable
      3. Read the executable into memory without running any of it
      4. Find the hash at the end and decrypt it using RSA decrypt and Sony's public key
      5. Hash the executable without the hash attached
      6. Compare the hash in step 4 and 5 for equality
      7. If they match then the game is valid, if they don't then the game is invalid

      The key point here is that the crackers have the public key from the console and the private key from Sony so only ONE of the steps in each process is compromised. Note that no-one "tells the firmware" anything, it is the firmware itself doing the talking, thinking and doing.

      The proposal the grandparent has is thus:

      Sony Playstation 3 after Firmware update

      1. Detect a disk in the drive
      2. Search the disk for the executable
      3. Read the executable into memory without running any of it
      4. Find the hash at the end and decrypt it using RSA decrypt and Sony's NEW public key
      5. Hash the executable without the hash attached
      6. Compare the hash in step 4 and 5 for equality
      7. If they match then the game is valid, run it and stop here
      8. Redo step 4 & 6 using the old key, if the hash does not match then reject as invalid
      9. If we got here, take the hash from step 5 and search a whitelist of "valid old hash values", if the hash is in the list then run the game, if it is not in the list then reject it as invalid

      The main thing to see is that the old games on the valid list will work, new games with the new key will work but "old" games not on that list (like the firmware jailbreak for instance) will not. Note that you will be forced to use the new firmware for all new release games otherwise the game won't run since old firmware won't have the new key. Yes, as long as you jailbreak BEFORE this update happens you will be fine (the crackers will modify the firmware to not bother doing any of the checks at all); however, if you fail to jailbreak before this update then the only way to break it will be the dongle or pulling out the ROM chips and reflashing them. New consoles produced from the factories after this point will have the update preapplied as well as having the new Sony key burned in for the firmware itself so you won't even be able to reflash the chips after yanking them out (the dongle may still work though).

      [NOTE: In the Playstation list, there may be a step 1.5 which is "search for firmware updates on game CD, if found then go to 'Check Firmware validity and install procedure'". This means the new patched firmware will be on all new game discs, jailbroken consoles will ignore the update, normal ones will install it.]

      P.S. If Sony was nice, they would double sign by attaching the new key based hash then attaching the old key based hash after that so it would run on unupdated consoles b

    54. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by mrbugjacobs · · Score: 0

      In response to this they could do something that would make the DRM agencies proud, or they could do something that would make this console the biggest success since the Amiga homecomputer. "And what is that", you say ? Do what Ken Kutaragi or what his name was, said in the first place... "MAKE IT TOTALLY OPEN" - release every spec, for graphics systems and everything, and send ten consoles to the AmigaOS4, MorphOS, and AROS devteams... So they could do some real magic on a open console !! But I guess they would be sued into oblivion, even Sony, thats how far the DRM infested world has come ..... Damn DRM, damn it to hell ! And damn the virii also.. Due to viruses and computer crime we probably will end up NEEDING hardware DRM .... Or how will we do our online banking .....

    55. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Ed+Avis · · Score: 1

      I expect that Sony keeps a copy of every 'official' PS3 game ever released. So all they need to do is calculate checksums for those, and release a new firmware with a hardcoded list of approved checksums. A new public-private key pair can be generated and used for future games.

      --
      -- Ed Avis ed@membled.com
    56. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Ginger+Unicorn · · Score: 1

      mean that every PS3 game to date will no longer work. While I wouldn't put it past Sony to try this...

      This idea is absurd on it's face. Seriously?

      --
      (1.21 gigawatts) / (88 miles per hour) = 30 757 874 newtons
    57. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by am+2k · · Score: 1

      Disk I/O is already the most painful performance issue on the PS3 (as far as I've heard). Clogging every file access with a hash verification algorithm won't help in getting the loading times down in any way.

    58. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by Daniel+Phillips · · Score: 1

      They won't. But they might hasten the release of the PS4.

      Incidentally, in Cantonese "4" rhymes with "dead". Which is exactly what the PS4 is in my mind. After an extremely unsatisfying consumer experience with PS3, no new consoles from Sony will enter my home. Next generation it is back to PC gaming for me (and no, not on Windows).

      --
      Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
    59. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by yuriks · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately for Nintendo, this protection scheme was defeated in court a few years later: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade

    60. Re:Invalidate Private Keys by jgtg32a · · Score: 1

      Couldn't I just take one of those hashed exe and reverse engineer it so I can find out where it looks for a "DLL" and then write a custom "DLL" launch my stuff? My use of "DLL" should show how much I know about programing.

  5. Epic Fail? by dunezone · · Score: 1

    Please, the Dreamcast was epic fail it shipped with accessible debug mode.

    1. Re:Epic Fail? by rhook · · Score: 2

      That was intentionally done for game developers.

    2. Re:Epic Fail? by Nrrqshrr · · Score: 1

      That would have been an epic win if it helped the console survive. But it didn't.
      Fail?

    3. Re:Epic Fail? by commodore64_love · · Score: 0

      I still can't figure out why Sony stopped the Dreamcast. When it was discontinued at the end of 2001, the DC was still in the #1 spot for most units sold (although PS2 was catching up). I think Sega gave up too quickly, and if they had stayed with the DC it would have sold more units than the Nintendo Gamecube or Xbox. (i.e. ended in second place for the 2000-05 generation)

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    4. Re:Epic Fail? by hardburn · · Score: 1

      I fail to see how that's a bad thing.

      --
      Not a typewriter
    5. Re:Epic Fail? by dunezone · · Score: 1

      Its one of the main reasons why burned games were able to play without modifying the hardware.

    6. Re:Epic Fail? by Chyeld · · Score: 1

      It was entirely because of the new incoming chairman of Sega, who felt that there was no future in being a 'hardware' company and decided to go all in with their software division. Of course part of that was because they had a pile of debt, five years of running at a loss, and none of the companies they talk to about merging into (including Microsoft) wanted anything to do with them. So it's not as if they didn't have a reason to lose faith in themselves in that regard.

    7. Re:Epic Fail? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sony didn't stop it... Sega did.. (sorry, couldn't help it.)

  6. Epic Fail? Hardly. by Weaselmancer · · Score: 4, Informative

    From the blurb:

    'Approximately a half hour in, the team revealed their new PS3 secrets, the moment we all were waiting for. One of the major highlights here was, dongle-less jailbreaking by overflowing the bootup NOR flash, giving complete control over the system.

    Ok, the PS3 was launched on November 11, 2006. Today's date is December 29, 2010. That means that it took over four years to be broken.

    Compared to DVD and Blu-Ray, that is actually pretty darn good.

    --
    Weaselmancer
    rediculous.
  7. But the commentards! by Simmeh · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Thousands of commentards said this couldn't happen. How can people on the Internet be wrong?!

    1. Re:But the commentards! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      This couldn't happen? You mean Sony bypassing the traditional channels to deliver an affordable, entry level super computing environment to the masses? I couldn't believe they got the thing to market in the first place.

      It has been mentioned before by Sony execs... That the public wasn't going to be able to harness the full power of the platform for several years. Here we are - ahead of schedule, I might add.

      For all you know those commentators were laughing milk out of their noses while writing.

    2. Re:But the commentards! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thousands of commentards said this couldn't happen.

      How can people on the Internet be wrong?!

      Is that the new I'm-so-CLEVAR!!!1! copycat meme going around? Suffix every word with "-tard"? Commentard? /b/tard? Slashtard? Farktard?

      Because seriously, Sarah Palin might be (well, definitely is) an airheaded moron when she bitches about not using the word "retard", but doing this as a reactionary thing? Come on, already. You can do better than THAT.

    3. Re:But the commentards! by kesuki · · Score: 1

      "Thousands of commentards said this couldn't happen. How can people on the Internet be wrong?!"

      mistakes even a perfect thinking machine can make mistakes.

  8. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It is impressive indeed. Though I do note that it didn't completly resist attack for four years. It just took for years to be completly, irrepairably and conveniently broken. There have been wayst o break the PS3s DRM for years, but their complexity put the beyond the ability of all but the most technologically capable users. With the code-signing cracked, it's as simple as burning an ISO.

  9. Wow... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    How did Sony fuck that one up?

    It was my(admittedly layman's) understanding that a public/private key crypto implementation, assuming it isn't deeply flawed, using key lengths suited to the computational capacities of PDP-8s, or otherwise totally fucked, was mathematically secure against anything other than a profound breakthrough in prime factorization algorithms, an unbelievable advance in computational power, or an insider leaking your private key.

    With stuffy like HDCP, it was understood that serious tradeoffs were made in order to make the crypto cheap and fast enough that any POS $200 monitor should be able to decode an encrypted bitstream fast enough to handle the demands of uncompressed digital monitor connections. The weaknesses just came with the territory.

    With something like the PS3, though, they have serious computing power available, and were dealing with a straightforward case of "verify that the code signed with private key X has indeed been thus signed, and not modified since, using public key Y, from which private key X is essentially not computable". Virtually every real-world use of cryptography depends on the ability to do that without disclosing your private key(save by malicious insider/hacker attack).

    What did Sony do wrong? Obviously, they could do nothing about a suitably well-equipped hacker physically modifying a PS3 to stop it from verifying at all, or to always return "yup, all good" regardless of the verification outcome; similarly, a firmware bug could allow the same outcome without the expense of physical modification; but how could it be that they would have to put anything in their client(no matter how well hidden by hardware obfuscation/TPMs/smarcards/whatever) that could be used to compute their private key? Isn't a public key, which is a totally safe piece of data to disclose, all you need to verify whether or not something has been signed with the matching private key?

    I admit that I don't have a deep understanding of this stuff; but it seems like this is the equivalent of "Hey, possession of the list of trusted CAs and their public keys has allowed a hacker with a copy of firefox to compute Verisign's root signing keys!".

    How did Sony fuck up such that this story is not the biggest breakthrough in cryptoanalysis since frequency analysis?

    1. Re:Wow... by Fireye · · Score: 4, Informative

      What did Sony do wrong? Obviously, they could do nothing about a suitably well-equipped hacker physically modifying a PS3 to stop it from verifying at all, or to always return "yup, all good" regardless of the verification outcome; similarly, a firmware bug could allow the same outcome without the expense of physical modification; but how could it be that they would have to put anything in their client(no matter how well hidden by hardware obfuscation/TPMs/smarcards/whatever) that could be used to compute their private key? Isn't a public key, which is a totally safe piece of data to disclose, all you need to verify whether or not something has been signed with the matching private key?
       

      From my layman's understanding of what they did (View the actual conference footage here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPjd6gHY6A4 ), they don't HAVE the private key. Sony made a big mistake in their key generation method, where they were supposed to use a random value for one variable, they used a static value. Because of that, you're able to generate valid signed packages without the private key.

    2. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm not even going to bother trying to wrap my brain around this issue, but I'm guessing it works the same way most other cracks work; by breaking the lock itself.

      There are some things which can be considered reliably safe with encryption, but all that needs to happen for jailbreaking hardware is more akin to cutting a padlock than slowly navigating through some 256-bit maze.

    3. Re:Wow... by hardburn · · Score: 1

      It was my(admittedly layman's) understanding that a public/private key crypto implementation, assuming it isn't deeply flawed . . .

      That last bit right there is the hard part. Making algorithms was a hard task, to be sure. It took eons before humanity had the right mathematics to make RSA possible, but that work is all done now. There isn't all that much work being done in making new crypto algorithms, because we're pretty sure the ones we have will stand up. Even a breakthrough in Quantum Computing or Complexity Theory wouldn't completely destroy everything out there. There is some work to do in hash algorithms (MD5/SHA1), but that's the exception.

      However, putting those algorithms into a practical system is hard, and the work has to be more or less started from scratch with each new system. Every single entry point to the system has to be secured, including a lot of non-obvious ones. DeCSS was done because just one software DVD player mishandled the keys, and that toppled everything else.

      --
      Not a typewriter
    4. Re:Wow... by Rich0 · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Dunno, but I can make a comment regarding HDCP.

      HDCP isn't really doing the same thing as Sony's code-signing, and it suffers from the DRM problem where Bob and Eve are the same person.

      As you say, Sony's use case is just traditional public-key digital signatures, and should be completely immune to attack barring major advances, or compromise of the signing key. So, they are without excuse.

      HDCP accomplishes a different mission. HDCP needs to allow any two random and unrelated pieces of AV equipment to talk to each other without anything in-between intercepting the communication. That means that each device must contain a keypair, and not a single key, which means that private keys are inside every HD TV sold today. If you can extract the keypair from any one of those TVs you can fully impersonate that TV which is all you need to crack the system barring key revocation, since HDCP dictates that any device trust any other device with full-quality streams unless it has a revoked key.

      If you crack one TV set you break HDCP somewhat. The manufacturer can of course revoke the key and recall all TVs containing that key at considerable expense, and then re-secure the rest of the system (once the revocation fully propagates, which of course involves a lag).

      The next problem with HDCP is that all the device keys are related to a master key (which is how devices can figure out if any particular keypair is a good one or not without having any prior relationship). The nature of that relationship allows the master key to be brute-forced once a sufficient number of device keys are obtained. Over time a sufficient number of device keys were obtained, and thus the master key was obtained. That makes revocation of individual devices no longer an option, and the only solution at this point is to invalidate every HDMI-sporting device out there.

      The protection on BluRay had similar issues. Again, this is all DRM and it is theoretically insecure since the threat model is an attacker who has physical possession of the keys, which of course there is no mathematical defense against.

      None of this applied to the PS3 - at least not regarding code authentication. Code encryption is a different story - if discs are encrypted then if you extract a private key from any valid console you can decrypt every disc out there, but you can't modify and run them without having the signing key or jailbreaking individual devices.

      I'm curious as to how they did it as well. If they didn't provide details I'd be suspicious that the key wasn't simply leaked. Key management is the achilles heel of public key crypto.

    5. Re:Wow... by bushing · · Score: 1

      How did Sony fuck that one up? It was my(admittedly layman's) understanding that a public/private key crypto implementation, assuming it isn't deeply flawed, using key lengths suited to the computational capacities of PDP-8s, or otherwise totally fucked, was mathematically secure against anything other than a profound breakthrough in prime factorization algorithms, an unbelievable advance in computational power, or an insider leaking your private key.

      Close. These algorithms only work correctly if implemented correctly. There are various known pitfalls with each of these algorithms; for example, the original iPhone was unlocked using an RSA implementation error (Bleichenbacher attack against an RSA implementation that does not correctly validate padding and uses exponent 3). ECDSA happens to have a "pitfall" that leaks information inside the signatures it makes.

      This doesn't make it a bad algorithm -- it can achieve the same security of RSA using smaller keys and in less time -- but the "pitfall" here is particularly bad.

    6. Re:Wow... by John+Napkintosh · · Score: 1

      People seem to be saying "big whoop - they just invalidate the private key for use with anything but list of titles which which they know it was signed". But did I hear him say in that video that it's possible also to calculate more private keys that are totally indistinguishable from original? Meaning that would do nothing at all to resolve that problem?

      --

      Long signatures suck.
    7. Re:Wow... by zn0k · · Score: 1

      Because they used a static rather than a random value it is specifically possible to calculate the private keys. Which the group did.

    8. Re:Wow... by dch24 · · Score: 5, Informative

      I'm a little uncertain what you're asking at the end of your comment, but the key they obtained was the Isolation-mode SPU AES key.

      They say at the end of their talk they do not have the LV1 OS keys, and they aren't going to work on them -- those are used to sign & verify games.

      The Isolation-mode SPU AES key is used to verify loaders, and it was broken because the encrypted block is stored at a lower address than the decryption code -- and the size parameter is not verified. So the encrypted block can be overflowed to overwrite the current instruction and then the isolated SPU is under user control.

    9. Re:Wow... by Marillion · · Score: 1

      When you sign data, The private key (k in the video) is used in a way that can be verified by the public key. In order to keep the private key private random data (m in the video) are added to the results. The security is that with more than one changing value, you can't solve for one value. If you use the same value for (m), one of your unknowns isn't unknown. You can factor it out when comparing two signatures. That factoring out leaves (k) exposed and solvable.

      --
      This is a boring sig
    10. Re:Wow... by MichaelSmith · · Score: 1

      How did Sony fuck up such that this story is not the biggest breakthrough in cryptoanalysis since frequency analysis?

      Its not that big a deal for them. People will still buy their consoles. Software publishers will still pay Sony for the signing keys. They don't lose much if home users can load their own software.

    11. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      How did Sony fuck that one up?

      When the algorithm said "insert random number here" Sony inserted a constant number instead. I.e., something like:

              S1 = K * R1; S2 = K * R2

      Two equations with 3 unknowns K, R1, and R2. But, Sony did it like:

              S1 = K * R; S2 = K * R

      Two equations with 2 unknowns... solve for K.

    12. Re:Wow... by rowanparker · · Score: 1

      In the third video, one of the people on the panel mentions that the PS3 returns the same 'random' number. If the number actually was random, then they wouldn't be able to find the private keys, because there would be 2 unknowns (private key and random number).

    13. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Actually, the bug wasn't in key generation, but in *signature* generation.

      They were supposed to salt each signature with a different random salt (number "m"), but they didn't, they used a constant number every time.

      That made the equations for computing the signatures, R and S, easily exploitable, making it possible to simply solve them and obtain the private key. Now, this isn't a computationally expensive operation, since the equations are rather simple, hence the EPIC fail: as soon as anyone realizes Sony didn't salt their signatures, they can almost immediately compute the private key used just by having two signatures using the same key (and salt).

    14. Re:Wow... by gnasher719 · · Score: 1

      It took eons before humanity had the right mathematics to make RSA possible, but that work is all done now.

      The mathematics behind RSA is actually quite simple.

      Fermat's Little Theorem from 1640 states that when p is a prime and 1
      Now let p be a prime of the form 3k-1 and take any x, 1
      That's all the maths you need for RSA, and Leibniz knew all the required mathematics in the late 17th century. However, performing the arithmetic operations for this would have been completely impossible before the second half of the 20th century.

    15. Re:Wow... by gnasher719 · · Score: 1

      Reposted because of stupid less equal:
      The mathematics behind RSA is actually quite simple.

      Fermat's Little Theorem from 1640 states that when p is a prime and 1 lessequal x lessthan p then x^(p-1) = 1 modulo p.
      Leibniz wrote an unpublished proof around 1683.

      Now let p be a prime of the form 3k-1 and take any x, 1 lessequal x lessthan p.
      If we calculate y = x^(2k-1) modulo p then y^3 = x modulo p:
      y^3 = x^((2k-1)*3) = x^(6k-3) = x^(2p-1) = x^(p-1) * x^(p-1) * x. x^(p-1) = 1 modulo p, so y^3 = x modulo p.
      Similar, when p and q are both primes of the form 3k-1, then we can solve y^3 = x modulo pq - but only if p and q are known.
      If p and q are large, then y^3 modulo pq can be easily calculated, but y^3 = x modulo p can only be solved if p and q are known.

      That's all the maths you need for RSA, and Leibniz knew all the required mathematics in the late 17th century. However, performing the arithmetic operations for this would have been completely impossible before the second half of the 20th century.

    16. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This is how, quoted from the presentation on TFA: "for some reason Sony uses the same random number all the time"

    17. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      From the slides the epic fail comes by Sony's use of the SAME random number used as a scalar multiplier in generation of key pairs for signing...

      R = (mG)x
      S = (e+kR) / m

      R and S are key pair, m is random number, G and x are related to elliptic curve crypto parameters, e is data hash and k is private key

      When m is identical for two signatures, so is R, and

      S1 = (e1 + k1.R1) / m S2 = (e2 + k2.R2) / m

      S1 - S2 = e1 - e2 / m

      m = e1 - e2 / S1 - S2

      You can then workout private key k

      k = e1.S2 - e2.S1 / R.(S1 - S2)
            = epic fail :)

      It looks to me that when Sony fix random number generation it will remove the exploit though (if it's possible for them to do that?)

    18. Re:Wow... by Penguinshit · · Score: 1

      Sounds similar to the mistake that allowed Britain to crack the Nazi Enigma code.

    19. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They say at the end of their talk they do not have the LV1 OS keys, and they aren't going to work on them -- those are used to sign & verify games.

      No, the keys which are used to sign games are the appldr keys (appldr runs in user space). They didn't care about them because they just wanted low-level access. They could get the lv2 keys because Sonys ECDSA implementation, which they use to sign their (S)ELF files, is broken. It uses a static number as a value which is supposed to be random, and that made it possible to recalculate the private keys.

      They couldn't get the lv1 for some reason ("weird hardware stuff", whatever that means), but at the end he mentions that they will "figure that out".

    20. Re:Wow... by jam244 · · Score: 1

      It doesn't matter. The private key is already compromised.

      For two signatures in the future, with truly random values of m, you won't be able to derive the private key, but the key has already been discovered. The cat's out of the bag now... you can't put it back in.

      The only way for Sony to prevent this is to revoke the signing (private) key in a system update, which would make GAMES NOT WORK. Any convoluted solution involving whitelists—like some mentioned above in this thread—don't work, because you can trivially create your own whitelist now, and sign it with Sony's actual signing key.

    21. Re:Wow... by marcansoft · · Score: 2

      The "pitfall" isn't a pitfall because it doesn't apply to correctly implemented ECDSA. As long as you use a random m for every sig, you're safe. If you reuse m just once (or you somehow let the attacker guess m, or even an incomplete part of it), you leak the private key. If anything, the only con is that ECDSA requires a random number source for signing.

      This is basically just a superficially subtle screwup that turns out to have massive consequences for the security of the cryptosystem.

    22. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you watch the videos you will learn that Sony slipped up on step (2) in the elliptical curve signature computation

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_Curve_DSA

      Specifically, they used k=constant in all their signatures instead of a new random number as the scheme requires. As a result of this, given any two signatures, the signing equations can simply be inverted to obtain the private key.

      A pretty huge screw up on their part for sure. It really makes you wonder what the heck these companies are doing when it comes to their cryptography implementations. Surely hiring an expert is not too much to ask.

    23. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They DO have the private key. This particular Sony fuck up has nothing to do with the software/firmware on the ps3 itself. It's with the super secret program that Sony uses to sign legit software/games to allow them to run on the ps3. Whoever wrote it did not implement the algorithm correctly (used a constant instead of a random number) and therefore allowed for the private key to be trivially recovered. Leaking the private key is the worst mistake possible for this kind of security. I wonder if similar issues exist further up the chain of trust.

    24. Re:Wow... by MHolmesIV · · Score: 1

      Indeed, in Sony's signing algorithm, there are two private unknowns, the private key, and a random number. If implemented correctly, you can never solve for the private key, since the number of unknown variables will always be 1 more than you can solve for.

      Sony set the random number to the same number every time, making it trivial, ie, 10th grade math level, to determine the private key.

      In the talk they joke about how Sony's "rand()" function for the signature algorithm is essentially just "return 4;"

      That's how they fucked up, and that's why it's an EPIC FAIL, as opposed to just a normal fail.

    25. Re:Wow... by MHolmesIV · · Score: 1

      No, they calculated the actual private key, because the static value caused an intractible problem to be turned into a simple one solved by simultaneous differential equations.

    26. Re:Wow... by m50d · · Score: 1

      What? There's no similarity there at all.

      --
      I am trolling
    27. Re:Wow... by JamesP · · Score: 1

      Maybe if Sony didn't sue security experts that were hired to review their processes they would have experts working for them

      Because the average code monkey does not know what's a SQL injection, let alone flaws in using cryptography.

      So, yeah, they deserve it.

      --
      how long until /. fixes commenting on Chrome?
    28. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

    29. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

      [reposted due to /. technical difficulties]

    30. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

      [try 3: my comment's don't get posted for some reason or another]

    31. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

      [try 3, now as AC, /., what's going on?]

    32. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

      [try #4, slashdot broken it seems]

    33. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod parent down, they *DO* have the private key. It's the K that they solve using the calculation in the presentation for gods sake.

    34. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      Mod AC up, I've checked after watching the YouTube video (just to be absolutely sure), and this seems to be the case.

      Although it *is* an epic fail, you may argue the safety of the EC algorithm if your RNG fails for signature generation. That is a safety catch that is not present for RSA. So watch out you kids, don't forget to use secure RNG's.

      So yes, they have the private key(s) because of a bug in their signature generation implementation. They probably used a software package instead of a HSM (hardware security module), which they should have used.

      [post 5, isn't this fun]

    35. Re:Wow... by tonique · · Score: 1
    36. Re:Wow... by owlstead · · Score: 1

      They actually *say* that they have got the private key at 8:10 in the video. Is every mod here so stupid that they don't watch the actual presentation. I guess they are.

    37. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    38. Re:Wow... by canajin56 · · Score: 1

      Why RTFA when you can just read the highest rated comments? ;)

      --
      ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
    39. Re:Wow... by Penguinshit · · Score: 1

      One operator kept using the same plaintext ground setting repeatedly which greatly assisted Bletchly Park in cracking the code. Of course, finally capturing a machine and codebooks sure helped...

    40. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They have the signing key for the lv2 loader, meaning they can sign a replacement to GameOS. That much was pretty obvious.

      They also have the AES keys for decrypting, for example, the sectors on disk... everything the isolated mode SPE does. However, they also pointed out that since the isolation mode SPE will decrypt anything you ask it to, that the security coprocessor that people were unsure how to hack or even a little bit afraid to try is essentially pointless.

      They didn't work on the app keys because their focus is on Linux. Rightly, in my opinion.

    41. Re:Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They explain it in the presentation. The public keys are supposed to be calculated from the private keys in a calculation that is seeded with a random number. Someone at Sony goofed and either broke the routine that is supposed to return a random number or they accidentally left placeholder code that always returns the same number... either way, no one seemed to notice that it always returned a value of "4" until these guys did and that was all they needed to computationally reverse the private keys without brute-force.

  10. Beowulf cluster by threaded · · Score: 1

    Yipee, replacement parts for the Beowulf cluster!

    1. Re:Beowulf cluster by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Imagine just a single one of these machines...
      Does this new hack allow us access to the RSX silicon - that is, is the hypervisor disabled?

  11. Just give me back my Other OS functionality by Mick+R · · Score: 2

    I wanted to commit a PS3 to biomedical research on a project of MY choosing, as well as play LEGIT games but that was taken because ... well it doesn't matter as it's too late now.

    1. Re:Just give me back my Other OS functionality by RocketRabbit · · Score: 1

      Why even bring it up then? It just seems silly.

      If you want a PS3 for gaming, go ahead and buy one. If you want to do "biomedical research" then use another technology like OenCL which is faster anyway these days.

  12. I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Nom+du+Keyboard · · Score: 0

    I wouldn't say Epic Fail:

    1: PS3 was released to retail on November 11, 2006. That's over 4 years of security when you had both the lock and the key.

    2: As is pointed out, if they want to pay the price for it Sony can invalidate and replace the keys revealed. Expensive and a PITB, but certainly possible if it matters enough.

    --
    "It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
    1. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by seebs · · Score: 1

      Not even all that hard, I suspect, to replace the keys. They don't need to accept all code signed with the old keys -- only the set of code signed with the old keys that they know they signed, which is a very small number compared to modern storage and computation.

      --
      My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
    2. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by h4rr4r · · Score: 2

      Which then means any ps3 not connected to the internet cannot play new games. That would be epic fail.

    3. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Rich0 · · Score: 1

      True - they could update the firmware to accept the old key only for signatures that have particular hashes, and supply a list of hashes. If there are 1000 games out there for the PS3 and a hash of the signature is 20 bytes long then you only need 20kb to store the whole table - a trivial amount to include in a firmware blob.

      Now, if you can get the keys needed to update the firmware that is a different matter...

    4. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

      Too late for that, now that we have keys we can sign our own hacked firmware updates.

    5. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Lunix+Nutcase · · Score: 1

      Which then means any ps3 not connected to the internet cannot play new games. That would be epic fail.

      How is that any different than what happens now? There have already been updates released that one was required to have in order to play newer games and/or blu-rays.

    6. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by mlts · · Score: 1

      It gave Sony about 3 years of a 0% piracy rate, which is unheard of. That in itself will likely make Sony drop even more fundage into the PS4 to make it harder to crack. I'm sure this time around, they will be using a real RNG for generating their keys.

    7. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

      Well that is lame.

    8. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by tepples · · Score: 1

      Which then means any ps3 not connected to the internet cannot play new games.

      Under a proper fix, like that used in the transition from DS to DSi, games would continue to be signed with both the old and new keys.

    9. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Pence128 · · Score: 1

      They actually got that first.

      --
      404: sig not found.
    10. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Pence128 · · Score: 1

      Which goes to show that OtherOS was the greatest anti-piracy measure in videogame history.

      --
      404: sig not found.
    11. Re:I wouldn't say Epic Fail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      And if you wanted to retain your linux partition on the PS3 prior to this new development, then your PS3 could not play new games, anyway. Or rather, didn't DARE to, for fear of the firmware upgrade from Sony trashing access to your partition. So Sony already had an epic fail resulting from their policies regarding "OtherOS", huh?

  13. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    To be fair, until Firmware version 3.21, which was released in April this year, it was officially supported to install an alternative OS on the PS3 - so there was little motivation to break the code signing system.

  14. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by jchillerup · · Score: 5, Informative

    Ok, the PS3 was launched on November 11, 2006. Today's date is December 29, 2010. That means that it took over four years to be broken.

    Compared to DVD and Blu-Ray, that is actually pretty darn good.

    I was at the presentation in Berlin today. They did bring up this exact point.

    Their counter argument was that people don't take into consideration that the console did support homebrew until Sony declared they'd drop that. The argument for that action was they'd save money not having to support it for their then-new PS3 Slim models, which turned out to be bullshit after hackers discovered that the Slim (with some hacking) could actually run the same Linux distros as the PS3 Fat. They then disabled OtherOS on the PS3 Fat, too.

    This was 12 months ago (can't cite a source other than the slides), making it take only 12 months of actual effort for it to get cracked, as opposed to other (closed) platforms where the homebrew hacking efforts begin at day 0.

  15. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Terrasque · · Score: 5, Informative

    That's true. And Sony have been boasting of having the toughest DRM of all consoles.

    However, it only took half a year from removing Linux support, and in that short period have had many partially successful attacks against it. Before, while they had the Linux support, such stories were remarkably rarer.

    Many critics meant that the continued security of the console was partially because they allowed linux to run on it, and so many of the talented people had no reason to look closer at it. Since PS3, after four year of "DRM cracking almost never heard of" have now gone to "Completely broken" in just over half a year's time, I think they have a point there.

    It's not that it was that much more secure, it's just that most of the really talented people had no reason to look into it.

    --
    It's The Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."
  16. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by F-3582 · · Score: 1

    Yeah, but during the first three of those four years the only reason was piracy why people would want to break it. Which is clearly not the intention of those guys. So, technically it was only twelve months since SONY removed the OtherOS mode.

  17. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Fireye · · Score: 1

    The people that did this exploit/hack/whatever reportedly only chose this method of action after Sony decided to remove OtherOS support from PS3's. Their stated goal is to get Linux up and running on retail PS3s. Maybe this would've occured a lot quicker if OtherOS never existed.

  18. What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by W.+Justice+Black · · Score: 4, Funny

    Folks toss about the phrase "Epic Fail" far too loosely. Here's what a real Epic Fail looks like:

    The DRM code has a bug that, when a certain condition happens (time passes, specially-formulated packet received, etc.), it overclocks the CPU to the point that it catches on fire. Within minutes of the event, most of the millions of PS3s in the wild have set peoples' homes ablaze.

    As a result, thousands die and the insurance industry collapses. Anarchy reigns, so there's nobody to enforce copyright anymore and the original DRM is rendered irrelevant.

    THAT is an epic fail.

    --
    "Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana." --Groucho Marx
    1. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by NitroWolf · · Score: 2, Funny

      Folks toss about the phrase "Epic Fail" far too loosely. Here's what a real Epic Fail looks like:

      The DRM code has a bug that, when a certain condition happens (time passes, specially-formulated packet received, etc.), it overclocks the CPU to the point that it catches on fire. Within minutes of the event, most of the millions of PS3s in the wild have set peoples' homes ablaze.

      As a result, thousands die and the insurance industry collapses. Anarchy reigns, so there's nobody to enforce copyright anymore and the original DRM is rendered irrelevant.

      THAT is an epic fail.

      While I tend to agree that it's not exactly an Epic Fail on Sony's part, your description goes far beyond Epic Fail... that would probably be the most Awesome Fail in the history of electronics.

    2. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Eric+Smith · · Score: 1

      That would be way beyond "epic". I'm not sure that a suitable adjective for that level of fail has even been invented.

    3. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by ChoboMog · · Score: 1

      Folks toss about the phrase "Epic Fail" far too loosely. Here's what a real Epic Fail looks like:

      The DRM code has a bug that, when a certain condition happens (time passes, specially-formulated packet received, etc.), it overclocks the CPU to the point that it catches on fire. Within minutes of the event, most of the millions of PS3s in the wild have set peoples' homes ablaze.

      As a result, thousands die and the insurance industry collapses. Anarchy reigns, so there's nobody to enforce copyright anymore and the original DRM is rendered irrelevant.

      THAT is an epic fail.

      No... That would be a "pretty sweet burn"... =P

    4. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 1

      Roman Fail?

      --
      Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
    5. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by jsh1972 · · Score: 1

      ludicrous fail.

    6. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "..so there's nobody to enforce copyright anymore and the original DRM is rendered irrelevant."

      Sometimes you fail so hard, you win. ;)

    7. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Thelasko · · Score: 1

      ...insurance industry collapses. Anarchy reigns...

      That's a pretty big jump right there. The government will never let the insurance industry collapse.

      --
      One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
    8. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Biblical Fail.

    9. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Bucky24 · · Score: 1

      the original DRM is rendered irrelevant.

      Aside from the anarchy and chaos and such that sounds like a win to me... Unless it's replaced by something even worse, I suppose.

      --
      All the world's a CPU, and all the men and women merely AI agents
    10. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by c · · Score: 1

      Aw, shit. That means the XBox 360 gains a lot of marketshare...

      --
      Log in or piss off.
    11. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Belial6 · · Score: 1

      Well, MS tried that with the original XBox, but they couldn't even get that right....

    12. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Kalriath · · Score: 1

      Plaid.

      --
      For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
    13. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Something tells me that, with all PS3s burnt, it wouldn't be the lack of copyright enforcement that would render PS3 DRM irrelevant. ;)

    14. Re:What Would Epic Fail Look Like? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >

      As a result, thousands die and the insurance industry collapses. Anarchy reigns, so there's nobody to enforce copyright anymore and the original DRM is rendered irrelevant.

      THAT is an epic fail.

      That's called "asbestos" and the insurance industry damage can be read about by looking at the wikipedia entry on Lloyd's of London. ;-)

  19. I wouldnt call it an EPIC FAIL for sony by bobjr94 · · Score: 1

    It took probably thousands or more hackers and modders since 2006 to crack it, so epic fail would be an overstatement. If they did it in an afternoon, then I would agree it would be an epic failure.

  20. OtherOS by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From @fail0verflow:

    "we only started looking at the ps3 after otheros was killed."

    and

    "our goal is to have linux running on all existing PS3 consoles, whatever their firmware versions."

    If Sony would have left OtherOS alone, they wouldn't be in this predicament.

    1. Re:OtherOS by Trelane · · Score: 1

      Yep. Add to it the fact that the update that kills otheros is only required if you want to keep using "your" ps3 (how is it yours if it obeys another party not you and it's arguably illegal to change this?) for games and sony online content. That is, if you value OtherOS (like I do), you pretty much already dedicated the box to doing only linux. Combine the various hacks that will allow you to escape OtherOS with this fact and the net result is that you can either stay in the now-unsupported sandbox with its six SPUs or else you can hack "your" ps3 to get the full seven SPUs (and perhaps play games again). I only see win here.

      --

      --
      Given enough personal experience, all stereotypes are shallow.
    2. Re:OtherOS by Abstrackt · · Score: 1

      If Sony would have left OtherOS alone, they wouldn't be in this predicament as quickly.

      Don't get me wrong, I think it's great that the removal of OtherOS prompted this result but I also think it's naive to assume that no one else would have tried to crack the PS3 just for the hell of it.

      --
      They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it's not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance. - Terry Pratchett
  21. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by kyz · · Score: 0

    Ok, the PS3 was launched on November 11, 2006. [wikipedia.org] Today's date is December 29, 2010. That means that it took over four years to be broken.

    No, it took 8 months to be broken.

    The Other OS functionality of the PS3 was unilaterally removed by Sony on April 1st 2010. The years before are of no importance, because you could freely boot Linux. Nobody who had the skills to crack the PS3 even bothered to look.

    When they removed Other OS, Sony signed their own fucking death warrant.

    --
    Does my bum look big in this?
  22. How did they get the private key, if they did? by Animats · · Score: 1

    Do they really have Sony's signing key?

    Of course, the real win would be to get the Windows Update private key. That, and a BGP exploit, and you can rule the Windows world. I still consider Windows Update an unacceptable backdoor. Someday, that's going to backfire.

    1. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by Fireye · · Score: 1

      They don't have Sony's signing key, from what I've read. What they have is a flaw in the key generation process, which allows them to generate valid signed packages without the private key. In fact, here's the video from the conference itself:
      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPjd6gHY6A4

    2. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by bushing · · Score: 2

      They don't have Sony's signing key, from what I've read. What they have is a flaw in the key generation process, which allows them to generate valid signed packages without the private key. In fact, here's the video from the conference itself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GPjd6gHY6A4

      No, GP was right. The exact signing key used by Sony may be derived from the public components of their ECDSA signatures. Not something close; not something equivalent.

    3. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by fail0verflow · · Score: 5, Insightful

      > Do they really have Sony's signing key?
      Yes, we have most of their signing private keys.

    4. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Microsoft can easily invalidate the key with an internet update. A consumer device not necessarily connected to the internet is harder.

    5. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > Do they really have Sony's signing key?

      Yes, we have most of their signing private keys.

      Are you planning on releasing these keys, before some judge considers these "trade secrets"?

    6. Re:How did they get the private key, if they did? by wheed+whack3r · · Score: 1

      I Believe what I am hearing is true, but wonder what you will really do with the Knowledge that has been obtained? I love fully customized GUI'S and cant wait to see a port of android OS and I pod OS to PS3! Ow great now I just need a D-Box motion code to ps3 DuelShock3 port and I will finally quite bitching about loosing the 2.60 firmware GUI I loved so much!!! Ow sweet home brew, I missed you so. I'm in it for android and other smart phone OS's and especially proper over scan for crappy Mitsubishi DLP T.V.'s. Seriously Mitsubishi is using a Crappy buggy "doomed to have hardware failure" updated Westinghouse WD-5050 TV firmware as a basis for WD-6060 TV's. Worst TV's ever! Thanks to Homebrew software for easing the sting of wasting money on that crappy TV, I can now enjoy the HUD not being cut off from anything PS3 again! yeah! When Android OS's Dynamic fire background can be ported to the standard XMB I will be pleased. If all is true above, the potential for dynamic backgrounds can enhance the ugly and lame 3.XX GUI of the P$3. And Linux will have full kernel access so "W.I.N.E." could be run possibly, not to mention porting a better sound visualizer like R4 to the RSX of the PS3. I can't stop thinking of the limitless potential of Full Kernel access Linux support!!!

  23. Cheats? by dave562 · · Score: 1

    What does this mean for hacks and other programs that modify program code or execute and stay resident alongside game code? Does the cracking of the keys allow custom boot loaders that will open the doors for hacking?

    If so, this is a sad day. The primary reason I bought a PS3 was to play in a hack free environment.

    1. Re:Cheats? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This article does not concern you. Move along.

  24. Worthy Technobabble by Sponge+Bath · · Score: 1

    "dongle-less jailbreaking by overflowing the bootup NOR flash"

    Awesome. I expect to hear this line in a sci-fi movie someday.

  25. Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot ? by Schwarzy · · Score: 1

    I remember that cracking PS3 got a huge soar when SONY killed Linux support with a firmware update.

    I wonder if current motives are still Linux booting. If this is the case, SONY executives are truly dumb.

    Does someone knows what are (practical) counter measures sony have against secret key leak ?

  26. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Kartu · · Score: 1

    It's a known myth, but actually it was broken because Sony allowed Linux to run in it.
    Geohot's mem glitch exploit would not work, if not OtherOS (Linux).
    And all existing hacks used dumps made using mentioned exploit.

  27. video mirrors and updates by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    there are video mirrors and updates here: http://www.ps3news.com/PS3-Hacks/Fail0verflow-27C3-PS3-Exploit-Hacker-Conference-2010-Highlights/

    1. Re:video mirrors and updates by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thanks for this!

  28. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by The+MAZZTer · · Score: 1

    Ah, but users have been able to run Linux for most of that time. Jailbreaks started being introduced only AFTER Sony removed Linux... I don't recall hearing about attempts before then.

  29. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I wonder if current motives are still Linux booting.

    You ever actually thought that was the real motive when the first uses of all these jailbreaks was to pirate games? How naive you are.

  30. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah this all has to do with Sony killing linux support. That is why the 360 has hacked firmware and the Wii has been hacked, because of linux... . Really can we really stop being hypocrites about telling this all has to do with regarding of free software and linux.

  31. What's this mean for linux? by Joe+Snipe · · Score: 2

    So does this mean a hypervisor free linux is around the corner? I may change my stance on buying a PS3.

    --
    Sometimes, life itself is sarcasm...
    1. Re:What's this mean for linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      No you wouldn't. The PS3 has been out for 4 years. If you haven't bought one by now, you obviously have no intention of getting one. Why would you want one, just to have one more cell? I call BS!

    2. Re:What's this mean for linux? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hypervisor free Linux is here today, albeit not entirely functional or stable; Google for PS3 AsbestOS. This development should make hypervisor free Linux not a total pain in the ass to use.

  32. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by hardburn · · Score: 1

    In other words, Sony has just gone and proved that the only DRM that remains unhacked is the kind that nobody cares to hack. See also: SACD.

    --
    Not a typewriter
  33. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1

    Ok, the PS3 was launched on November 11, 2006. Today's date is December 29, 2010. That means that it took over four years to be broken.

    Another way to look at is that on April 1st, 2010 the "other OS" option was retroactively removed from all PS3s with current firmware.
    That makes it 5 months from pissing off the wrong people to the first widespread jailbreak and 9 months to a permanent crack.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  34. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by madsenj37 · · Score: 1

    Only on the original models. Slim has never had this option.

    --
    Choosing the lesser of two evils is a choice for evil.
  35. LOL Homebrew by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah, homebrew. That's it. People are dying to run homebrew... like a custom-copied version of LittleBigPlanet 2

    1. Re:LOL Homebrew by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      DC had an awesome homebrew scene. I for one cant wait for homebrew with ps technology.

  36. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 2

    In other words, Sony has just gone and proved that the only DRM that remains unhacked is the kind that nobody cares to hack. See also: SACD.

    SACD is cracked. Or at least worked around enough so that it doesn't matter.
    There are two hacks for SACD:

    1) Physical modification of various players to extract the PCM audio after conversion from DSD, this approach is a few years old now.
    2) The widespread crack of HDCP enabled extraction of the original DSD audio from any HDMI equipped SACD player.

    There are plenty of SACD rips floating around the net

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  37. precisely. by spazdor · · Score: 0

    Mod parent up, folks. This is exactly the fix we should expect from them.

    --
    DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
    1. Re:precisely. by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

      So then we get the new key. The private key can be calculated again. Also we can sign our own modified firmware now.

    2. Re:precisely. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

      I did consider that possibility myself, but I don't think it can be done perfectly. They can include a list of hashes for all the big games, but think how many games there are - and then they have slight variations by version, by region, and so on. Unless they can get every publisher to send the hashes for every version of every game they have sent to the CD press, some people will find their games broken. Sony might consider that a price worth paying.

    3. Re:precisely. by spazdor · · Score: 2

      And that helps:

      people who bought their PS3's before Sony manages to rush a new firmware image through the factory, and who hold back their online updates before Sony manages to rush a new one through the update system. Remember, if they can update the signing keys, they can also update the key checking code, so there's no reason the second key has to be as easily compromised as the first.

      Anyone who can emancipate their PS3 in this (presumably) short window of time is gonna be able to keep their PS3 well-stocked with spoofed updates from this day forward. But this doesn't break all PS3 security forever.

      --
      DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
    4. Re:precisely. by spazdor · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Unless they can get every publisher to send the hashes for every version of every game they have sent to the CD press, some people will find their games broken

      But Sony already possesses them - they had to sign them in the first place! Either that or they entrusted all those publishers with with their private signing key. Which would be a terrible idea.

      --
      DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
    5. Re:precisely. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 2

      I did consider that possibility myself, but I don't think it can be done perfectly. They can include a list of hashes for all the big games, but think how many games there are - and then they have slight variations by version, by region, and so on. Unless they can get every publisher to send the hashes for every version of every game they have sent to the CD press, some people will find their games broken. Sony might consider that a price worth paying.

      It is almost certain that the process of signing the games includes a hash generation. Usually the way these things work is that you hash the entire image, then encrypt the hash with the private key. Mainly because hashing is orders of magnitude faster than encryption. So even if Sony didn't archive a copy of every game they signed due to laziness or lack of process or they ran out of shelf-space, it would have been trivial to archive a copy of every hash that they signed.

      --
      When information is power, privacy is freedom.
    6. Re:precisely. by marcansoft · · Score: 2

      This is exactly the only possible fix. It is, however, technically quite hard to pull of for a number of reasons. I'm not at all certain that Sony will do that. They need to build a hash list of every version of every game, package, downloadable cotent, deal with shop versions and stuff like that, etc...

    7. Re:precisely. by marcansoft · · Score: 2, Informative

      Assuming they don't botch signing with the new key, no, we don't. The code running on the PS3 is perfectly fine (the signature verification, that is; the rest of the security is a clusterfuck). So is the way the signature is implemented. The screwup is in Sony's signer code. If they fix that and only issue safe signatures from now on, we can't compute new keys.

      But because we can downgrade and due to the oracle attack on the secure SPE, this will likely not gain them much.

    8. Re:precisely. by marcansoft · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Sony cannot permanently regain any existing PS3 with a firmware update (nor can they fix this hole trivially at all, including in new manufactured units). They can make it harder for you to install a hacked firmware on a PS3, but as of today every manufactured PS3 is vulnerable to a modchip (NOR/NAND flasher) forever.

    9. Re:precisely. by tepples · · Score: 1

      They can include a list of hashes for all the big games, but think how many games there are

      After the crypto on the Nintendo DS was thoroughly broken (starting with the "NoPass" exploit and culminating in R4-style cards), Nintendo included the SHA-1 of the first 3000 or so authentic DS releases in the DSi firmware, and then signed all future releases with a new key that the DSi checks.

    10. Re:precisely. by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      They cannot revoke this and they cannot update the private keys. The revocation list is owned in this hack and the loader where these keys were pulled is at such a low level that Sony cannot update it. Perhaps new consoles will be updated but not the zillions already out there...

      Oh and they can sign new firmware so Sony updating firmware isn't going to help. Near as I can tell this DOES bust the PS3 "forever" - or at least the one I own :-)

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    11. Re:precisely. by spazdor · · Score: 1

      Really?

      BRB, hitting "Boxing Week" sales.

      --
      DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
    12. Re:precisely. by BLKMGK · · Score: 1

      This video ought to help explain. If I have followed correctly there at the beginning and towards the middle where they discuss the revocation I believe this is true ->

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84WI-jSgNMQ&feature=player_embedded#!

      Oh and if you looking to pirate listen to this part too -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84WI-jSgNMQ&feature=player_detailpage#t=795s

      --
      Build it, Drive it, Improve it! Hybridz.org
    13. Re:precisely. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      > They need to build a hash list of every version of every game

      like what, the entire _5_ PS3 games? phhh~

    14. Re:precisely. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      So did this accomplish anything but selling more R4i-style cards, like the one I bought? (It was barely more than the R4-style card, I just have a DS.)

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    15. Re:precisely. by tepples · · Score: 1

      It appears Nintendo would have a stronger legal case against makers and sellers of R4i-style cards, which require a ROM of a licensed, vulnerable game in order to function on a DSi. I've ordered an Archos 43 instead, as Android homebrew appears to be far less vulnerable to legal action than DS homebrew despite Oracle v. Google.

  38. Not altogether unprecedented... by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    ...access to the signing keys. This is fairly unprecedented, as far as I know

    The HDCP master key was also recently found.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Not altogether unprecedented... by Goaway · · Score: 1

      HDCP was a horrible algorithm from the start. The method for finding the master key has been known for many years. It's just that it required quite a bit of effort to actually get it.

      That said, I am not sure if somebody actually used the theoretical attack, or if it was just leaked.

  39. Re:a loader that has a matching checksum by spazdor · · Score: 1

    Depending on the specifics of the checksum procedure, this could be far from trivial. If Sony has any sense they will use a hash function that makes collisions extremely hard to find.

    --
    DRM: Terminator crops for your mind!
  40. So the PS3 been out since 06... by nhat11 · · Score: 0

    and now cracked in 2010? That's not too bad if it took hackers almost 4 yrs to crack it. Most encryption isn't made to be uncrackable, just takes a ridiculously long amount of time to do it that it becomes impracticable in the long run.

  41. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by h4rr4r · · Score: 1

    It is what I plan to do with it.

  42. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Mongoose+Disciple · · Score: 1

    When they removed Other OS, Sony signed their own fucking death warrant.

    ... because this has somehow killed Sony or even the PS3?

  43. XBMC by Flammon · · Score: 2

    I hope XBMC will be ported to it now.

    1. Re:XBMC by nosfucious · · Score: 1

      I bought my PS3 waiting for an opportunity such as this. It might be curtains for chipped original XBOX, but it has served me well for many years.

      Yay to high-def media on my HD TV and bluetooth Hi Fi. Must get the Apocalypse Now ripped with the 5.1 surround instead of the low-def options.

      --
      Q:I was listening to a CD in Grip and it sounded horrible! What's up? A:Perhaps you are listening to country music
    2. Re:XBMC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/15/hacker-gets-xbmc-running-on-his-ps3-tells-you-how-video/

      Turn this into a community effort to clean it up and distribute as a part of a custom firmware?

  44. Obligatory xkcd from the video... by ELCouz · · Score: 1
  45. An Interesting Trend by wiredmikey · · Score: 0

    Not surprising and something that's likely to be a trend in consumer devices over time, especially as more and more devices become "connected" -- An interesting research report we highlighted last week shows just how vulnerable these newly connected devices are (ok PS3 isn't newly connected but many more consumer devices are) Cellphones, iPods, digital cameras, set-top boxes, gaming systems... these devices pervade modern life. Mostly, they make our lives easier and more fun. But if they're built without the proper security technology, our favorite gizmos and gadgets can seriously compromise our privacy, finances and even our personal safety: http://www.securityweek.com/security-focus-consumer-electronics

    1. Re:An Interesting Trend by h4rr4r · · Score: 0

      1. Stop spamming
      2. This is a good thing you nitwit. It means owners of the device now actually own it.

  46. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by pak9rabid · · Score: 1

    They only started attempting to crack it once the OtherOS option was removed, which was around 9 months ago. So, in essence it took them 9 months to crack, not over 4 years.

  47. I know how Sony fucked this up... by cigawoot · · Score: 1

    They removed OtherOS. If they would have left OtherOS intact, these groups would have had no reason to want to crack the PS3.

    Sony did this to themselves.

  48. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Terrasque · · Score: 1

    Possibly. I just look at the numbers (over 3 years in relative peace, then several strong (as in easy to do by customer) cracks in under a year) involved, and that many of the people trying to crack it now says they only started because linux support was removed.

    Did the Sony engineers remove it because they knew this would happen, or did this happen because they removed the support? Did the chicken come before the egg, and was he wearing a condom? We don't know.

    However, one thing that I have been thinking about these last minutes.. I don't see why this is the end of the world for Sony. There are a limited number of games using the old key. And with crypto signing / verification you usually work on a hash.. Let's say that the hash is 256bit long (rather overkill, really), and there are 30.000 games released (Wikipedia lists 653 games, but I don't think it's complete. Plus you probably have different versions and locales) - that's still under 1MB of data. It's perfectly doable for them to make a whitelist of hashes allowed to use the old key. And if they use exceptionally large hashes for some reason, or validate against the whole binary code... Just sha256 it. Done deal. If performance is a problem (scanning the table) you could make an index of it during firmware upgrade, or have a local cache of valid hashes.

    In short, I see absolutely no reason why they couldn't do this. Sure, it's a lot of work, and you're almost guaranteed to miss some.. But the alternatives are worse. Just give the ones with problems some free store credit, everyone is happy, and The Disaster(TM) is easily averted.

    --
    It's The Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."
  49. Bad thing? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm sorry, the PS3 being cracked is a bad thing? Maybe for Sony's crypto guys, but not for the consumer. I'm way more likely to buy a PS3 now that I can run MY code on it and do what I want with it.

    Didn't I read something about the US Army/Air Force/Navy/Marines/Something using PS3s as ad-hoc supercomputers? Sounds like a great thing for them.

    1. Re:Bad thing? by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

      Any big customer like that, I imagine Sony would be happy to sell them PS3s with a custom firmware. It's the more moderatly sized research organisations that might benefit - those who don't have the money or connections needed to get Sony's cooperation.

  50. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by afidel · · Score: 1

    Considering the attacks against the PS3 skyrocketed after OtherOS was removed in April, yeah I think for the kind of people technically proficient enough to perform these type of hacks it was, or at least it was about the perceived challenge from a huge faceless corporation. Most of the people capable of pulling this type of stuff of are smart enough to have a job which makes the couple bucks saved in pirating games worthless compared to the hours spent.

    --
    There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
  51. XBMC, XBMC, XBMC! by AbRASiON · · Score: 2

    That's all I want, badly, very badly.
    It's half the reason I got the PS3 when I did, XBMC was in the early stages of PS3 support, however the idiots at Sony blocked the GPU acceleration for the video so the team abandoned it once the 3D loophole was closed in linux. I don't know the full term, something along the lines of a hypervisor.
    Then they closed off linux all together.

    I love it as a gaming machine but I wish it could match my Xbox1. The Ps3 hardware is amazing, XBMC would be brilliant on it.

    1. Re:XBMC, XBMC, XBMC! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not going to happen. XMBC team have said they're x86 only these days and not interested in other archs.

  52. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

    3. The SACD player digital audio output. All SACD players must support a DRMed extension - I forget it's name - but it's very primative and trivial to break. So you could just record off that.

  53. A bit close-minded around here by metalmaster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The PS3 was being attacked well before OtherOS removal. When linux was available the graphics on the machine were limited to virtualization. The race was on too crack the 7 locked down SPUs. Were people successful? Mostly no, but that doesnt mean attempts havent been made. If i remember correctly, Geohot's intention was to gain access to the cores. They just happened to find an exploit to give them keys to the kingdom

    Removing linux definitely brought the talent out of the woodwork, but it did not start a war

    1. Re:A bit close-minded around here by Khyber · · Score: 1

      AsbestOS gives you full access to everything.

      And with this, now we can make bootable livecd environments once we have every private key figured out.

      It's also portable to other machines. You can show your friend your latest distro mods.

      --
      Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
    2. Re:A bit close-minded around here by zaffir · · Score: 2

      Minor correction: You had access to 6 of the 7 available SPUs under Linux on the PS3; one SPU was reserved for the hypervisor.

      The GPU is what was locked down, thus the thing everyone wants access to.

      --
      "Upon attaching the waterblock to my penis, I began to notice that I know nothing about computers." -- JRockway
    3. Re:A bit close-minded around here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The race was on too crack the 7 locked down SPUs?

      Ever put your hand on a ps3 when otheros was still there, installed linux and looked into programming?

      There is only one locked spu, 6 of them were freely available and totally easy to use and program for in linux at that time!

      They are quite an interesting concept, and for some stuff really nice - but in the end every intel compatible quad core cpu and higher can do more computation with the sse2 instructions alone.

  54. Relative Longevity by devnull17 · · Score: 1

    PS3's security might be dead, but it was effective for a hell of a lot longer than the "EPIC FAIL" meme was funny.

  55. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The xbox one was released on 15th Nov 2001 and its private keys still havnt been cracked.

  56. George Hotz OtherOS Crack Jan 2010 by DeWinterZero · · Score: 1

    The removal of the OtherOS option was not the reason for the current crack. The OtherOs was removed because George Hotz figured out a crack involving the OtherOS option. He released that crack in Jan 2010 and Sony removed the option in March 2010. The current cracker crew cracked it in 9 months while having 3 years of people exploring lots of dead ends for them to ignore. Yes, a small percentage of people will use the now open PS3 to run homebrew. 99.99% of people will use the crack to run pirate games. Free always trumps $.

    1. Re:George Hotz OtherOS Crack Jan 2010 by marcansoft · · Score: 1

      Geohot developed his exploit because OtherOS wasn't offered for the PS3 Slim, and the PS3 Fat was discontinued. So yes, Sony started this by removing OtherOS on the Slim, and made it ten times worse by forcibly removing this on the Fat.

    2. Re:George Hotz OtherOS Crack Jan 2010 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have it on good authority that "GeoHotz" is actually Julian Assange's pseudonym.
      Let's be clear here : SONY stole the OtherOS feature from us, they didn't "remove" it, or "disable" it, or "update a security flaw". *Theft*.

  57. Re:a loader that has a matching checksum by TooMuchToDo · · Score: 1

    Give me enough EC2 cycles (or donated, via BOINC), and you can find those collisions. It just takes some time.

  58. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1

    3. The SACD player digital audio output. All SACD players must support a DRMed extension - I forget it's name - but it's very primative and trivial to break. So you could just record off that.

    I own a stand-alone SACD player and I have no idea what you are talking about.
    If you are thinking of SP-DIF/toslink - at best that only gives you down-rezzed CD-quality - might just as well rip the CD compatibility layer that most SACD discs have.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  59. Fail by Tripp-phpBB · · Score: 1

    http://twitter.com/fail0verflow Whoever originally wrote something about "overflowing the bootup NOR flash" needs to be shot (after watching the talk and paying attention)

    1. Re:Fail by Fireye · · Score: 1

      Mod parent up. PSGroove's mention of NOR flash and dongleless jailbreaking is bunk, not sure how they got that.

    2. Re:Fail by StillAnonymous · · Score: 1

      Would you prefer they Hacked the Gibson?

  60. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by hedwards · · Score: 1

    That's nearly a year until it was completely haxxored, it had been successfully hacked a couple times over that time period, just not in a way that didn't require a dongle.

  61. Knock on wood, Sony? by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 1

    So, appeasing the users with OtherOS capability got goodwill on Sony's side for 3 years, 4 months. Sony withdraws the feature that appeased hackers and it got defeated in just under 9 months.

    They thought they had security; they just had never been tested. They'd thought that if they were, they would pass. Looked at the tested (XBOX, Wii) and thought, "There but for grace we go"? No, they said, "Screw you," and now see what they just found out.

    That's the impression that I get.

    --
    Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
  62. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by larry+bagina · · Score: 1

    Speaking only for myself, I wouldn't care about dongles or hacking it if they hadn't removed the Other OS option. I'm sure it will primarily be used for warezing, but I don't have the time or inclination for that shit (hell, I have more than enough games I haven't finished yet). Linux support was an important factor in buying my PS3. Had it not been a feature, I probably would have bought an XBox360 -- that's what most of my friends play and the games I do have (Orange Box, Fallout 3, etc) have fewer bugs and better support.

    --
    Do you even lift?

    These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.

  63. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by geekoid · · Score: 1

    Yes, now if they can get the slim to run PS2 games, I will be ecstatic.

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
  64. Stop using the term epic by geekoid · · Score: 1

    you are diluting it's epicness. Pretty soon everything will be epic this, epic that. won't someone think of the epicness~

    --
    The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
  65. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by lehphyro · · Score: 1

    I think they said you couldn't use 3D features from OtherOS, so homebrew wasn't very interesting. My bet is that Sony did a very good job indeed and it was necessary four years to break the PS3 even though it's not completely done yet (you can't run software written on your own Blu-ray).

  66. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by BorgDrone · · Score: 1

    HDMI can transport DSD, some SACD players have an HDMI output.

  67. now what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    so we can make signed yet unauthorized PS3 games? Time to bring back the Legacy of Kain/Soul Reaver story.

  68. Yup sell more PS3. by leuk_he · · Score: 1

    If (big IF) it is Home brewed, there is still one mayor thing. The PS3 Network. Once you open up the console for "homebrew" sony network(for multiplayer games) software might be able to detect that. Sony can ban (or even brick) the hardware form the PS3 network. SO if you want to be on the network AND play "backups"you need 2 PS3 consoles. Sony will be happy to sell you more consoles.

    And do not be confused about this, sony is much more aggressive about cracks than nintendo. They fixed the 2.41 overflow quite fast, and made the fix mandatory in the PS3 Network.

  69. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by sjames · · Score: 1

    This lends credence to the claims that DRM gets cracked to support legitimate rights of the owner. For 3 years they allowed homebrew and Linux and had few problems. As soon as they stole that feature from existing owners the efforts to crack the DRM began in earnest.

  70. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sigh. If only folks would put as much effort into improving the government (etc) as they do wasting time cracking game consoles. Nice to see what really matters. The country is going to hell in a handbasket - but hey, we sure showed Sony. Folks -really- need to check their heads.

  71. Let us install what we want! by Billly+Gates · · Score: 1

    Why should Sony respond to consumers hacking their own systems to run their own software? Why should we take this cr*p anymore?

    I am sorry but we would not tolerate our pc's to be locked in such a way and it is time we as consumers demand everything else to be open. Can you image if Microsoft did this and forcing everyone reading this to run Windows 7 and ban all GNU software? I hate to tell Sony, but they do not own the PS3s after we purchase them. WE DO.

    It is a sad day when you try to jailbreak and root your own system. The arrogance of cell phone makers, Apple, and Sony are astounding to say the least. There should be laws against console makers using such abusive practices. They are monopolistic and anti competivie in nature. We could have 3 or 4 more platforms today if it were not for console makers dumping products below cost and then locking them down forcing royalties on software.

  72. Locked hardware needs to be outlawed. by Kaz+Kylheku · · Score: 1

    Or at least, there must be laws in place which require vendors to make it clear that locked hardware which only accepts signed code is not being sold, but rented.

    I.e. the unit is a rental platform, owned by the vendor, for the purpose of purveying content under the control of that vendor.

    Once you sell (actually sell, not rent) a piece of hardware, you cannot control what software goes on it.

    The locked model is fine, but it's outside of the ethical definition of what it means to sell something. It's a different type of agreement from a sale agreement.

  73. who cares? PS3 is slow by YesIAmAScript · · Score: 1

    It's years old now. You can get a faster netbook for the same price (less if you are careful).

    And it only has 512MB of RAM

    Seriously, The Linux isn't even worth caring about anymore.

    --
    http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
    1. Re:who cares? PS3 is slow by Khyber · · Score: 2

      That 512MB RAM with proper coding acts very much like 2-4GB of DDR2.

      Size isn't all that matters, you know. The bandwidth alone is insane.

      As for outdated? The newest AMD/nVidia GPUs are just now touching the PS3's theoretical performance of 2TFLOPS.

      The hypervisor slowed things down. Without it, and with direct access to the other locked SPE and full RSX access, the system in itself has the capability to perform on par with current PC systems of high-end gaming spec.

      --
      Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
    2. Re:who cares? PS3 is slow by jisatsusha · · Score: 1

      From what I could remember, you could only access 256Mb of RAM from Linux, so it's even worse than that.

  74. This flaw is intentional not EPIC FAIL. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    As an ex first and third party PS3 dev I used this exploit myself for a long time, actual devs who are not dependent on middleware sussed this one out themselves to save money on devkit licenses. Its an obvious kid level exploit left in there by the original developer out of spite to allow first and third party devs to get shit done, not to be unkind but that something to obvious is just now out just goes to show how fucking retarded whats left of the scene is.

    1. Re:This flaw is intentional not EPIC FAIL. by yuhong · · Score: 1

      Which would make it even more epic fail, because it is not the right solution.

  75. joyrider by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    it is an epic fail, just watch the video's of the congress floating around the net (the complete ones)

    for instance the main reason they can sign the code (self) in the same way as sony is doing, is just an utterly stupid programming error. If you look at the vids and see the equasion it has 2 variables and can not be solved, however as they explained in the video sony did not get a random number (which one of the variables is) but used a constant, if it was indeed a random number, they could not have calculated the keys and would not be able to sign the code like sony does. now that it is a constant, it's just a matter of solving an equation with one variable ...

    That for me is trully an epic fail !!!

    also about the dongle stuff, since they now can sing selfs in the same way sony does for games, demo's or whatever code they want to run, you do not need a dongle because the ps3 will think it's a legit self. Meaning they can not see the diffrence between their signed selfs (sony's) or the one the team will make so you can say basically put the selfs on a usb stick and let it run without having problems at all. So the ps3 usb thingies are no longer needed at all

    that's just an effect of their epic fail... There are other parts what make it fail but the key one trully made me laugh

  76. Anybody else agree? by ZDRuX · · Score: 1

    I expect the sales of the PS3 to rise in the coming months.

    --
    The magical number is: 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
  77. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1

    HDMI can transport DSD, some SACD players have an HDMI output.

    Really? I never would have guessed.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  78. Best Part Of The Talk by FrankDrebin · · Score: 1
    What sane folks do:

    int getRandom( void )
    {
    /* return a value from /dev/random */
    }

    What Sony did:

    int getRandom( void )
    {
    return 4; // I rolled a die, it told me 4, so this is random
    }

    --
    Anybody want a peanut?
    1. Re:Best Part Of The Talk by stillnotelf · · Score: 1

      Come on, at least cite your sources. (Unless you're Randall, of course.) http://xkcd.com/221/

    2. Re:Best Part Of The Talk by diamondmagic · · Score: 1

      GP is citing the "Best Part Of The Talk"... everyone knew where the image they showed was from, or at worst, you know everyone else knows and you go and Google it.

  79. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Khyber · · Score: 1

    Just wait for the consumer lawsuits, developers abandoning a platform that is totally insecure, and more.

    Yea, it might kill Sony from ever entering the console scene ever again.

    --
    Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
  80. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by initialE · · Score: 1

    I'm actually surprised the crack was released by a private group, and not the US military, which purchased so many PS3s to run their cluster.

    --
    Starbucks, Harbuckle of Breath.
  81. Xbox Live Indie Games by tepples · · Score: 1

    Before then sony had the best possible security possible for a console, give the modders an outlet

    That might not be perfect. By your measure, before this break, Microsoft had the best security in the form of Xbox Live Indie Games where modders could even sell their games. It was so good that Apple copied the XNA business model ($99/yr to unlock your own hardware, and an exclusive online store to sell your wares for a 30% cut) wholesale for its own App Store. But for some reason, it didn't work as well for Apple as for Microsoft: iPhone SDK and App Store access wasn't enough to keep iOS 2 and later from getting jailbroken.

  82. Luminesweeper by tepples · · Score: 1

    What about PS3 exclusives? Shooter

    There are shooters on every platform since the NES.

    Infamous

    Infamous is on 360 and PC; it's just called Prototype.

    Little Big Planet

    WarioWare DIY for DS is close.

    Luminez

    What is Luminez? Is it anything like Lumines, which I have on my PSP, or Luminesweeper, which I have on my Game Boy Advance?

    Some of these are not just exclusives, they are games that raise the bar, shining examples of the medium taken to the next level.

    Here's your Shinin' example.

    (Obligatory grammer nazi comment:

    As in Kelsey?

    You cannot capitalize the first word of your sentences but you capitalize the "PS" in "PS3"? Really?

    Some languages capitalize proper nouns but not the first word of a sentence. I imagine alen's English is better than your Noeneg or your Toki Pona.

  83. Compare DSi-compatible DS flash cards by tepples · · Score: 1

    Which is trivially broken by the jailbreak simply telling the firmware that it's one of the "genuine" games.

    That's what the DSi-compatible DS flash cards do. The jailbreak would have to include a copy of the executable of one of the genuine games, and a multimegabyte executable is a much larger volume of copying than U.S. courts have allowed so far in cases like Sega v. Accolade or Lexmark v. Static Control Components.

  84. Job almost complete... by Jafafa+Hots · · Score: 2

    Now all they have to do is crack the "having to buy an overpriced piece of proprietary hardware that merely replicates what the PC I own can already do" part of the equation.

    Crack that, and I'll be all set. Otherwise I'm not spending several hundred dollars to buy a box to take up more space simply to play software that my PC would be able to play if it weren't for someone's desire to complete control and every last dollar.

    Change from a hardware/software company to a software company, and I'll use your product.

    --
    This space available.
  85. Sega v. Accolade by tepples · · Score: 2

    Nintendo had a nifty solution for the old Gameboy(/color) - code wasn't signed, but games did need to have [...] the Nintendo logo

    Typography is not copyrightable, and a U.S. trademark cannot be used as an ersatz copyright or patent. See Dastar v. Fox, and especially Sega v. Accolade.

    1. Re:Sega v. Accolade by julesh · · Score: 1

      Typography is not copyrightable, and a U.S. trademark cannot be used as an ersatz copyright or patent. See Dastar v. Fox, and especially Sega v. Accolade.

      Not to mention Lexmark v SCC, holding that even a computer program is not protected by copyright when there is no possible other way of making the system work:

      On the copyright claim, the court noted that unlike patents, copyright protection cannot be applied to ideas, but only to particular, creative expressions of ideas.[16] Distinguishing between an unprotectable idea and a protectable creative expression is difficult in the context of computer programs; even though it may be possible to express the same idea in many different programs, "practical realities"—hardware and software constraints, design standards, industry practices, etc.—may make different expressions impractical.[17] "Lock-out" codes—codes that must be performed in a certain way in order to bypass a security system—are generally considered functional rather than creative, and thus unprotectable

  86. Epic Records by tepples · · Score: 1

    Folks toss about the phrase "Epic Fail" far too loosely.

    Any failure involving Sony is an epic fail because Sony owns Epic Records.

  87. It lasted for years by judeancodersfront · · Score: 1

    not sure how that is an epic fail.

    But I'm sure the 5 guys who use it for homebrew will be happy along with millions of pirates.

  88. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    wow! how can slashdot be stagnant with all of these new Michael KristoFuckheads showing up all the time to keep it fresh?!

    anything clever to say about my mum? Nothing new I'll bet!

    You are a loser^340!

  89. Re:I don't understand... by Zlurg · · Score: 0

    My fucking GAWD...what's NEXT? . THEY HACKED MY CAMCORDER!!!! Now my entire Adult Home Video Center displays images of unshorn maidens above the age of 30. . WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!!!! . "Shit, Martha, the public figured out how to hack our iPod. Every time we make whoopie, we expose ourselves to perverts." "What do we do George?" "Well, Martha, I believbe we BUY OURSELVES ANOTHER MUTHERFUCKING HUNDRED DOLLAR CAMCORDER while Slashdot praises itself for figuring out a way to make ours into a gynecological exam. Happy sixtieth birthday, Martha!" "Oh, George, you are so 733t!"

  90. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Nope... I just have the ONE account... You are the pathetic one MKP^340!

    Go put one of your guns in your mouth and have ur mum help pulling the trigger!

    You're worse than a nigger!

  91. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by MichaelKristopeit343 · · Score: 0
    who is "I"?

    you are NOTHING.

    cower some more, feeb.

  92. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by Kalriath · · Score: 1

    What usually happens is that the pirate user (who are about as technically proficient as a brick wall) simply ride off the back of the more academic users who tend to hack the device for less dubious reasons.

    --
    For a site about things like basic rights, Slashdot users sure do like to censor "dissent".
  93. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Kartu · · Score: 1

    Linux was removed only after glorious mem glitch by Geohot, so it's obvious what's the egg here.

  94. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

    SPDIF can do 96KHz 24-bit... or are SACD players required to cripple their SPDIF output?

    If so, there are probably a few people who have connected their incredibly expensive SACD players to their incredibly expensive speakers using an SPDIF link... and really, they couldn't tell the difference. There's a reason CD was set at 44.1KHz: Any higher and you are beyond the limits of human hearing. I suspect this is a large part of why SACD and DVD-Audio both flopped - unless you are someone of near-superhuman perception and using the very best equipment, it's pointless.

  95. Cool, but I'll wait by geminidomino · · Score: 1

    I'll wait for a release before I decide to reverse my decision not to get a PS3...

  96. Re:Just because SONY stopped to support Linux boot by headbulb · · Score: 1

    Same, It's my box. I will run linux on it.

    I have to wonder if the 7th spu could be unlocked for games and what performance benefits it would have.

  97. Here is what Sony should do by thehunger · · Score: 1
    Sony should announce that they will commit to do the following within 6 months:
    • bring back OtherOS support
    • make a full PS3 Linux distro available (Ubuntu would be preferred over, uh, Yellowdog)
    • provide OtherOS access to hardware previously denied, such as video and graphics accelleration chips. Preferably with some open source hardware accellerated drivers.
    • expand the PS3 firmware's audio and video codec support, and make it become a general media player

    and then ask the hackers not to release the code and tools (and possibly provide additional incentives to sign an NDA).
    I mean, by publicly conceding their accomplishment and and by giving the public back what they took away previously, it becomes harder to argue that the cracking tools need to be released. Of course the whole message needs to be calibrated just so it won't appear as giving in to blackmail. It will give them and game developers more time to reap the cost of developing the PS3 and games.

  98. Impressive feat of engineering / IBM ? by ncostigan · · Score: 1

    First off i'd like to congratulate the fail0verflow team.
    Regardless of the motivation or rational behind the attack, and the perceived errors in the implementation, this is seriously impressive feat of engineering to attack and defeat such a system.

    everyone seems to see it as a fail on behalf of Sony .
    Isn't this IBM's Cell at fault ?

    1. Re:Impressive feat of engineering / IBM ? by Arnold+Reinhold · · Score: 2

      ...

      everyone seems to see it as a fail on behalf of Sony . Isn't this IBM's Cell at fault ?

      The Epic Fail, exposing Sony's private key, had nothing to do with the IBM Cell processor. In fact the flaw was not in any of the PS3 software. It was a mistake in the program used to sign software approved to run on the PS3. That program presumably runs only on some highly guarded server in the bowels of Sony. It could have been fixed by adding one line of code, a call to random number generator to generate a new random value for each signature. Even a crappy random number generator would probably have resisted attack. All that was needed was keeping attackers from finding two different signatures that used the same "random" number. You have to go back to the Venona NSA exploit in the Cold War to find an example of a large organization screwing up what should have been an unbreakable cipher system.

  99. OK, can I have my Linux boot back then? by cheros · · Score: 1

    Sony removing the Linux boot feature via an "upgrade" was like selling a car with allow wheels and breaking into your garage to replacing the wheels with steel rimmed ones - it lead to a ban on Sony kit in many places because it's in principle a breach of trust and results in a device that does not match the description it was sold as.

    Since it's now possible to break the box without, could I have that option back?

    --
    Insert .sig here. Send no money now. Owner may sue, contents will settle. Batteries not included.
  100. Here's a link to the video of the talk from 27C3 by HonestButCurious · · Score: 1
  101. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1

    SPDIF can do 96KHz 24-bit... or are SACD players required to cripple their SPDIF output?

    Yes they are. Also, that's stereo only. My personal interest in SACD was for multichannel.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  102. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by blizz017 · · Score: 1

    I'm surprised you actually expect such an announcement to come from them. Why in the hell would they ever open themselves to a potential lawsuit by announcing it publicly. That's not to say it hasn't been done, particularly since depending on what the PS3 cluster is being used for, the NSA and/or DISA has almost assuredly broken the PS3 down to find out its flaws security wise.

  103. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

    And multichannel I think is dead for a different reason. People don't listen to music like that any more - how many people do you know who actually sit down and just listen to music? It's become something portable, or something that plays in the background while doing more productive things. Multichannel brings no benefits under those circumstances - you're either wearing headphones, or moving around the room.

    Good for movies, though.

  104. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1

    And multichannel I think is dead for a different reason.

    It's not. It's just on bluray now.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  105. uh.. by mr_3ntropy · · Score: 1

    wh000sh

  106. Will I be able to backup/restore if my PS3 breaks? by necronom426 · · Score: 1

    The only thing I'm really interested in is getting round the copy protection on my own files. I'm pretty sure that if my PS3 breaks, I lose some of my saves, as you can only restore to the machine the backup was made on, otherwise it doesn't copy the protected files.

    Copy protection on save files is the reason I'll never buy another Guitar Hero type game until the protection it removed, and also why I've not played World Tour as much as previous games.

    If this hack gives me back control of my own save files, then I'm glad it's happened.

  107. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by SuricouRaven · · Score: 1

    Read the last line. I said multichannel is dead (Or rather, never really lived) for music, but is still a success for movies.

  108. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 1
    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  109. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Michael Kristopeit
    mike@kristopeit.com
    14605 34th Ave N
    Apt 108
    Plymouth, MN 55447
    US
    408-307-9811
    I bet his name is not Michael Kristopeit. Probably his ex-boyfriend that he is getting back at.

  110. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
  111. Not that way by DrYak · · Score: 1

    why the PS3 lasted this far is because OtherOS kept all the competent people happy enough not to try to break into the system

    Really? people haven't been trying to get to accelerated video in linux on the ps3?

    Yes, they tried : But in completely different manners.
    - The main efforts since day 1, were done by using the SPUs of the CELL, instead of the GeForce. I.e.: using a completely different part of the PS3, which is a SIMD exactly like the modern DX10&11 GPUs with unified shaders, but which OtherOS applications are authorised to use.
    - The more recent efforts were trying to get the hyper-visor to authorise access to the GeForce.
    - NONE of these method was about getting unsigned code to run, or finding a way to sign code.

    Or piracy(Piracy was a big BIG motivator on Xbox, 360, PS2 and Wii;

    The main problem that piracy, homebrew, and other hacks faces, is that it requires coordinated efforts to understand a system. (Most of the console hacking is done on wikis, etc.)
    By doing this OtherOS option and providing all the necessary tools, Sony made sure to split the community.
    On one side, the legal, in the open, homebrew community. They got everything they need from Sony (bar access to the GPU) and could do wonderful homebrew stuff on their own (for example, they don't need a way to run unsigned code or sign their code : OtherOS will run homebrew code anyway).
    On the other side, the pirate groups. Which need to tackle a completely different set of problems (running unauthorised code as an example). If they start coordinating to achieve this, they are clearly and demonstrably doing something which is considered illegal in lots of jurisdictions.

    Also, the brains tend to gather around homebrew, whereas piracy attracts mostly leeches. If all the intelligent people are busy running Linux on the PS3, nobody would be free to help the script kiddies getting free copies of PS3 games.

    also Dreamcast but, the DC's security was even bigger epic fail than Sony's

    The DC was a completely different beast. It didn't really feature a protection system on purpose. The console was *designed* to be able to boot from plain CD media. This was designed to enable demo CD, karaoke CD, extra bonus material on audio CD, etc.
    Incidentally, this also meant that it was possible for home brewer to burn their own CD-R and run home made software without any major problem.

    The only form of game-copy protection was the medium itself : GD-ROM.
    - They were non standard, so SEGA & NEC hoped that nobody would be able to read them. But people ended up with several solutions, the most popular being using a bootdisk (fully supported by the CD-R method) and copying the data over serial or network.
    - They were huge, so they would be hard to copy. But peer-to-peer networks slowly expanded to the point of being able to carry payload with sizes up to a couple of gigabytes.
    - They were huge, so it won't be possible to fit a games on a normal CD-R. But clever re-compression trick enabled exactly this (ranging from simply removing or downgrading intro movies, all the way up to using a sophisticated on-the-fly decompression system similar to what Linux LiveCD do).

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  112. Re:Epic Fail# 340??? WTF? by MichaelKristopeit355 · · Score: 1
    a shame you have no such family, nor any identity whatsoever.

    cower some more, feeb.

    you're completely pathetic.

  113. pwufessuh haiwypheet BLOWN AWAY 5x? LOL! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    http://mobile.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1930156&cid=34719276

    http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1916240&cid=34612834

    http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1916240&cid=34647708

    http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1922942&cid=34665368

    http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1924664&cid=34669668

    ROTFLMAO! I wouldn't listen to "professor hairyfeet" guys, he's only an ITT Tech student.

  114. See "pwuffesuh haiwypheet" BLOWN AWAY 5x! LOL! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    http://mobile.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1930156&cid=34719276

    http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1916240&cid=34612834

    http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1916240&cid=34647708

    http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1922942&cid=34665368

    http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1924664&cid=34669668

    ROTFLMAO!

    I seriously wouldn't listen to "pwuffesuh haiwypheet" people!

    (He's only an ITT Tech student)

  115. Linux on PS3? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Finally possible to run linux kernel on PS3 and calculations using the cell processor?

    Anon Finnish Computer Person

  116. I'm just going to put this here... by EkriirkE · · Score: 1

    erk: C0 CE FE 84 C2 27 F7 5B D0 7A 7E B8 46 50 9F 93 B2 38 E7 70 DA CB 9F F4 A3 88 F8 12 48 2B E2 1B
    riv: 47 EE 74 54 E4 77 4C C9 B8 96 0C 7B 59 F4 C1 4D
    pub: C2 D4 AA F3 19 35 50 19 AF 99 D4 4E 2B 58 CA 29 25 2C 89 12 3D 11 D6 21 8F 40 B1 38 CA B2 9B 71 01 F3 AE B7 2A 97 50 19
      R: 80 6E 07 8F A1 52 97 90 CE 1A AE 02 BA DD 6F AA A6 AF 74 17
      n: E1 3A 7E BC 3A CC EB 1C B5 6C C8 60 FC AB DB 6A 04 8C 55 E1
      K: BA 90 55 91 68 61 B9 77 ED CB ED 92 00 50 92 F6 6C 7A 3D 8D
    Da: C5 B2 BF A1 A4 13 DD 16 F2 6D 31 C0 F2 ED 47 20 DC FB 06 70
    (geohot.com)

    --
    from 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
    to 45 2F 6E 40 3C DF 10 71 4E 41 DF AA 25 7D 31 3F
  117. Re:Epic Fail? Hardly. by Lanteran · · Score: 1

    Except to gain access to the GPU....

    --
    "People don't want to learn linux" hasn't been a valid excuse since '03.
  118. Good for Sony by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm glad they are suing this person. Just because something *can* be done, doesn't mean it *should* be done. The claim that GeoHot "takes a stance" against piracy is lunacy - by finding and publishing those keys, they are advancing piracy and all manner of behavior that is contrary to the legal agreements that one makes when they buy/use a PS3.

    Lets put it this way - I'm sure that GeoHot lives in a house. His house undoubtedly has windows made of glass. Everyone knows that glass is easily broken, so clearly it is OK for us to go break the glass in his windows and steal his belongings, er, I mean use-them-without-his-permission. After all, since it is *possible* to break glass windows, and he knows that it is possible, it must be OK, right?