Will there be any anti-theft protection in Pyra?

[MrConfusion]

If I was a thief I'd probably first clone the data on the device on the off chance there was something valuable in there, like saved passwords or valid session keys. In a space without wireless connectivity, of course.

If I was after stuff like that I would start by ejecting the SD cards and then simply DDing them to my PC - no connectivity worries. Of course I have no idea what the relationship between SD storage and internal flash in the Pyra wil be, but at least in the Pandora your data is hardly too safe to begin with...

That's exactly why my Pandora's readonly flash is kind of an extended diagnostics/booting oriented minilinux and everything that matters is then on those encrypted SD cards.

However, the typical Pandora/Pyra thief will be someone who thought they were snatching up a NintendoDS and I see three scenarios:

1. As soon as you open it and see the keyboard, dumpster it as too hard to sell quietly - most likely!

2. Check on the internet what the darn thing is, reflash, sell or keep

3. Sell on ebay as "I've no clue what this thing is, but is 50 buckaroos too much to ask?"

 

[bzar]

If I was after stuff like that I would start by ejecting the SD cards and then simply DDing them to my PC - no connectivity worries. Of course I have no idea what the relationship between SD storage and internal flash in the Pyra wil be, but at least in the Pandora your data is hardly too safe to begin with...

I was thinking about the internal storage with the cloning. SD cards are of course trivial.

 

[Neelix]

I rather suspect most thieves wouldn't bother to boot it up, they'd just take to to the nearest pawn shop to see how much they could get for it.

-Neelix

 

[Inqui]

And those will test (boot, give power) it before buying it.


Thats the first moment, when a gps status could be send

 

[Grench]

If you were going to do this successfully it would need to be a private key burnt into the ROM on the device tied to a public key for validation on a central repository where the judgment could be made for OK Vs Stolen.

Yes, anyone who can code could get access to view the private key on the device.  But if the central repository is no longer willing to issue a 'certificate' to a device with that key pair - then the device would die.

Of course ALL of the devices would die if the central repository were gone or unavailable.  Think of something like what happened to the video games that required GameSpy to operate.  The central repository went away and the games died or in a few cases were community re-coded to get around it.

So - in general I feel that this is entirely not worth pursuing.  There is some sliver of good intentions, but that comes with a big pile of evil that we simply don't need to deal with.

 

[Kev2442]

Actually, I don't see who would steal that.

Robbers steal things that both have value and would easily be traded.

The first one is true, the second... not at all.

Most of the Pyra buyers would be on this forum, and if one's get stolen and available for purchase, it would probably be in the trading area or on eBay. The stolen unit would be quickly found.

Besides, it's a geeky, tech-savvy unit. The potential robbers surely wouldn't even know how to use it.

Plus, it ain't expensive-looking, so they may not want to rob it as they wouldn't see its value.

Let's face it, it ain't a Galaxy S6. It is neither mass-produced (easily found) nor publicly-wanted (easily traded). It's not worth taking the risk, so why steal it in the first place ?

 

[dimag0g]

However, the typical Pandora/Pyra thief will be someone who thought they were snatching up a NintendoDS and I see three scenarios:
1. As soon as you open it and see the keyboard, dumpster it as too hard to sell quietly - most likely!

2. Check on the internet what the darn thing is, reflash, sell or keep

3. Sell on ebay as "I've no clue what this thing is, but is 50 buckaroos too much to ask?"

Being unable to reflash the Pyra will reduce this to alternatives 1 and 3 (1 being most likely). So yeah, it's more to annoy the thiefs than to protect legit users.

I rather suspect most thieves wouldn't bother to boot it up, they'd just take to to the nearest pawn shop to see how much they could get for it.

And the reflash protection will reduce that amount to near zero.

If you were going to do this successfully it would need to be a private key burnt into the ROM on the device tied to a public key for validation on a central repository where the judgment could be made for OK Vs Stolen.

I'm not sure how to make myself clear. There is no need for central repository in order to protect the key, only a small controller with internal flash. Simply put, if you break off / burn off the chip read pin, reading becomes prohibitively hard. Google for "security fuse" or "lock bit" to see what I'm talking about.

 

[Grench]

If you were going to do this successfully it would need to be a private key burnt into the ROM on the device tied to a public key for validation on a central repository where the judgment could be made for OK Vs Stolen.

I'm not sure how to make myself clear. There is no need for central repository in order to protect the key, only a small controller with internal flash. Simply put, if you break off / burn off the chip read pin, reading becomes prohibitively hard. Google for "security fuse" or "lock bit" to see what I'm talking about.

Then exactly how do you plan on this system differentiating between stolen and non-stolen units?

 

[TrashyMG]

Protection or not, the end result is still a stolen Pyra and one sad user.

 

[dimag0g]

If you were going to do this successfully it would need to be a private key burnt into the ROM on the device tied to a public key for validation on a central repository where the judgment could be made for OK Vs Stolen.

I'm not sure how to make myself clear. There is no need for central repository in order to protect the key, only a small controller with internal flash. Simply put, if you break off / burn off the chip read pin, reading becomes prohibitively hard. Google for "security fuse" or "lock bit" to see what I'm talking about.

Then exactly how do you plan on this system differentiating between stolen and non-stolen units?

There is no need to differentiate units. A stolen unit works normally and boots the OS (which in turn can ask for a password, but that's another story). Only when someone tries to reflash, the bootloader would check if the key on the SD card matches the key in the internal memory. The internal memory is programmed during production and then the security fuse is blown, so it cannot be read or written anymore.

There is no cryptography involved in this, so the key can indeed be read by opening up the chip. Which is absolutely useless if you plan to use or sell the unit. You can also replace the chip and flash a new key in it, again, too much trouble for a thief.

Anyway, ED seems to say that no such hardware is in place, so the topic can be closed for good.

 

[WizardStan]

So what happens if, 15 years from now, I pull out my Pyra for some nostalgia and realize the OS is borked, the SD card corrupted, and ED's server is a distant memory? My unbrickable computer is a brick.

 

[matzesu]

I tock a Apple Sticker on my Pandora, now it looks like something, nobody wants..


Anyway: most thiefes dosnt know the Pandora/Pyra so they sems like a DS Konsole to then rather than an Expensive Exclusive Mini Linux Gaming PC which is more exlusive in quantity than a bugatty vynron...


A Iphone is something the Peaple know, but something whitout a big apple icon, whit a keyboard instead of a Touchscreen, isnt that hip and trendy unless you knew what it realy is..


If you trust the guy, you show the Pyra, and you know he wouldnt buglar you, then spread the word of the Pyra, but otherwise , say its an inexpensive old nintendo DS or put in in your poket, and run !!!

 

[dimag0g]

So what happens if, 15 years from now, I pull out my Pyra for some nostalgia and realize the OS is borked, the SD card corrupted, and ED's server is a distant memory? My unbrickable computer is a brick.

Quite the same thing will happen with my personal data if I forget the password for my HDD. Or if I lose my exagear activation key. Any kind of protection creates yet another point of failure.

By the way, what is the MTBF of an OMAP chip? In 15 years there's a good chance your Pyra will be a brick anyway.

 

[Kev2442]

Apple has a kinda-crappy-but-still-of-use system for stolen phones (never had an iPhone, so that's what I heard) :

- Send an SMS to the stolen phone.

or

- Get the phone's location, but lock the phone.

If we could make use of the optional GSM module, we could make a site dedicated to that purpose, like stolenunit.openpandora.org.

Enter your username/Pyra ID number/phone number, and get your unit's location and remote access (SSH ?). As long as you've activated it in your Pyra of course.

If the option is burried in menus, yet easily found in your documentation (so that it's unlikely you don't acknowledge it), you should have enough time to do it before the robbers supposedly finds the option and disables it.

 

[dimag0g]

Apple has a kinda-crappy-but-still-of-use system for stolen phones (never had an iPhone, so that's what I heard) :

- Send an SMS to the stolen phone.

or

- Get the phone's location, but lock the phone.

If we could make use of the optional GSM module, we could make a site dedicated to that purpose, like stolenunit.openpandora.org.

Enter your username/Pyra ID number/phone number, and get your unit's location and remote access (SSH ?). As long as you've activated it in your Pyra of course.

If the option is burried in menus, yet easily found in your documentation (so that it's unlikely you don't acknowledge it), you should have enough time to do it before the robbers supposedly finds the option and disables it.

I believe the part of iPhone anti-thieft scheme that really works is:

a) you cannot use a stolen phone (it will be locked as soon as it connects to the network)

b-) when (a) becomes common knowledge, thieves lose motivation to steal iPhones

While (a) could theoretically be implemented in Pyra (not with the current hardware), (b-) will be practically impossible to achieve.

GPS tracking is arguably a less attractive feature. Besides, do we have a GPS to begin with?

 

[levi]

Yes, anyone who can code could get access to view the private key on the device.  But if the central repository is no longer willing to issue a 'certificate' to a device with that key pair - then the device would die.

Say the secret message is encrypted using the public RSA key. Anyone with a legitimate Pyra can decrypt this using their private key and see what the special message is.

With that publicly known, and the codec, anyone can create their own encrypted message using their own private key. You could make it a secret what the codec used is, strip all the headers from the keys and message, and moderators delete people discussing how it works, but I think you'd risk losing a lot of customers with that sort of policy personally.

I'm just discussing this now out of personal interest, for what it's worth, if it's clear nothing like this is going to happen. I'm still interested if there is a way exists to do it that doesn't rely on keeping secrets.

 

[missholloway]

Yes, anyone who can code could get access to view the private key on the device. But if the central repository is no longer willing to issue a 'certificate' to a device with that key pair - then the device would die.

Say the secret message is encrypted using the public RSA key. Anyone with a legitimate Pyra can decrypt this using their private key and see what the special message is.

With that publicly known, and the codec, anyone can create their own encrypted message using their own private key. You could make it a secret what the codec used is, strip all the headers from the keys and message, and moderators delete people discussing how it works, but I think you'd risk losing a lot of customers with that sort of policy personally.


I'm just discussing this now out of personal interest, for what it's worth, if it's clear nothing like this is going to happen. I'm still interested if there is a way exists to do it that doesn't rely on keeping secrets.

My favorite part was the talking about not keeping secrets love it too cute all jokes aside seriously I was put in a situation of going through seven years of my life of having someone I really care about keeping secrets and using scripted messages I gave him my all and I still do don't ask me why I haven't figured that out yet but more people need to think like you and own up to what they write


Sent from my LGMS395 using Tapatalk

 

[levi]

Hah, I'm not really in a position to lecture on keeping secrets in relationships, but thankfully in computer crypto secrets are easier to grok

 

[WizardStan]

Quite the same thing will happen with my personal data if I forget the password for my HDD. Or if I lose my exagear activation key. Any kind of protection creates yet another point of failure.

The hard drive password is your choice, and Exagear is intentionally closed source with no promise about accessibility in the future. In both cases it's totally irrelevant to the argument anyway: for the hard drive you're making a concious choice to lock it down, and even if you do lose the password you can always format it and continue using it, backing up the encrypted data in case you ever remember the password; Exagears is closed source, a completely different paradigm from the Pandora/Pyra.In both cases losing the password would be your own fault anyway, not the same situation at all.

By the way, what is the MTBF of an OMAP chip? In 15 years there's a good chance your Pyra will be a brick anyway.

The OMAP3 was estimated at 20 years. Of constant use at stock voltage. There's no reason to suspect it won't still work just fine in 2030, and the Pyra should be about the same. Also irrelevant anyway, the time frame was just an example: whether it's 15 years or 6 months from purchase, if the hardware still works and I need to reflash it there should be nothing beyond my control preventing that from happening.
The point is that you're petitioning to remove a major selling point of the Pandora from its successor. EvilDragon is wrong, what you want can be done by modifying the hardware and the x-loader, but even if the whole "cannot flash without the special code" deal was entirely optional, modifying the hardware to allow it would render the Pyra brickable.

It isn't going to happen. Instead of going back and forth about whether this would even in principle be a good idea or not (it's not, it won't deter theft nor will it help get the Pyra back into your hands) you should redirect your efforts into something that would actually help: instead of merely trying to punish the person who stole from you (and consequently punishing valid users as well) try to come up with a way of making it either less desirable to be stolen or more likely to get returned to you when it is. There's already been several good suggestions, work with them.

 

[Urben]

The whole locked-when-stealing thing doesnt work. A potential thief will very unlikely know what the Pandora is which means he will not know about this lock. We had to put a thief warning on the Pyra like the sticker on cars with the blinking red led.

My idea is that the Pyra is so unknown the thief has to consider if the attempt and its risks is worth the profit. But sure he can guess its 50$ upwards.