Hacking Not Serious, But a Question.

[keasy]

I'm totally innocent and bewildered how you seriously clever guys that are into 'hacking scenes' do it. It's a mystery and dark art I could never wrap my ageing brain around.
But I had a thought and it's in all probability a completely stupid one and ludicrous to the educated. But I'll put it up for flaming anyway.


The 3DS ROM's are encrypted and digitally signed...okay I'm already at the end of my microcosmic knowledge. So how do people/hackers plug away at breaking the encryption ?
Is it the same idea as running algorithmic programmes and hoping to eventually hit on a character or number or whatever it is that's alien to me ?

And now for my silly (sillier) question....

You know how there's all these kinds of Distributed Computing Projects like say...Folding @ Home and Seti @ Home, would it even be possible for some coder to write such a thing to bash away at cracking the encryption of ROM's. Would it even be legal ?

You may now commence my flaming....

 

[andibad]

for software to de-encrypted is legal.

but for copyright material content is illegal.

 

[popoffka]

Basically, if the encryption is done right, there's no way to crack the encryption (except for checking every possible key, but let's just say that there're too many of them to check each one). However, there are usually some flaws in the implementation of the signing/signature check system (like the epic fail in the PS3 fw), which help hackers to find a way to run their own software.
There was an attempt at bruteforcing the key for the DSi last year and there were a lot of participants, as I remember, but it still ended without any luck, because 115792089237316195423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639936 keys is not something you can bruteforce in a few days, weeks or even months, not even with lots of computers.

 

[Rydian]

It's often not about breaking the encryption, but finding a workaround so that you don't have to. Generally finding a way to modify the OS so that it doesn't do the kinds of checks it normally would before/while running software.

 

[keasy]

That clears that up then.

I was just curious as to it's feasibility.
Thanks dudes for indulging my silliness.

 

[ZombiePosessor]

My question is, how can ROMs be dumped correctly yet there's no way to load them? I remember it happening with DS games too, months before PassMe and stuff was introduced, but people KNEW it was coming, in some form, while the ROMs were being dumped. That is not the case with 3DS ROMs, so are people just dumping them for archival purposes or because they're hoping for a flashcart/system exploit soon?

 

[Rydian]

My question is, how can ROMs be dumped correctly yet there's no way to load them? I remember it happening with DS games too, months before PassMe and stuff was introduced, but people KNEW it was coming, in some form, while the ROMs were being dumped. That is not the case with 3DS ROMs, so are people just dumping them for archival purposes or because they're hoping for a flashcart/system exploit soon?

There's ways to load them. Just, not on flash carts or using hardware that normal people have laying around...

 

[ZombiePosessor]

My question is, how can ROMs be dumped correctly yet there's no way to load them? I remember it happening with DS games too, months before PassMe and stuff was introduced, but people KNEW it was coming, in some form, while the ROMs were being dumped. That is not the case with 3DS ROMs, so are people just dumping them for archival purposes or because they're hoping for a flashcart/system exploit soon?

There's ways to load them. Just, not on flash carts or using hardware that normal people have laying around...

I must be out of the loop worse than I thought then... care to elaborate?

 

[Rydian]

I must be out of the loop worse than I thought then... care to elaborate?

No, this is nothing abnormal, there's always ways to run stuff... but it's usually through hardware hacking. You know, this kinda' shit.

Stuff that's custom-made per-situation, often involving test boards and soldering wires and shit.

Not stuff for normal people.

 

[ZombiePosessor]

I must be out of the loop worse than I thought then... care to elaborate?

Stuff that's custom-made per-situation, often involving test boards and soldering wires and shit.

Not stuff for normal people.

I assumed it was made on a per-basis need, that's exactly what I meant on care to elaborate, was wanting to see someone's contraption for it. I recognize a few pieces of hardware in that picture, awesome.

Thanks for the info

 

[Rydian]

While site like hackaday.com and such catalogue hardware hacks for various systems, people usually try to keep ones that might allow piracy research under wraps.