Google TV Hackers Open a Shell on the Chromecast; More Hacks To Follow

Via Engadget comes the news that Google's latest (and quickly sold-out) toy, the Chromecast, may soon be hacked out of one-trick-pony status; just a few days after it came out, the folks at GTV Hacker have successfully turned their attention to the Chromecast, and managed to exploit the device's bootloader and spawn a root shell. Some interesting findings, as explained in their blog post: "[I]t’s actually a modified Google TV release, but with all of the Bionic / Dalvik stripped out and replaced with a single binary for Chromecast. Since the Marvell DE3005 SOC running this is a single core variant of the 88DE3100, most of the Google TV code was reused. So, although it’s not going to let you install an APK or anything, its origins: the bootloader, kernel, init scripts, binaries, are all from the Google TV. We are not ruling out the ability for this to become a Google TV 'stick.'"

Comments

Any Ideas?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Google's "Chromebooks" have a fairly trivial (and documented/vendor-provided) mechanism for booting whatever you want on them. They default to using the crypto-tastic signed image; but it's not a hack to turn that off.

The phones that they sell directly (at least if you don't count the...um...wonderful people at Motorola) also tend not to be terribly touchy on that score.

Google TV devices, though, and now this 'Chromecast' thing they lock up tight. Are they trying to appease some paranoic video rightsholder? Is there some benefit to Google that I'm not seeing? Why the (comparatively) hands-off treatment of other devices compared to the freaking out about things that connect to TVs by default? It's doubly odd because many contemporary phones and tablets can connect to TVs, though that isn't their primary use case.

Re:Any Ideas?

[Anonymous Coward]

Netflix in particular won't have anything to do with any device that isn't locked down. Although rooted Android devices are a notable exception, apps have recently started attempting to test to see if the device is rooted so they can refuse to run if so. (With varying degrees of success presumably, since if you have root you can control what the app is allowed to see to a certain extent.)

Re:Any Ideas?

[CastrTroy]

It's obviously quite highly subsidized. At $35 for the Chromecast and 3 months of free Netflix (even with an existing account), the cost to existing Netflix subscribers is about $11. They are planning on making money from renting/selling movies on Google Play store, and probably more money through affiliate programs sending new customers to Netflix and other programs that will probably be on there in the future like Hulu and Amazon Prime. If everybody just buys them and installs another OS on them, they won't make much money. With the phones, tablets, and chromebooks, they are selling them above cost price, so they don't have to make up the difference by people renting movies and such.

Re:Any Ideas?

[Anonymous Coward]

Anyone could pickup 50 1.5GHz A9 usb/hdmi sticks with 512MB ram, 4GB flash and wifi for about $28 each from china (that's just from a very quick look for something from a reliable looking supplier). So it's really a question of how much you value the 3 months of netflix how much of a subsidy this thing has (with it's less flash, ports and what I'm guessing is a cheap as possible SoC). Personally I'd say it has no subsidy at all as I'm sure the hardware (including adding all duty/taxes) comes out under $35 to google and probably under $25. Even if google paid netflix half what you imply the normal price is (i.e. $4/month or $12 for the 3 months included) they would probably still not be losing money on it. Of course I really doubt google are paying netflix a cent.

Re:Any Ideas?

[beltsbear]

The Netflix free deal was over two days ago. I ordered one from Google and they explicitly said that there was no free Netflix other then the standard one month offer to new customers.

Re:Any Ideas?

[gl4ss]

Netflix in particular won't have anything to do with any device that isn't locked down. Although rooted Android devices are a notable exception, apps have recently started attempting to test to see if the device is rooted so they can refuse to run if so. (With varying degrees of success presumably, since if you have root you can control what the app is allowed to see to a certain extent.)

yeah that would be a reason, but as you're saying that still doesn't rule out chromeos or android so.. wtf? there's a simpler explanation though. the reason is that they never got the google android tv UI "just right" - so they just went "fuck it" and now it's not a problem that most apps don't run.

of course it sounds like it's very tinkering/enthusiasist unfriendly, but hey, it's fucking TV PEOPLE they hired to do decisions on the tv stuff.

and fyi, thanks to fucking apple all the fucking companies are heading for the same mindset of "if we can't do it supercoolmegaright then don't do it at all and don't let the user to do it all" - hence we have disappearing features and vendors catering only the parts that everyone knows how to use. Imagine photoshop with that attitude, imagine sdk's with that attitude. it's shit I tell you.

Re:Any Ideas?

[iluvcapra]

"if we can't do it supercoolmegaright then don't do it at all and don't let the user to do it all"

Users have a habit of loading up phone banks with the stuff that doesn't work mega-right, even if they had to do some mild circumvention in order to try in the first place.

Google's goal (as with all of its hardware products) is to make something with no manual, no learning curve and no technical support, aside from user-supported forums, so they're going to be parsimonious about what they implement. They want you to buy the box, happily use it (to generate clickstream and view ads), and never mention the box to them again.

Re:Any Ideas?

[iluvcapra]

They are planning on making money from renting/selling movies on Google Play store, and probably more money through affiliate programs sending new customers to Netflix and other programs that will probably be on there in the future like Hulu and Amazon Prime.

I assume there's some value to the kind of user data they'd collect from such a stick as well -- Netflix has made a business out of trying to guess what movies people will like based on their past viewing, and now Google has this stick that knows not just what Netflix movies you watch, but which Youtube, Vimeo and MKVs off your LAN you like to watch. They can also see when you fast-forward and when you don't, just as Netflix can, either by itself or in collaboration with the remote app, which can geolocate and tie the viewing information to any number of other data points. The HDMI can record when your TV is switched on or not (regardless of wether you're watching the stick's output or not), what model TV you're using...

Re:Any Ideas?

[aztracker1]

Google may make a little money off the Youtube ads.. this device, with two predicted extensions, is a *really* natural fit for something I've wanted... I've had many occasions where I've had a youtube clip up on my tablet and wanted to be able to click a button to watch it on the TV. Netflix to a slightly lesser extent, I often pull a video into my queue on my tablet to pull it up on my TV (since searching/navigating on a roku is a bit more cumbersome). This fill that niche for me. I'm thinking that Plex will likely support this within a really short turn around of an SDK from google, and may get me to finally pay for an android version. The only down side is that neither of my TVs apparently provide (enough) power from the HDMI slot, so it needs the power cable. I've been pretty happy with mine so far (it arrived friday afternoon, had to order from best buy, since amazon was sold out).

Re:Any Ideas?

[bloodhawk]

Googles goal has never been to make things better or more accessible, quite often that is a side effect of their actual goal "to make bucket loads of money selling advertising and your personal information".

Re:Just buy an Android 'stick'

[TFlan91]

Devices where users only have to plug in and switch to the related input on their TV will win. Regardless of whatever techies moan and groan about, simplicity and elegance is what sells (did you not pay attention during the initial iPhone craze?)

No one is going to want to buy an empty usb drive, install their own choice of OS, required streaming programs, etc, after-which they then have to CONFIGURE it (I know, scary word).. see where I'm going with this though? No average Joe or Jane is going to do that, they will spend the seemingly cheap $35? (I can't remember the price) for this fancy stick that has the word Google written on it.

Re:Just buy an Android 'stick'

[spire3661]

Its CHEAP and backed by google. you would have more of a point if it werent so insanely cheap. I have lots of ways of getting video to my TVs I have an HDMi distribution panel that reaches every TV in the house, I have 3 win7 MCE DVRs, 3 Apple TVs + a mac mini that can stream anything to them., several Micca players, etc. I like Chromecast because its cheap, easy to use and I can slap one on every Tv for less then a single Apple TV. For the price, it represents a good value.

Chromecast on Linux?

[spivster]

According to Chromecast's official support page, Linux isn't supported: https://support.google.com/chromecast/answer/3209990?hl=en. I'm hearing mixed reports that it works, or doesn't, on various distros. At any rate, Google has done a lousy job of supporting the platform that made them rich (think Picasa for Linux, the non-existent Linux Drive client, etc.). I don't have a Chromecast. For one thing, it doesn't seem to do much more than my Blu-Ray and HDTV can already do. For another, I'm not sure I could even use it with my Linux box. Has anyone been able to use it with Linux?

Why bother?

[nurb432]

Sure, its cool to have a USB sized PC in your pocket, but its not like there are not already 100's of them out there, that are NOT locked down.

Re:Just buy an Android 'stick'

[mattsqz]

i dont think anyone was advocating using an empty usb drive, which is nothing but a storage medium, in place of this. but rather, one of the many quad-core android jellybean hdmi dongles available from china for $30-80 (with varying hardware specs) such as this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jkws05jsAH8

People can't buy what they don't know exists

[tepples]

its not like there are not already 100's of them out there

That depends on whether home users are aware that these "already 100's of them" exist. A lot of them are sold only online, not in brick-and-mortar stores where one is already shopping for other things, and they aren't promoted very well. Google can back the Chromecast with marketing muscle in Latin-alphabet markets that a no-name Chinese company can't really match.

Re:Just buy an Android 'stick'

[spire3661]

ITs not just YouTube. Press Ctrl+o in Chrome and load up any h.264 movie and stream it to Chromecast. Netflix works flawlessly already, more apps will be coming fast. The dongle is not the product, the API that drives it is. There is going ot be a FLOOD of development for this thing. The problem with Apple TV is that it only works with Apple gear and its closed to small developers.. With Chromecast ANY computer running chrome can cast to it.