In one of the coolest and more outrageous repair stories in quite some time, three white-hat hackers helped a regional rail company in southwest Poland unbrick a train that had been artificially rendered inoperable by the train’s manufacturer after an independent maintenance company worked on it. The train’s manufacturer is now threatening to sue the hackers who were hired by the independent repair company to fix it.
After breaking trains simply because an independent repair shop had worked on them, NEWAG is now demanding that trains fixed by hackers be removed from service.
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This story should be on every newspaper front page right below war correspondents.
Yeah, especially in the EU where apparently their laws regarding circumventing DRM might make the people who fixed this the bad guys instead of this comically evil manufacturer who put GPS kill switches on public passenger trains.
right below war correspondents
Eh, they should report war on the same page as the weather if you ask me.
Let us know what country you’re in, so the next time you’re invaded and genocided we’ll remember it’s barely as important as the weather forecast.
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That’s generous but their user history makes it pretty obvious that they’re mad about aid being sent at all when it could go to paying off their student loan debt instead.
as if those are mutually exclusive things to have lol
Why not both?
Ask them, I think it’s stupid as shit to frame them as mutually exclusive choices.
My reading of that was “climate change will kill most of our species in the long term if we don’t take it seriously, so that’s also something very important to track and belongs on the same page as wars.”.
in the sport section
Go Team Go.
Put the election polling there too.
That does make more sense.
Well, climate change is front page news…
“We didn’t add a kill switch to our trains to force the use of our maintenance service, but fuck the hackers that removed the kill switch we didn’t implement, and the trains that were hacked and don’t have the kill switch we didn’t add should be removed from service.”
Dear Reader,
Regarding your recent free and non-profitable un-fucking of our problem, please use the honor system and manually refuck yourself.
Love, Technology Companies.
Someone’s gonna figure out a horror movie for this called The Refucker
Wasn’t free - they were paid to hack it.
But yeah.
Could be free as in freedom, as opposed to free as in beer?
But freedom isn’t free. Costs a buckofive.
You fucking numpty.
“And how dare those hackers go through all the trouble of finding those (literal) GPS coordinates of train maintenance centers not in our system to circumvent us getting more money.”
That’s awesome. Man, fuck that company. Bricking a train? Outrageous.
Poland ought to ban that company from ever working or operating or selling any products inside of its country and any trains made by that company that are not currently owned by Poland should be prevented from traveling on the tracks that cross through Poland.
This is the kind of government intervention I can get behind. This story is so outrageous, it’s hard to believe it’s true.
Maybe make it the entire executive and senior management, rather than the company.
I feel like train operators will have heard of this, and will not be accepting that company’s tenders
Realistically, that would be quite an overreaction and the corporation does have valuable knowledge and skill in creating trains. But how great it would be if this were to cause open source code to be a requirement…
Run by fucking criminals. We should brick them like they’re The Sticky Bandits
Better to brick them like The Cask of Amontillado.
Great idea, Marv.
The person is doing a talk about it in hamburg, germany (37c3) next week. Its on my to watch list because that sounds hella interresting.
Edit : 37c3 list of talks : https://halfnarp.events.ccc.de/#dec115da17562cebafa9ba7a150a4fc607c25c880c03593dcc8da6087c9441a4
That actually does sound hella interesting. I’m saving your comment to try to remember but actually look it up in about two years when I scroll back though my saved posts.
Went to subscribe to it until I remembered i don’t speak German lol
nearly all talks are either in English or have English translations. not sure if they’re available on YouTube but you should be able to find everything on https://media.ccc.de
Time to learn!
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Consider this a reminder :p
C3 talks are available online for quite some time after the actual event, so you might still be able to watch it then.
Where “quite some time” is “indefinite”. Proper archives go back to 2002, 19c3.
Takes some time for stuff to show up in the archives though as start+end get cut manually, while the congress is running there’s always an archive of raw steam dumps maybe that’s the one you mean.
It’s 37c3, but thx for the hint. The talk is called Breaking “DRM” in Polish trains by Redford, q3k, MrTick
I will try to watch it on stage, unfortunately still no final schedule available
Fixed the edition number. I always forget what number we are at haha. I will not be on site, but i saved it in my planner : https://halfnarp.events.ccc.de/#dec115da17562cebafa9ba7a150a4fc607c25c880c03593dcc8da6087c9441a4
The numbering got a bit messed up as there weren’t chaos covid congresses.
Nowadays satire can never be as good as reality is.
Trump and the whole Brexit circus have set a very high bar, but somehow someone still manages to produce quality comedy.
Steam engine breaks, you can fix it.
Steam engine with digital circuit breaks, you’re a hacker, a pirate. DRM was a mistake.
But how else could companies make more money off of something you already paid for? Will someone think of the shareholders‽
If you’re allowed to do any maintenance you want on the physical components of something you own, then you should be allowed to do any maintenance you want on the software components of something you own.
It’s not hacking (in the sense of “unauthorized intrusion”) if you own it or have authorization to do it from the owner of it.
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Sadly they will probably win this as well. Some claim there could safety concerns and it isn’t certified or could damage their brand… time for people’s manufacturing of products? Hehe
But if the people controlled the means of production… that would be…
I think this one might go well. Company preventing a country’s trains from being serviced by a third party. I expect that train builder has already tanked their business, but it would be an interesting one to be litigated, the sort of case that can get the law changed
I’m not firm in polish law, do they have the same laws as in the USA? Because that’s what you’re comparing right?
As far as I know, there is no such thing as DMCA provisions against working around software protection mechanisms in the EU and in fact at an EU level the direction is to increase ownership rights, not decrease them.
However depending on the contract the train company might not legally own those trains (for example, it’s structured as a Lease), but if the hackers can show proof that the train company authorized them to do those changes it would be a case against the train company, not the hackers.
This is an EU country, not the US.
Things like the DMCA provisions forbidding working around IP protection mechanisms (and software is copyrighted) don’t apply here.
IANAL (so take this it with a pinch), unless the trains are legally theirs rather than the train company’s, it’s not hacking, it’s just “software maintenance” and the only right this company has here is to withdraw product warranties because of “unauthorized changes”.
There might or not be a case against the train company (for example, if the contract forbade this or the train company tried to sell those trains onwards as if they were original) but not against the people who did the software changes on the trains when authorized by the owners of said trains.
I assume EU has safety regulations and if a train suddenly loses its brakes they would be liable wouldn’t they? Now they can say someone has “hacked the train” and they can’t guarantee the brakes will work. I am not sure where the USA argument came from
The responsability of circulating with a vehicle that abides by safety regulations is of the owners, not the makers.
You’ll notice that even in the consumer auto segment (which, since run-of-the-mill consumers are not expected to be “experts”, has lots of of ways to make sure that brand new cars are sold already pre-certified “road-worthy” because normal consumers don’t have the know-how to make sure of it themselves), the actual car owners still have the responsability of having a periodic inspection done to the car and repair those things that stop it from being road-worthy and they cannot circulate with it in a public road if it’s not compliant (at least that is the case in Europe).
Outside the consumer segment, I expect that the rules for trains are pretty similar to those for commercial aviation: the manufacturer has no responsability beyond a contractual one (i.e. the purchasing entity probably demands contractually that the vehicles they get comply with regulations, the parts they buy obbey certain specifications and maintenance done by a manufacturer-certified shop delivers a compliant vehicle) and all the regulatory responsability is in the hands of the owner (more specifically the “operator”, as for example for leased planes the airline doesn’t actually own them but they do operate them hence they’re the ones with regulatory responsabilities).
The USA argument comes from the anti-circunvention legislation for software being part of the DMCA law, said legislation giving rights to the makers of the software to stop changes to it even in devices they do not own. Where such legislation does not apply there is no law forbidding somebody doing whatever changes they want to software as long as they own the device containing said software or have the authorization of the owner of the device whose software they are changing - the only applicable legislation here is Copyright and that only limits the distribution of the software, not the changing of it.
It’s not at all unusual for Americans to argue that people can’t legally circumvent software protections even in devices they own, because that is indeed the case in their country thanks to the DMCA, but expecting that to be the case in Poland doesn’t make sense as the laws there are not at all the same as in the US.
That’s a whole lot of energy spent based on completely incorrect assumptions about me or what I was saying so your argument can work. But sure whatever makes you feel like you are right.
That’s a very weird take.
You don’t know me and went all weirdly personal full of assumptions about me and without making an actual argument.
Whatever is going on there, it’s all in your head.
I wonder if they were taking notes from John Deere and the automotive industry or will it be the reverse here soon?
Just imagine all these vehicles that could be bricked for not going back to the stealerships for outrageous prices on parts and incompetent service.
Also the vehicles that could be disabled for not paying for device protection plan that allows your vehicle to operate safely. It would be a shame if your vehicle stopped working on your way to work or the hospital.
I suspect Tesla, BMW, and John Deere are the closest to this reality.
I sure hope the government doesn’t help with another great cash for clunkers national program to get rid of more cars too old for these measures. Sure is a great way to drive new car sales though…
Oh don’t count GM and a Ford out of it. They’re already kicking android auto and Apple car to the curb so they can control more stuff and get access to more data. The savvier they get the closer that comes to reality.
Of course, by the end of our lives you won’t own a car at all. You’ll subscribe to a car company that will act like a hybrid ride share and rental program. Commutes will be on a rideshare basis and you’ll be able to rent a car for a weekend road trip.
I just heard about GM this morning in my tech news. I didn’t realize that about Ford too.
I’ve drawn a line in the sand with my vehicles at about 2011 for tech. I love tech and I love cars but just not into the current versions of everything being touch screen controls.
Give me knobs for climate controls, gear shifters, and gauges for the rest. They don’t need all of these computer systems that fail or become outdated as soon as they are released like the manufacturer’s nav systems. We also don’t need them to stop working completely because a sensor failed and can only be replaced by the dealer.
My phone in a holder can be the smartest part of the car for me thanks.
I think you can go further. My 2017 A4 is still “normal.”
I’m glad to hear that. Often I’ve driven rental cars and *last time I struggled to find the gear shifter which was replaced by buttons on the dash.
I’ve also seen just a video of a Tesla only new driver struggle to drive a ICE car because it had a gear shifter and didn’t automatically brake. I’m feeling like a dinosaur now…
Stop reading my mind.
You can pry my older cars from my cold, dead, hand.
If the manufacturer can stop your trains, then obviously anyone with the necessary hacking skills can do it too. Certain governments might be very interested in tampering with the logistics of another country.
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SPS became desperate and Googled “Polish hackers” and came across a group called Dragon Sector, a reverse-engineering team made up of white hat hackers.
Hilarious. I hope 404 continues with this level of high quality journalism.
Dragon sector, who they hired, is a security capture the flag team.
Edit: Socials of those who worked on it
https://social.hackerspace.pl/@q3k
https://infosec.exchange/@mrtick
https://infosec.exchange/@redfordTIL that [security CTF](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_the_flag_(cybersecurity\)) is
an exercise in which participants attempt to find text strings, called “flags”, which are secretly hidden in purposefully-vulnerable programs or websites
Never heard of this and I may not be alone in that. Thanks for pointing this out.
I did one before. They are SO MUCH FUN. Now I have too many children.
sob
edit: There are other ways of capturing the flag like having your team name on the home page of a local web server or whatever.
You make it sound like the event ends in an orgy.
The good ones do
The anti-circumvention clause is being abused for some years now, it’s disgusting.
This is the sort of case that can fix it
Is it abuse, or is it working exactly as intended?
They mean it’s abusive in nature I guess
So which anti-circumvention clause do you mean?
Remember, US law doesn’t apply in Europe and as much as I know there is nothing like that in the EU.
This is good. Someone did that for printers too
And American Weight (?) digital scales. The ones that brick themselves after 2,000 uses because how dare you only pay once.
Lol. Always suspected there was a scam there, but every time I bring it up in a conversation - people just call me a conspiracy theorist.
This goes for pretty much everything though. Planned obsolescence is real, but people think it’s just the natural way of things.
is there an article about this? Would love to read about it
There is no article that I could find, so I guess you take my word for it. But I’ll fill you in on why I said it from what I remember. You can make up your mind on this:
I was looking for a digital scale during the pandemic and naturally went on Amazon. I found some within my budget (I live outside the US) but most of them had multiple reviews complaining about a weird error that they couldn’t fix. I did some digging around, yet nobody seemed to know what the error really was that was showing up after some time of prolonged use without signs of wear. Eventually, I got to a thread on some technical forum that said it was a software error that strongly hinted at planned obsolescence after so many uses.
The weird thing is that I can’t find any of the models that had this on Amazon anymore but it doesn’t surprise me after some of the shit I’ve seen on there with people manipulating reviews on other products I’ve bought. So I guess it could go either way for someone review-bombing the product or it being a real issue, but that doesn’t explain the error showing up on other sites. I wish I could remember what the error code was.
If anybody knows anything more about this, I’d love to hear it. It certainly was a strange surprise that ended up costing me a bit more than I was planning to spend. But I guess bullet dodged?
I like how, instead of recognizing that they got caught, now the train manufacturer is claiming this is some kind of dark PR strategy.
If it is, then please show the public that it’s a dark PR strategy by explaining the hidden unlock codes and the DRM code!
I hate this fucking planet.
I think this is pretty cool. Sure, capitalists are gonna capitalist, but here we have subversive moves in a positive direction.
Oh yeah what the people did to get around this is fucking awesome I do love that side of this story don’t get me wrong.
If they required the trains to be serviced by manufacturer they should have written it into a mandatory service contract at time of sales.
If anybody wants to know more, they can watch it here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8NqBXT6Kos
Ah, Louis Rossmann, a real-life superhero. He did some great work in his career.
Why are you referring to him in the past tense? AFAIK he and his cat are still ranting about tech rights on the daily.
Don’t forget his friend Foxy
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