Hacking WARNING - Gateway team bricks card ON PURPOSE!

[escherbach]

wrong user reply

 

[RedCoreZero]

Insert rant here saying how wrong this is.

 

[escherbach]

it funny how people are bitching about Gateway, what did you expect from a team who are thieves end of the day? did people really think team like Gateway was going to play fair?

Yeah, this is unfortunately the truth. These guys found a fairly feeble exploit in a narrow range of firmware versions and are now hellbent in getting as much money as they can out of people. No philosophy of open source sharing with these guys. Shame, as it would mean much quicker progress and a larger cooperation might lead to further exploits much more quickly.

Ah well - it's like buying drugs, always be wary of the dealer

 

[Technicmaster0]

Yeah, this is unfortunately the truth. These guys found a fairly feeble exploit in a narrow range of firmware versions and are now hellbent in getting as much money as they can out of people. No philosophy of open source sharing with these guys. Shame, as it would mean much quicker progress and a larger cooperation might lead to further exploits much more quickly.

Ah well - it's like buying drugs, always be wary of the dealer

Just that GW could brick consoles for users who use the official launcher, too.

 

[kingsora831]

What we should do is either in this thread of any of the other GW threads is release the correct checksum for the current launcher. (from users who arent having issue)
So users who want to continue using the latest launcher can make sure their launcher isnt corrupted before using.

 

[Technicmaster0]

What we should do is either in this thread of any of the other GW threads is release the correct checksum for the current launcher. (from users who arent having issue)
So users who want to continue using the latest launcher can make sure their launcher isnt corrupted before using.

Or you just download the official launcher and tell everyone the checksum.

 

[masterzero]

or just move out of 2.0b2

 

[Flame]

Yeah, this is unfortunately the truth. These guys found a fairly feeble exploit in a narrow range of firmware versions and are now hellbent in getting as much money as they can out of people. No philosophy of open source sharing with these guys. Shame, as it would mean much quicker progress and a larger cooperation might lead to further exploits much more quickly.

Ah well - it's like buying drugs, always be wary of the dealer

well said man. major props

 

[Thomas83Lin]

Normmatt's region free patch is NOT causing any bricks since he patches the brick code!

Am I reading this correctly that normmatt's patch already patches out the brick code.

 

[Runehasa]

Where does one get Normmatts patched launcher. Im using an original card with original launcher but am leary about having such code even present in my system

 

[dc740]

kingsora831

that doesn't have any sense. if the SD card gets corrupted you will brick your console, even when you are using the original cart. It's insecure to run GW code. The only safe option is to use the Normmatt's region free patch. And of course, never buy from GW team (again, if you have the cart).

 

[soulrazor]

when something similar happened with the psp scene (ps3news if i recall messing with dark-alex firmware) there was pandora to restore the bricked consoles.
With this case there is no solution for now. nintendo wont fix it and from the looks of it even a nand restore will be helpless to fix it.

 

[profi200]

Warning!

There is one report of a brick caused by the region free Launcher.dat. That means they included more bricking code, than we thought. It was already Normatt's guess, that there is more brick code. Even Normatt's Launcher is not 100% save!.

 

[Cyan]

I started to wonder if it wasn't done on purpose by the Gateway Team, and I see it has been confirmed.


The code is only in 2.0b2?
previous versions doesn't have any (other) malicious codes like that too?

edit:
And if there are even more than one in 2.0b2, it can be there since few revisions.

 

[gamefan5]

I don't believe this shit.

And anyway, to those who bought these clones or having their 3DS bricked, you get what you paid for.

The R4 "team" has always been shitty and selling shitty products. R4 ain't making money as they used to be in the past.

They are just spreading false rumors and lying on forums.


And if the Gateway team really does it on purpose, then serves you right !

Gateway put a code in their launcher.dat which roughly works like this:

if(<low 4bits u32 output from random-number-generator are zero> && <checksum over arm9 code is invalid>)
brick();

The random-number-generator uses the console date for initialization. That's why all the bricks occured after a certain date. The second part checks whether the launcher.dat file itself is legit. Any modification makes the checksum fail and therefore bricks the console.

Apparently, the code works like this. It can be patched tho, but fixing 3DSes affected by the glitch will be very hard, as apparently it destroys more than just the NAND.
The code has been found by Normatt, neimod and yellow8 apparently. However, the code can be patch, as apparently Normatt has patched the code before releasing the region free patch.

I am an owner of gateway myself, so I am not pointing fingers at them. It must be frustrating for them because other teams are using their launchers and not profiting from it.

Believe it or not, there was another team that used to do it. The DSTT team! Lots or clones used their firmware so to put a stop to it, they put a code to destroy the fake carts if their firmware was used on it. It didn't brick the DS tho.

All in all, I would be fine if it started bricking the cloned carts, however the console itself... A bit too far.

EDIT: This brick-code does not only brick the firmware on the NAND but also reprograms the eMMC-controller of the NAND in such a way that both 3DS and computer will think that the NAND is only 0 Bytes. This is extremely difficult to fix and you cannot fix it with a simple USB-cardreader.

^If this is true, than not even soldering fixes it. Basically, your 3DS is as good as dead.

 

[R4iFanboi]

So, this is why newer updates were delayed LOL. GATEWAY team was busy coding to brick 3DS' of people.

What about innocent people who buy at local physical stores say in countries like Brazil? Possible that a store there stock R4i Deluxe and not Gateway? The end user won't even know that Gateway is the first flashcard and have a system brick. Way to go Gateway team. YOU F&#^&%

I hope some real hackers will release custom firmwares/rom loaders not requiring flashcards, just to teach these fucking team a lesson.

 

[s-arash]

if i get backup from my nand and my 3ds bricks , can i fix it with nand flashing?

 

[Moquedami]

If Normmatts launcher already had the bricking code patched, so he knew this would happen and could have warn about it, am I right?

 

[kingsora831]

kingsora831

that doesn't have any sense. if the SD card gets corrupted you will brick your console, even when you are using the original cart. It's insecure to run GW code. The only safe option is to use the Normmatt's region free patch. And of course, never buy from GW team (again, if you have the cart).

Your SD can only get corrupted if/when your writing data on it.
So if you are about to run the launcher, and have recently written new data on ur SD card, then you have to make sure that the checksum hasnt changed before running the launcher.
Again, this is all for those who want to continue using the latest version.

Or you just download the official launcher and tell everyone the checksum.

Im about to check the checksum now and will post it,
but it will also help if others do the same so we can match checksums and know that it is indeed correct.

 

[RchUncleSkeleton]

So the gateway makes money by developing a product that lets you pirate copywritten software but as soon as someone tries to pirate their work they go on a warpath and start purposely bricking people's stuff?! What a fine example of morality and legitimacy.

 

[Mr_Pichu]

While I feel it would reasonable to simply hang the hardware on detection of a modification to the launcher.dat file, bricking is not cool. That is unless you are working for the NSA, trying to protect the interests of the USA. It is NEVER okay to brick intentionally, for fun or profit.

 

[Technicmaster0]

Believe it or not, there was another team that used to do it. The DSTT team! Lots or clones used their firmware so to put a stop to it, they put a code to destroy the fake carts if their firmware was used on it. It didn't brick the DS tho.

All in all, I would be fine if it started bricking the cloned carts, however the console itself... A bit too far.

And the DSTT Team died because everyone had panic that they own a fake one.

 

[gamefan5]

And the DSTT Team died because everyone had panic that they own a fake one.

Indeed. XD