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Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

arstechnica.com

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Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#11

Post by iSnow »

djhworld wrote: post #6

The home assistant blog post goes into this issue as well https://www.home-assistant.io/blog/2023/11/06/removal-of-myq... If anything it highlights the point that having a cloud service to handle your smart home device is a recipe for shenanigans like this. Stick with ZigBee/Matter devices, and if the device is WiFi try and at least make sure it works over the local network.

Buying smart home devices with cloud integration also just means that at some point, the manufacturer will declare it obsolete and will rip out support to force you to re-buy every 5-7y.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#12

Post by emmet »

Haven't fully wrapped my head around Matter yet, but does that standard solve the problem? It's my understanding that there's no need for specific apps when anything can connect to a Matter device. Or can manufacturers still pull a fast one like this and kill Matter compatibility with an OTA firmware update? Not sure why they'd want to, but I wouldn't put it past them.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#13

Post by SargeDebian »

emmet wrote: post #12

Haven't fully wrapped my head around Matter yet, but does that standard solve the problem? It's my understanding that there's no need for specific apps when anything can connect to a Matter device. Or can manufacturers still pull a fast one like this and kill Matter compatibility with an OTA firmware update? Not sure why they'd want to, but I wouldn't put it past them.

If you intentionally remove functionality, why would any functionality be safe from that?

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#14

Post by emmet »

SargeDebian wrote: post #13
emmet wrote: post #12

Haven't fully wrapped my head around Matter yet, but does that standard solve the problem? It's my understanding that there's no need for specific apps when anything can connect to a Matter device. Or can manufacturers still pull a fast one like this and kill Matter compatibility with an OTA firmware update? Not sure why they'd want to, but I wouldn't put it past them.

If you intentionally remove functionality, why would any functionality be safe from that?

Sorry, my question is if Matter is baked in or can be stripped. Not sure if they can remotely kill the Thread radio or not.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#15

Post by mavamaarten »

"unauthorized users". They are authorized if they are trying to control their own garage door.

The company I work for has a policy where we don't block third party clients, as long as they use a uniquely identifiable user agent and API key that we provide to them. That way we can easily monitor if they're calling endpoints excessively and make sure that our alarms don't go off when they did something wrong, but still offer power users flexibility. Power users are the users you can get good feedback from, and they spread the word more than a regular user would. If keeping them happy doesn't require active effort, it would be silly to start a cat-and-mouse game just to keep them busy and angry with you.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#16

Post by jstanley »

fidotron wrote: post #4

The brazenness of Chamberlain here is incredible given how problematic a garage door that opens by itself could prove to be, and they could have chosen to go on about that, but instead they just go for the full crazy angle. Ultimately this whole using-a-product-means-using-the-user-experience-dictated-by-the-product-seller, be it SaaS, mobile app or hardware is a total dead end. The part Richard Stallman missed when…

I don't think Richard Stallman missed that point at all.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#18

Post by Someone1234 »

ss64 wrote: post #17

I just know the real reason for this will be some undisclosed security bug.

Since Chamberlain admits it is about money (i.e. their authorized 3rd party integrations pay them, and Home Assistant does not) do we really need to look further? Plus the official app is full of ads.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#19

Post by rft »

gpderetta wrote: post #8
jve wrote: post #5

> Ah, now it makes sense. Your garage door opener app isn't here only to open your garage door; it's here to display ads and upsell you on services. > "I clicked door open/close event and it popped up the video storage subscription dialog to ask me to subscribe," I mean... who, while waiting to get into or out of garage, sitting in the car or soon to be sitting in the car clicks on ads to buy something? Wouldn't conv…

The add-free version will be soon be available for 9.99€ per Month.

In a year you need to subscribe to the 14.99€/month tier to remove all ads, the 9.99€ tier will show you "a low number of highly relevant ads to provide you with information on how to more optimally use our^Wyour device and support our continued development of these industry leading services".

On a less snarky note, I hate how this has become so common that for some reason this is not "sue the company into non-existence" behavior, but we just sigh and either add the company to our shit list or pay the price because we are now locked in.

Re: Chamberlain blocks smart garage door opener from working with smart homes

#20

Post by Someone1234 »

bell-cot wrote: post #2

> ... Do not buy products or services from companies that treat their customers this way. ... True. But when you have good-enough alternatives, simply do not buy any "smart home", IoT, or connected devices at all. Unless [complex open-source conditions here], buying from NiceCorp does nothing to stop them from being taken over by NastyCorp, with the obvious malicious intent.

This is a strange point to make.

- People complaining that their IoT device doesn't integrate with Home Assistant anymore...

- Solution (?): Stop buying IoT devices so that nothing integrates with Home Assistant.

That's kind of the exact opposite of people's goals in this situation.

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