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PS3 PS3 hacked by Geohot

x3sphere

x3sphere

Administrator
Staff member
Enforcer Team
Game Info Editor
Sousanator said:
This makes me think Sony found this exploit and tried to hide it by saying no-one uses Other OS anymore
Click to expand...

Must say I sort of feel bad for Sony.. that their system is being exploited through a feature they basically included out of good will. There was completely no incentive for them to include OtherOS from the start, but they did it anyway. I guess this will rule out any form of Linux on the inevitable PS4.
 
N

NoEffex

Seth's On A Boat.
x3sphere said:
Must say I sort of feel bad for Sony.. that their system is being exploited through a feature they basically included out of good will. There was completely no incentive for them to include OtherOS from the start, but they did it anyway. I guess this will rule out any form of Linux on the inevitable PS4.
Click to expand...

That's only true to an extent. Since I don't think piracy (and in turn, loss of money) is possible through OtherOS, I don't think that it's THAT big of a deal in terms of what they'll be facing.
 
W

Whisper

Logic :(
Seems like people are starting to figure out what this hack means, and how to use it.

Q: Do you think I'll be able to use my PS3 as a Multimedia center which can play anything I can easily play on the PC, what about other homebrew?
A: Homebrew was possible on the OtherOS, and having access to the hypervisor opens up some new paths, like if it's confirmed that RSX access is restricted, one could get access to it.
The main problem is that one needs a lot of internals documentation, a lot of which might not be obtainable easily without reversing the GameOS as well(RSX drivers).
Q: Do you think an "ISO Loader"/running backups can happen anytime soon? Does this exploit allow us to reverse the GameOS?
It should make some things easier, but as GeoHotz has pointed out, you load things into the SPE even from the OtherOS.
To run backups one would need to have the GameOS under their control. The problem with getting into the GameOS is that the load process of this OS probably involves isolated decrypting (in the SPE) of
needed images/loaders/executables. We know that the hardware root key which is present in each SPE is used to decrypt some of the loaders and I suspect it will decrypt other decryptors and signature
verification code forming a chain of trust, however this chain could be broken if one could get access to some decrypted code which decrypts other code using some other software keys.
While the hardware keys themselves may not be found, if one can decrypt everything else using these software keys, it should be possible to decrypt the entire GameOS and relevant code, and with this hack or maybe even with only the

OtherOS, if the process is understood well enough, load a "cracked" GameOS which does as the user pleases. How feasible such an attack is, is unknown to me as I don't have a PS3, nor have I seen any relevant code, but
from reading the IBM Cell security papers, this attack seems possible. Obviously, the legality of such an attack is questionable, but it should allow running backups and reversing the GameOS(to advance homebrew, RSX drivers and others).
If the OS is designed to use the root key for everything, this would be troublesome, and it would require someone with vast funds to decap a PS3 cell, and obtain the keys.
It also seems to me that these keys may be individualized per console, which may mean that the root key is probably used only during hypervisor bootup or only during the initial gameos bootup.
If that it's true, then the attack is feasible, but the difficulty differs depending on the option:
1) Hypervisor bootup - with geohotz's exploit, everything should be doable now
2) GameOS bootup - Software attack possible, but likely tricky, however using a passthrou FPGA card to gain access to the XDR while the GameOS is running it should be possible. Attack would be slightly costly.
Regardless of what turns out to be the case, documenting the hypervisor is important, so if you have the time and are capable, you should get to it!

Found this to be an noob friendly explanation for people who are slightly confused or just joining us.
PS3: Hacked | DigitalFoundry
 
KezraPlanes

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
hmm so only basically this only unlocks the full power of OtherOS? Nice...
 
KezraPlanes

KezraPlanes

Just some dood
W

Wheres

New Member
^ Oh well I hope there is no piracy with this being out and who knows what custom firmware for ps3 is doing HENburger for ps3- allows to play homebrew XD
 
M

Muratcan

New Member
I was feeling lost without an explanation of the exploit but this guy analyses it, explains how the hack works and what could become of it:
How the PS3 hypervisor was hacked root labs rdist

Still feel somewhat lost though with all of that jargon :scared:

In short:
*A modchip could be made (I assume this would be for FAT PS3s only considering Geohot's exploit only works under linux?)
*It is now easier to find a softmod (This would of course work on all PS3s. Hurrah for us Slim users! :p)
 
nathanmoon

nathanmoon

Programmer. Procrastinator.
Muratcan said:
In short:
*A modchip could be made (I assume this would be for FAT PS3s only considering Geohot's exploit only works under linux?)
*It is now easier to find a softmod (This would of course work on all PS3s. Hurrah for us Slim users! :p)
Click to expand...
yes, this hack will only work on FAT PS3's, since support for the "Other OS" install option was removed by Sony in the PS3 Slim..and yes also that this probably only works best in Linux

thx for the link btw.. :)
 
S

seifer69er

New Member
Correct me if i am wrong, but isnt the PS3 HDD based on a FAT32 file system?
In other words, the HDD can only handle file sizes up to and including 4GB, hence disallowing any Blu-ray ISO's to be "Ripped". Im just annoyed at how many people keep begging for Blu-ray ISO support.

You would need a "Custom" NTFS formatted HDD (max theoretical filesize 2^64 bytes (16 EB) ZOMG:scared:), or at least a network Rip (as seen on the XBOX360)

To me this is cleverly implemented by sony, they must of forseen this while designing the PS3 :cool:

On the plus side, homebrew has no worries and would be great to see.
But on the flipside PSX games would be slaughtered left, right and centre. PS3 trophy support would suffer in the end, ie. Feature to be removed.

Good will come of this "exploit" but at what cost?
 
nathanmoon

nathanmoon

Programmer. Procrastinator.
seifer69er said:
Correct me if i am wrong, but isnt the PS3 HDD based on a FAT32 file system?
In other words, the HDD can only handle file sizes up to and including 4GB, hence disallowing any Blu-ray ISO's to be "Ripped". Im just annoyed at how many people keep begging for Blu-ray ISO support.

You would need a "Custom" NTFS formatted HDD (max theoretical filesize 2^64 bytes (16 EB) ZOMG:scared:), or at least a network Rip (as seen on the XBOX360)

To me this is cleverly implemented by sony, they must of forseen this while designing the PS3 :cool:

On the plus side, homebrew has no worries and would be great to see.
But on the flipside PSX games would be slaughtered left, right and centre. PS3 trophy support would suffer in the end, ie. Feature to be removed.

Good will come of this "exploit" but at what cost?
Click to expand...
u r certainly NOT wrong in any way seifer69er, the PS3 also only recognises FAT32 based external HDD's, so, anybody thinking of loading BD Game Rips from an external HDD running NTFS will have to kiss that thought goodbye too..

thx for pointing this out btw.. :D
 
Hellcat

Hellcat

Contributor
seifer69er said:
Correct me if i am wrong, but isnt the PS3 HDD based on a FAT32 file system?
Click to expand...
/me raises hand
I'm not 100% sure, but AFAIK the *internal* PS3 HDD FS is based on something from the Unix/Linux world.

External drives are accessed using FAT32 as it's the only license free FS available on most (if not all) OSes.

Then again, there is the BDEmulator (on dev PS3s) that doesn't use any FS at all, but raw images and a small index for it....
 
M

Muratcan

New Member
seifer69er said:
Correct me if i am wrong, but isnt the PS3 HDD based on a FAT32 file system?
In other words, the HDD can only handle file sizes up to and including 4GB, hence disallowing any Blu-ray ISO's to be "Ripped". Im just annoyed at how many people keep begging for Blu-ray ISO support.
Click to expand...

With homebrew support they could add NTFS functionality. Even if that isn't possible then ISOs can easily be split and still play as if they are one whole ISO file, something which is very popular on the Wii.
 
nathanmoon

nathanmoon

Programmer. Procrastinator.
Hellcat said:
Yes, that's a dev-PS3 running there, Ref-TOOL if I'm not mistaken (debugstations have the "Emulator (DEV)" option disabled).
Click to expand...
nicee..but will we be seeing the release of this emulator any time soon?? :laugh:, i mean given that Geohot has opened doors to new possibilities, do u think this emulator will be released at any time in the near future??
 
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