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Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

theregister.com

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Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#81

Post by slimsag »

dastx wrote: post #79
userbinator wrote: post #54

One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

> Firmware updates are good. They [[can]] patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device.

Emphasis mine - updates also remove features and introduce security issues. It's not cut-and-dry "updates are good"

I am pretty sure my Samsung fridge update removed 3 of the limited ~12 or so apps it had in the first place.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#82

Post by glassneedles »

dastx wrote: post #79
userbinator wrote: post #54

One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

I can’t vouch for Samsung but Vizio have said in the past that they make very little profit off their TVs and this is offset by data that is collected from usage.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20190114/08084341384/vizio...

Now I’d imagine that Samsung are making a hefty profit on the 75” 4K all singing sets (and still spying on you) but the cheaper ones seem to be priced so there isn’t much profit.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#83

Post by userbinator »

dastx wrote: post #79
userbinator wrote: post #54

One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously.

The point is that there are no "security issues" in a dumb media player like the DVD player I have. Suppose an "attacker" (and that is stretching the definition a lot...) can create a disc that can overflow a buffer somewhere and crash the player or cause it to do something "interesting", and I have been somehow tricked into attempting to play this disc --- so what? It's not connected to the Internet, the firmware is read-only, there's literally nothing of value to attack. I'll just eject the disc (manually if necessary) and not play it again.

Instead this stupid "update culture" has created horribly buggy software that's barely functional "because we can always change it", and now we somehow need an Internet-connected media player,along with all the downsides --- including security --- that brings, just so they can (try to) silently attempt to fix some bugs that should never have gotten out in the first place? My experience tells me that they will fix one thing and break something else in the process, so there's overall no real improvement.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#84

Post by Wowfunhappy »

dastx wrote: post #79
userbinator wrote: post #54

One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

What security updates would you foresee being necessary for a traditional BluRay player? Perhaps I'm not being creative enough, but I can't think of what a hacker would accomplish.

Other than allowing the player to read pirated BluRays, I guess, but that's not the user's problem.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#85

Post by reaperducer »

Wowfunhappy wrote: post #84
dastx wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

What security updates would you foresee being necessary for a traditional BluRay player? Perhaps I'm not being creative enough, but I can't think of what a hacker would accomplish. Other than allowing the player to read pirated BluRays, I guess, but that's not the user's problem.

Maybe making the player part of a DDOS botnet? That's all I can think of.

The only consumer electronic in my house I allow to talk to the internet is the AppleTV. Nothing else is allowed on the router. Not the TV. Not the disc player. Not the refrigerator. Not even the "smart" thermostat.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#86

Post by Wowfunhappy »

reaperducer wrote: post #85
Wowfunhappy wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What security updates would you foresee being necessary for a traditional BluRay player? Perhaps I'm not being creative enough, but I can't think of what a hacker would accomplish. Other than allowing the player to read pirated BluRays, I guess, but that's not the user's problem.

Maybe making the player part of a DDOS botnet? That's all I can think of. The only consumer electronic in my house I allow to talk to the internet is the AppleTV. Nothing else is allowed on the router. Not the TV. Not the disc player. Not the refrigerator. Not even the "smart" thermostat.

> Maybe making the player part of a DDOS botnet?

This only works if the player is connected to the internet, which shouldn't be necessary to begin with.

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#87

Post by WrtCdEvrydy »

phildenhoff wrote: post #77
gruez wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think that's the only reasonable thing to do. But that'd also mean you need double the flash capacity, which drives up the BOM cost.

Not necessarily. I worked on the team the managed the OS for an embedded hardware project (radio equipment) and our disk was partitioned four ways: 1. current operating system 2. previous operating system (and next, on upgrade) 3. data partition, shared across both current and previous OS 4. factory reset partition That means if we needed to do a factory reset we could just load the firmware archive from the fourth p…

Yeah, but this is 2020... the blu-ray drive needs a copy of React with node_modules sized at 26Gb :P

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#88

Post by zzo38computer »

dastx wrote: post #79
userbinator wrote: post #54

One thing you have to understand is that these internet-connected Blu-ray players in question are programmed to log their activities and send copies of this information to Samsung. In some ways, this is even more disturbing than the bricking. Only corporate greed can create a media player that watches you and needs constant firmware updates. I have a VCR and DVD player which still work, and things like this are the r…

> needs constant firmware updates Firmware updates are good. They can patch security issues and they can improve different aspects of the device. The security being the best plus obviously. Wholeheartedly agree that there is no reason for a company like Samsung to track your every move despite you paying them hundreds for said devive. I'd be very surprised if they don't make a hefty profit from such devices. So why t…

Firmware updates can be good, but only the user with physical access should be able to install a firmware update. An example of how this might be done may be: There is a ROM firmware (always read-only) and EEPROM firmware (read-only except during firmware upgrade operations); the ROM firmware only checks a switch (which is a physical hardware switch can be set only by the user) and if set, will load the data on the DVD (or CD or CompactFlash or whatever other media it uses, but specifically not internet) as a firmware upgrade into the EEPROM; if the switch is not set, then the EEPROM is read-only and nothing can upgrade it, not even a custom firmware. (The user could also physically open it up and replace the EEPROM chip themself, if wanted, but this would normally be unnecessary.)

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#89

Post by WrtCdEvrydy »

Ambroos wrote: post #78
Symbiote wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least TVs on the (originally) European DVB broadcast system can pick up firmware from broadcasts. Packets in the transport stream include the necessary firmware.

This is still used for set-top boxes, at least in Belgium. It happens in the background now, but up until a few years ago when you first got one you'd only see the firmware downloader for an hour or two, with this block diagram where you could follow along: https://i.imgur.com/hh7eWZr.jpg The worst part about that was if your signal quality wasn't great. You'd see blocks fail, and it'd take ages for them to come up a…

That is the most LCAR upgrade screen I have ever seen...

Re: Samsung Blu-ray players bricked because of an XML config file

#90

Post by eucryphia »

Our Samsung home theatre sound system's bluray stopped working years ago, everything else works fine.

We have a few Samsung products and each one has a particularly annoying problem.

The worst part is the support, I post a polite request on their website and always get a very concise unhelpful answer.

I no longer buy Samsung products.

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