Calculator hackers crack OS signing key, opening a closed platform

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Aug 17, 2009, 8:24 AM UTC

dan_the_welder wrote: post #11

jacobolus wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (The 83 is mandatory in U.S. education and sometimes distributed for free, all American High Schoolers use it, and did so for at least the last 10 years.) It's a bit off the subject, but this has always struck me as a terrible scam. For the material it is used for (introductory calculus) and the way it is used, one of these TI calculators hurts student learning and understanding more than it helps, and there is no…

And now a cracked OS allows cheating since they have an approved 'test mode" to prevent access to stored files. http://education.ti.com/educationportal/sites/US/homePage/ns... So blinking the led without any access blocking will be an early task for the subversive TI hacker.

Post by jrockway » Mon, Aug 17, 2009, 8:50 AM UTC

jacobolus wrote: post #7

mahmud wrote: post #2

A man has just become immortal. TI scene will never be the same again; the TI-83 calculator turns to an open platform today (The 83 is mandatory in U.S. education and sometimes distributed for free, all American High Schoolers use it, and did so for at least the last 10 years.) Bonafide 3rd party OSes can be loaded on it now, no more shells. Help crack the rest of the keys (Win32 and Linux clients; linux version requ…

> (The 83 is mandatory in U.S. education and sometimes distributed for free, all American High Schoolers use it, and did so for at least the last 10 years.) It's a bit off the subject, but this has always struck me as a terrible scam. For the material it is used for (introductory calculus) and the way it is used, one of these TI calculators hurts student learning and understanding more than it helps, and there is no…

Post by mahmud » Mon, Aug 17, 2009, 9:24 AM UTC

mtrimpe wrote: post #10

Oh those good memories of the TI-83, my first and only foray into the world of assembler programming, trying to cram a complex algorithm in 6 registers, the good times!

Post by rflrob » Mon, Aug 17, 2009, 9:46 AM UTC

jacobolus wrote: post #7

mahmud wrote: post #2

A man has just become immortal. TI scene will never be the same again; the TI-83 calculator turns to an open platform today (The 83 is mandatory in U.S. education and sometimes distributed for free, all American High Schoolers use it, and did so for at least the last 10 years.) Bonafide 3rd party OSes can be loaded on it now, no more shells. Help crack the rest of the keys (Win32 and Linux clients; linux version requ…

> (The 83 is mandatory in U.S. education and sometimes distributed for free, all American High Schoolers use it, and did so for at least the last 10 years.) It's a bit off the subject, but this has always struck me as a terrible scam. For the material it is used for (introductory calculus) and the way it is used, one of these TI calculators hurts student learning and understanding more than it helps, and there is no…

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Aug 17, 2009, 10:07 AM UTC

ephermata wrote: post #19

jacquesm wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not trying to piss of anybody (wow, you're touchy). I just think that you're putting the bar for immortality a little low here. Brute forcing a key is not exactly rocket science. Congratulations though :) edit: smiley duly noted. edit2: now if only the downmods would grow a sense of humor too :)

Running the general number field sieve is not exactly brute forcing. IMHO, understanding and tuning an algorithm as complicated as the GNFS is pretty close to rocket science. Not as close as actually inventing it or writing the code yourself, but this is more than just writing a short program to try all combinations.