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DJI Spark Owners Must Update Firmware By September, Or Their Machines Will Be Bricked (suasnews.com)
garymortimer shares a report from sUAS News: News has arrived of a mandatory firmware update from DJI. Owners of DJI's latest and smallest quadcopter must update their firmware by September the 1st or their machines will automatically ground themselves. The Firmware update apparently is to stop in flight shutdowns that have been occurring. So no bad thing to fix, a safety issue. Perhaps questionable is DJI's ability to brick other peoples property if required. The "Kill Switch" option is already causing consternation in user groups.
They're just begging to get hacked and have their firmware code leaked.
To ensure your firmware can't be updated without your explicit permission. See also, Win 10.
Good reason to kill that contract.
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Anyone know how the kill is implemented? Was the original firmware set with an expiration date, in anticipation of it receiving an exciting and mandatory upgrade; so the deadline was baked in from day one? Did some earlier, smaller, update quietly add this 'feature' to be announced at a later time? Is there no change whatsoever in the drone's behavior; but some companion app does a version check before it issues any flight commands; and will be updated to refuse to talk to the older version?
Regardless of implementation, this is a fine testament to the advantages of products that spend their entire lives phoning home to the vendor; but some implementations are even worse than others.
Where are the FOSS firmwares for these things, from the likes of which routers have benefited for many years?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
Personally I have never been into ANYTHING that can connect to a cell phone in this manor for a lot of reasons.. But the very fact that the maker of your product can now KILL IT via remote software? How is this NOT a major strike against this company? I mean, of all the ways you could have done this you just flat out remote kill it?
Well I tell you what DJI. You just earned yourself a permanent 'no sale' from me on any product you make. But hey, to be honest you got a hard no sale on the drone from the get go. Now you've killed all potential trust I can have in your company.
Government mandated "kill" switch to remotely ground them? Government mandated "kill" switch if they fly too high/too close where they aren't? Nice...you WILL install this update, or we'll BRICK your device. Sorry, I would never buy a product, that they say, you install this update, or we'll destroy property that you purchased.
And not much of anything else :-(
Makes me glad I build my own... Hobbyking FTFW!
I've pretty much had it with DJI and their anus sniffing techniques. The Mavic is my last DJI product. After that it's Fuck DJI and Fuck Apple forever!
that you don't really own it. . . . it's more of a subscription plan type thing :D
They allow you to play with their shiny new toy ( for a fee of course ) but you'll play with it as you're told. If you don't, we'll take it away.
And - there - is - nothing - you - can - do - about - it ( except not buy the damn thing in the first place )
I just love that feeling. . . . don't you ?
( It's like Microsoft. . . . or Adobe. . . or Autodesk . . . or Cable TV . . . or . . . damn this is pretty common these days huh ? )
- Come to think of it, do we really own anything anymore ? -
The sooner folks realize this, the faster DJI will cease to be anything meaningful in the world of quad-rotor aircraft.
This realization will be the proverbial snowball getting kicked off the mountaintop.
Wave goodbye to DJI -waves-
If you want to actually own one you'll have to build it. DJI just sells you the right to fly it but it's not really yours.
...country. C'mon! What did you expect?!? Ever since we (America) gave all of our manufacturing (and engineering, design, etc.) to Communist China, we've been transferring our Sovereignty to them. And I include Apple, etc. in that category axs they caved so easily in their "Privacy" concerns in exchange for Chinese $$$.
So it won't fly if you don't upgrade the firmware. That isn't the same as "bricked."
Bricked is when it won't do anything. As in, it's a brick. Won't boot / communicate / etc... Usually recovering something that's bricked involves re-flashing firmware offline somehow, or running some sort of emergency recovery utility and spoon-feeding it a bootloader over USB/serial/I2C/whatever.
DJI set up the app so it won't let the drone take off.
It's as if there's one person who writes how characters talk about computers in most TV shows, and that person wrote this article.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
Imagine you had bought a full-fledged aircraft. If the manufacturer finds a dangerous flaw, the FAA can ground the entire fleet; no recourse. I am not pleased with society's over-reaction to drones (getting hard to find places to fly them), but I do believe in making them safer (and limiting the ability of idiots to give drones an even worse reputation).
As for the "bricking" headline, I suggest the original poster stop hyperventilating. Requiring you to update the firmware before flying again is nothing at all like bricking your device. Get a grip!
Right back atcha.
Does it get bricked remotely, or is there an expiry date built into the existing firmware? I'm pretty darn sure that if it's the former, but the only way I can see that being enforceable is if they also required the 'copter to have an internet connection either before or during each flight.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Why, please tell me, would I want to buy something where the maker and not me gets to decide what lifespan the product gets to have? We're back at the garage openers that are under 100% control of the company making them, why the hell would I willingly hand over control over my product to the maker? At the very least I'd want the option to wipe their software and install my own.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
When I bought my drone I looked into various manufacturers and types including DJI and saw that buying a DJI was a recipe for disaster. You don't want to become slaved to the manufacturer with forced updates and requiring Internet connection and other silly stuff. This can seriously hinder your usage of the drone just when you need to use it, not to mention what will happen when the company goes broke. Bye bye drone.
So I bought a chinese drone instead with no "no-fly zone" garbage and no forced updates of any kind. It uses generic lipo batteries and I can use whatever camera I want. I just turn it on and it flyes with no problems.
The hacking community have been pulling apart DJI drone software and firmwares for a while now. And the more they learn, the worst it gets. For example both the iOS and Android versions of the DJI GO 4 app have built in hot patch functionality (Tencent Tinker / JSPatch), then enables DJI to make unrestricted app modifications outside of the users control. This is in direct violation of app developer policies on both platforms. And after the community found out, DJI has been scrambling hard to avoid getting their apps banned. It is also speculated this is one of the primary reasons why DJI drones recently was banned from US military usage.
While my first response to this situation was outrage, sober second thoughts have prevailed, and I now see some sense in DJI's actions. They have a moral obligation to the public, (and a fiduciary obligation to their shareholders - I don't give a shit about that, but some people do), to ensure that the products they sell remain both safe, and compliant with changing regulations. The problem here is not in their ability to enforce updates that correct safety shortcomings and allow for changes in legal requirements, no-fly zones, etc. The problem is the lack of a regulatory framework with teeth - one that would ensure continued functioning of the products if the company folds, and would also forbid them from charging for post-purchase updates, stop them from force-updating random shit in order to siphon more money, data, or whatever out of the buyer, etc.. (We'll likely never see that regulation, because the gubmint pays allegiance to the corps, not the voters - but that's a whole 'nother topic).
In the old days of amateur radio, when home-built transmitters could screw up TV reception, aircraft communication, and emergency services more easily than they can now, the technical barriers to entry were such that by the time most people knew enough to build such a transmitter, they also knew enough to build it correctly and use it responsibly. Today, in the case of drones, any fuckwit can buy one and wreak all kinds of havoc. In short, irresponsible people who would use drones unsafely or illegally, are the reason we can't have drones that we truly own. Unless we make 'em ourselves... ;)
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
You say that like it's a bad thing. See also: Rule 34.
But that aside, it's easy to understand a manufacturer erring on the side of caution in today's litigious world. One kid in the US loses an eye and it's not the drone operator that'll get sued for failing to update their firmware, it's the large global company with lots of resources.
At an individual level the risk is miniscule. For DJI the risk needs to be assessed at a corporate level, in terms of financial exposure, any criminal liability, the PR aspects and any potential barriers to future operation in a given jurisdiction.
It's why they have the no-fly zone support in the first place..
See also: Rule 34.
Note to self: DONT use Google to confirm the obvious.
Must clear cache. Delete cookies. Replace PC.
Some of the DJI hardware is frankly lovely. It comes with excellent software too.
You may want more manual control and some people are writing software that allows greater autonomy but there aren't many options that include the usability and capability of the DJI drones, let alone at that price point.
Just because something is accessible to beginners doesn't preclude its use by professionals.
Anybody tried to use the app store on their wii lately?
When Netflix updates there codex Netflix will no longer work because there is no way to update on the wii.
Sure purchased games still work but the device has certainly lost some of it's functionality, including the ability of most games to network. That is a company that didn't even go out of business. Just stopped supporting their own product.
âoeTolerance applies only to persons, but never to truth. Intolerance applies only to truth, but never to persons.
Your drone should be able to fall out of the sky and kill anyone that it wants whenever it wants because you want the choice to be able to fix it at your convenience.
Fuck right on off.
How are they able to self-brick but not self-update?
On the one hand, we have people who routinely don't do updates because they can't be bothered, or don't feel they bear any responsibility to the upkeep of their equipment.
On the other hand, you have companies like Microsoft who have done an excellent job of fucking up so many updates so badly, that people are now *afraid* to update for fear of having their machines get hosed.
So we're stuck taking everything at a case-by-case basis. If DJI doesn't have a history of botching their updates, there is no excuse for someone to update their copters. If the update fixes a catastrophic problem that is a possible safety issue, then I see no reason why the update *shouldn't* be forced, and that the copter should ground itself if not updated. This seems entirely sensible to me. Why should some bystander have to risk being injured cause some asshole doesn't feel enough responsibility to perform basic maintenance?
The "Kill Switch" option is already causing consternation in user groups.
Who could have expected that people would be upset that it turns out they don't own a device that they thought they owned?
You're right, it's better for DJI to refuse to include these features so agencies like the FAA can just ban amateur quadcopter pilots outright.