American Farmers are hacking their Deere Tractors with Ukrainian Firmware

[kpitcher]

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/a...inian-firmware

To avoid the draconian locks that John Deere puts on the tractors they buy, farmers throughout America's heartland have started hacking their equipment with firmware that's cracked in Eastern Europe and traded on invite-only, paid online forums.

Tractor hacking is growing increasingly popular because John Deere and other manufacturers have made it impossible to perform "unauthorized" repair on farm equipment, which farmers see as an attack on their sovereignty and quite possibly an existential threat to their livelihood if their tractor breaks at an inopportune time.

[opal]

Good

[tod evans]

Chips were a big deal when they first started putting 'puters in tractors, swap out a chip and gain horsepower...

[timosman]

Isn't it against the EULA?

[ChristianAnarchist]

Farmers have common sense...

[TheTexan]

Farmers have common sense...

I guess. But remember, they installed software from Ukraine. So they shouldn't be surprised when their tractor's gmail account gets hacked.

[opal]

Isn't it against the EULA?

screw the EULA... it ain't yours until you mod it

[sparebulb]

Farmers have common sense...

They probably have a far greater sense of what they want and the drive to get it than the average putz.

However, the vast majority of row crop farmers that I've ever known are whiny statist welfare whores.

Cattlemen used to be more like us, but that is changing now too.

Out here in fly-over country, most farmers have a sycophantic love for Juan Deere.

All of our elected "representatives" come around wearing their bright new out of the package JD hats when they glad-hand the farmer set.

And laughing their asses off at them behind their backs.

[Anti Federalist]

Look for this in cars very soon.

Unless you are an "authorized" service facility, you be able to make no repairs.

$#@! a bunch of computer cars and tractors and motorcycles...

[TheTexan]

Look for this in cars very soon.

Unless you are an "authorized" service facility, you be able to make no repairs.

$#@! a bunch of computer cars and tractors and motorcycles...

It's cool tho, the vehicle can drive itself to the authorized service facility. Making it super convenient.

[tod evans]

It's cool tho, the vehicle can drive itself to the authorized service facility. Making it super convenient.

And bill your credit account accordingly...

[Cleaner44]

Russians hacked the tractors?

[timosman]

Russians hacked the tractors?

Who were you expecting?

[TheTexan]

Installing hacked software on tractors should be a felony crime, due to the national security interests w/r/t agriculture.

John Deere needs better lobbyists.

Perhaps I've found my calling...

[ChristianAnarchist]

Look for this in cars very soon.

Unless you are an "authorized" service facility, you be able to make no repairs.

$#@! a bunch of computer cars and tractors and motorcycles...

One of the reasons I keep at least 2 vehicles that are older and fall into the "classic vehicle" category...

[Dr.3D]

Makes me wonder why farmers are buying John Deere tractors if this is what they are doing to their customers.

[TheTexan]

Makes me wonder why farmers are buying John Deere tractors if this is what they are doing to their customers.

Everyone knows, John Deere has the highest quality caps, jackets, and other official merchandise

[AuH20]

There is a big case on the USC docket that could close down the alternative printer cartridge business.

http://www.npr.org/2017/04/06/522826...g-consequences

There's a case before the U.S. Supreme Court right now that centers around a lowly office supply product - the printer cartridge. It could have wide-reaching implications though for a whole host of consumer goods from electronics to cars to medicines. Noel King from our Planet Money podcast has the story.

NOEL KING, BYLINE: A Lexmark laser printer costs somewhere in the neighborhood of $400. A Lexmark refill toner cartridge costs about $130. It's not cheap. So there are businesses that have sprung up that take empty Lexmark printer cartridges, refill them and then resell them for a lot cheaper. Eric Smith owns one of those businesses - Impression Products. It's a small company in West Virginia. Every year, he says, they refill and sell tens of thousands of Lexmark printer cartridges.

ERIC SMITH: I buy the empty toner cartridges by the truckload every day.

KING: A couple years back, Eric started getting cease and desist notices from Lexmark - stop reselling our cartridges.

SMITH: I just kind of ignored the letters. I kind of thought they were bluffing.

KING: They were not bluffing. Lexmark printer cartridges come with a license. It's written right on the side of the box. It says basically this cartridge is patented by Lexmark, you can't reuse or resell it. So Lexmark took Eric Smith to court. Eric's lawyer is arguing once a consumer has bought a product, the company that sold it - in this case Lexmark - can't tell the buyer what to do with it. There's a legal term for this - patent exhaustion. Here's Eric's lawyer, Andrew Pincus.

[timosman]

John Deere just told the copyright office that only corporations can own property, humans can only license it

https://boingboing.net/2017/04/22/drm-eschatology.html

CORY DOCTOROW / 6:22 AM SAT APR 22, 2017



John Deere has turned itself into the poster-child for the DMCA, fighting farmers who say they want to fix their own tractors and access their data by saying that doing so violates the 1998 law's prohibition on bypassing copyright locks.

Deere's just reiterated that position to a US Copyright Office inquiry on the future of the law, joined by auto manufacturers (but not Tesla) and many other giant corporations, all of them arguing that since the gadgets you buy have software, and since that software is licensed, not sold, you don't really own any of that stuff. You are a licensee, and you have to use the gadget according to the license terms, which spell out where you have to buy your service, parts, consumables, apps, and so on.

As software eats the world, it's devouring the idea of private property -- "that sole and despotic dominion which one man claims and exercises over the external things of the world, in total exclusion of the right of any other individual in the universe."

The fact that the DMCA felonizes bypassing copyright locks, combined with the proliferation of copyrighted software in gadgets means that companies can turn their commercial preferences into private laws. Just design your gadget so that using is in any way apart from the official, prescribed way requires breaking a copyright lock. Now, anyone who violates your license terms is also committing a felony, punishable by five years in prison and a $500,000 fine.

For a first offense.

What's more, security researchers who reveal defects in these gadgets face the same harsh punishment, and routinely self-censor, even when they find potentially life-threatening bugs in medical implants or cars.

Other automakers pointed out that owners who make unsanctioned modifications could alter their vehicles in bad ways. They could tweak them to go faster. Or change engine parameters to run afoul of emissions regulations.

They’re right. That could happen. But those activities are (1) already illegal, and (2) have nothing to do with copyright. If you’re going too fast, a cop should stop you—copyright law shouldn’t. If you’re dodging emissions regulations, you should pay EPA fines—not DMCA fines. And the specter of someone doing something illegal shouldn’t justify shutting down all the reasonable and legal modifications people can make to the things they paid for.

GM went so far as to argue locking people out helps innovation. That’s like saying locking up books will inspire kids to be innovative writers, because they won’t be tempted to copy passages from a Hemingway novel. Meanwhile, outside of Bizarroland, actual technology experts—including the Electronic Frontier Foundation—have consistently labeled the DMCA an innovation killer. They insist that, rather than stopping content pirates, language in the DMCA has been used to stifle competition and expand corporate control over the life (and afterlife) of products.

We Can’t Let John Deere Destroy the Very Idea of Ownership [Kyle Wiens/Wired]

[oyarde]

Really not sure why anyone is buying any of it .

[Anti Federalist]

The fact that the DMCA felonizes bypassing copyright locks, combined with the proliferation of copyrighted software in gadgets means that companies can turn their commercial preferences into private laws. Just design your gadget so that using is in any way apart from the official, prescribed way requires breaking a copyright lock. Now, anyone who violates your license terms is also committing a felony, punishable by five years in prison and a $500,000 fine.

Three felonies a day.

[pcosmar]

Look for this in cars very soon.

Unless you are an "authorized" service facility, you be able to make no repairs.

$#@! a bunch of computer cars and tractors and motorcycles...

I saw that coming with ASE certs. (which certify nothing)

Never have been.

[ChristianAnarchist]

Look for this in cars very soon.

Unless you are an "authorized" service facility, you be able to make no repairs.

$#@! a bunch of computer cars and tractors and motorcycles...

There is a work around for this problem and someone will make a ton of money if they take this idea and put it into reality. The "law" only protects the boxes that run the firmware, not the engine blocks and wheels (etc.). All someone needs to do is produce their own open source black box to replace the original black box and you are in business. Can you imagine a "universal black box" which would replace nearly all factory black boxes and all you would need is a wiring harness adapter to make it connect and a script you could either download or develop yourself to make the universal black box perform the same function as the factory one. There are only so many ways one can deliver spark to a cylinder at a particular time or cause a transmission valve to engage. It's merely finding someone with the engineering genius to make a universal box with enough computing power, memory and programmable inputs and outputs to provide signals at the right time...

Hell, I bet there are guys in our little circle here who could figure this out...

[misterx]

Don't worry. Ukraine will be folded into the New World Order sooon enough, and these rogue hackers will be brought to swift justice.

[misterx]

I saw that coming with ASE certs. (which certify nothing)

Never have been.

ASE certification is the way it should be done. A private company verifying levels of competency, with no government involvement. The consumer can choose to look for someone who is ASE certified or not, you can still work on cars without the certification because there is no government mandate.

[specsaregood]

There is a work around for this problem and someone will make a ton of money if they take this idea and put it into reality. The "law" only protects the boxes that run the firmware, not the engine blocks and wheels (etc.). All someone needs to do is produce their own open source black box to replace the original black box and you are in business. Can you imagine a "universal black box" which would replace nearly all factory black boxes and all you would need is a wiring harness adapter to make it connect and a script you could either download or develop yourself to make the universal black box perform the same function as the factory one. There are only so many ways one can deliver spark to a cylinder at a particular time or cause a transmission valve to engage. It's merely finding someone with the engineering genius to make a universal box with enough computing power, memory and programmable inputs and outputs to provide signals at the right time...

Hell, I bet there are guys in our little circle here who could figure this out...

And you think they haven't planned for that? Is your little alternative box approved by the USDOT and 50 state equivalents? Is your little box approved for use by the insurance companies? Come on...

[ghengis86]

And you think they haven't planned for that? Is your little alternative box approved by the USDOT and 50 state equivalents? Is your little box approved for use by the insurance companies? Come on...

Yup. Great idea but Officer Friendly will just plug into your ODB II or pop the hood on your next traffic stop then belt you over the head with his night stick and haul you in. Or DMV annual inspections.

[oyarde]

And you think they haven't planned for that? Is your little alternative box approved by the USDOT and 50 state equivalents? Is your little box approved for use by the insurance companies? Come on...

Yeah , you might need your own ins co .

[ChristianAnarchist]

Yup. Great idea but Officer Friendly will just plug into your ODB II or pop the hood on your next traffic stop then belt you over the head with his night stick and haul you in. Or DMV annual inspections.

Some states still don't have such inspections (MS and others). I'm about to have a 450 hp V8 stuck in my gutless H3...

[ChristianAnarchist]