Amazon Quietly Bricked Jailbroken Kindle Devices Last Year
from the taking-money;-building-walls dept
It appears that Amazon is very serious about walling off its garden. Late last year, it pushed out a firmware update for its Amazon Fire TV devices that not only made rooted devices unusable, but prevented Fire TV owners from rolling back firmware to previous, more root-friendly versions. Apparently, Kindle users were also included in this lockdown.A recent post at Good Reader notes that the latest firmware for Kindles is pretty much identical to its Fire TV firmware, right down to the destruction of functionality.
The new firmware was pushed out to all modern Kindle devices in late November of last year. Anything after version 5.60 will not allow you to hack the firmware and do interesting things like change the screensaver system or install custom apps.And, like its firmware for the Fire TV, rollback to less hack-resistant firmware is nearly impossible. You can force it back, provided you have a soldering iron (and the willingness to apply it to your device) or you can follow a few not-so-simple steps to take your root access back from Amazon. But once again, it's the company removing functionality for the sole purpose of making devices perform the way Amazon wants them to, rather than leaving these sorts of decisions to those who have purchased the devices.
And it's not as though Kindle owners are receiving any heads up from Amazon about the firmware's plans for their jailbroken devices. No mention of it is made in the firmware's specifications, which only tells you about the (supposedly) good things the update will bring: vague "bug fixes and improvements." Softpedia's hosting page for the latest version (5.6.1) goes into a little more detail, but it only contains a list of slightly-upgraded Amazon features, rather than the limitations the firmware will impose on paying customers.
If you like Amazon's walled garden, the company is more than happy to ensure you never find the gate. If you don't, Amazon is more than happy to step in and brick over any openings. The latter does a huge disservice to paying customers who are looking to get the most out of something they purchased and own, but seems to still somehow "belong" to Amazon.
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Filed Under: bricked, firmware update, jailbroken, kindle, ownership
Companies: amazon
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Open initiatives are slowly growing and gaining ground for a while now so maybe we are not too far from this future?
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What's not to love?
It does not take a Stallman to figure out that this is a rather one-sided shift of balance.
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Re: What's not to love?
Very well put. This is the main reason file sharing and jail breaking are so popular. It's the consumers attempt to regain control over their media. Your average consumer isn't a lawyer. They don't understand that even though they payed for something, it's not really theirs.
It's also very ironic. The very one sided control these companies are exercising is, IMO, one of the main reasons people choose file sharing over legal methods. I'm sure there is a percentage that never intended on buying, but I'm betting the bulk of file sharers do so because of convenience and control over the media.
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Re: Re: What's not to love?
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Re: Re: What's not to love?
I don't know if that's the main reason, but it is one of the reasons. Most people I know who jailbreak devices do so to gain control over the devices, not the media.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
Technically true. Rooting the device gives you control over the hardware that you do not otherwise have. So while it doesn't create new hardware capabilities, it does give you access to hardware capabilities that were otherwise unusable. In practice, there isn't much difference between the two in this context.
As to "content", I think you're right -- I was getting tripped up by that word. To me, "content" means "data that other people are providing" (this includes software). People I know who jailbreak are not doing so to gain greater control over that stuff. They're jailbreaking in order to gain greater control over the OS and, by consequence, the hardware.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
You're wrong and he's right. You're assuming it's obviously for infringement that they're doing it. Certainly many are, but just as certainly, many are not. I couldn't care less about the content I see out there these days. I do care that a PS2 could be used to run Linux with its other OS feature. Many bought them just to do that. Rooting it could allow owners to "pirate" video games, but that's nothing I care about.
Think Apple and its music players. You could get all your content from iTunes, or you could use them to play any mp3 you want. Bricking a machine because the owner isn't also buying your content is assault on the customer post-purchase. I refuse to support vendors who assume I've joined their club just by purchasing something. When you've got my money and I've got my hardware, we're done; end of story.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
He didn't say piracy, he said content.
I do care that a PS2 could be used to run Linux with its other OS feature.
I think KoD would consider the operating system content, so that would fit right in with his description of why people want to control their devices.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
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Reference "Wall-e" who was cleaning the world for BNL
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Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
It goes both ways.
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Re: Re: What's not to love?
When I go to the theaters and pay $10 for the worlds shittiest hotdog and $5 for a 12oz Coke which is filled to the brim with ice. I see it as a purchase of the dvd release of the movie I'm going to see. Or when I have to sit through 10 minutes worth of ads with each 30 minute show I watch, I feel I'm financially entitled to download the pirated versions of the seasons instead of purchasing the dvd box sets.
Back in the 80s the entire premise for cable TV was to watch TV without ADs. But now, not only are they forcing us to watch insane amounts of ads but they're making us pay $50-$100 a month to watch them.
Every time I hear the argument that pirating media is destroying sales this silent rage inside me grows a little bit bigger. lol
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Re: Re: Re: What's not to love?
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Re: What's not to love?
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Hopefully this realization will turn more serfs into Constitutional Peasants named Dennis, who will stand up to this sort of information hardware totalitarianism and just say "No".
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There seems to be a consistent shift to less user-friendly actions by Amazon lately.
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-- Darth Vader
That's one of the most-quoted movie archvillain lines ever. It takes more imagination than that to top (or rather sink below) corporate America.
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As soon as I saw one, I would long press the notification and disallow that app from creating notifications. Nothing Kindle wants to tell me about is important enough to put up with ads in my notifications.
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another brick in da wall
One day yup but the goal here is to get you all to NOT use hardware form jerks.
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i wonder what dragsters, for example, would say and do if when they tried to do whatever they wanted with an engine, for example, and they were stopped from doing so by the original manufacturer?
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Thankfully I sold it off shortly after the fact because I had no need for a 7" tablet. I would have been royally pissed if I were still using this device and it was bricked for me.
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Every ebook I buy from them is immediate striped of its DRM protections and stored within my Calibre library which is linked to my Mega cloud for easy access to all my jail broken devices. Of course, none of them are from Amazon.
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Pardon My Ignorance
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Re: Pardon My Ignorance
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Re: Pardon My Ignorance
http://kodi.wiki/view/Amazon_Fire_TV
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Re: Re: Pardon My Ignorance
You only need to check, "allow third party software" in settings. For Fire TV Box, or Fire Stick, or Fire Tablet. Same setting like any android device. When you want to install something that doesn't originate from the app store.
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Re: Pardon My Ignorance
"Rooting" a device means to gain admin access to it. It was once used solely to describe gaining admin access to someone else's computer (i.e. hacking), but modern devices often try to prevent their owners from having absolute control over them. Thus, people have to "root" their smartphones and tablets to be able to do whatever they want with them.
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Re: Pardon My Ignorance
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Abuse of power
I'm not surprised at all. Why should we allow others to own _our_ devices?
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Re: Abuse of power
Did you know that the "supposed" Kindle Page at Amazon.com will actually only ship outside the US?
Sadly, I have bought my last Kindle. I used to like Amazon.
P.S. Don't give car makers any ideas!
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Stallman was right (again)
https://fsfe.org/campaigns/android/android.html
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I tried to install the instant video app seeing as I had amazon prime. But no, apparently Amazon dont wnt to make it compatible with my tablet.
So I can get video on my phone (too small for anything beyond 5 minutes) or on my laptop (too big for settling down to a program/film in bed).
Luckily I found the relevant .apk online and low and behold - IT WORKS FINE
This is purely a case of amazon wanting to make people by a kindle fire.
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Just say no
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If I was going to program an app for a phone. I would do it for Apple and Android and maybe Windows but will avoid Blackberry. I also won't try to make it compatible with older then 3 years of age. You may be able to install it on your 5 year old device but since it doesn't meet the specs, I won't be supporting it.
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Two sides of the coin
1. Malware can take advantage of that, so it is a security issue (bug) that one would expect Amazon to fix.
2. Users can gain more control over the device they purchased.
I'm all for allowing custom firmware on a device but not at the expense of security.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
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Re: Two sides of the coin
Also, I for one don't run many mission-critical ops on an entertainment device, so security is not first priority. Functionality is.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
Imagine if Windows or Mac imposed these restrictions on their desktop OSes...
Regardless, some people root their devices to gain more control and to remove all the BS while others do it because they can afford the software they want to use.
In the end, it's not up to you or anyone else to say what I can and cannot not do with what I OWN.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
Why not? If someone is bypassing the security mechanisms on their devices, that's something they should be able to choose to do. The manufacturer isn't a nanny.
Also, just because a device has been jailbroken doesn't mean that device is insecure. It's entirely possible jailbreak a device without sacrificing security. In fact, I would argue that it's better that way -- if you're relying on the manufacturer to keep you secure, you're in a weak position in terms of security.
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Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
I root my devices to not only increase security, but stability and performance.
Although I have to agree that the less tech savvy are putting themselves at risk but that's their choice - live and learn.
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Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
This is true, but the less tech-savvy aren't going to be rooting things anyway. In terms of how the manufacturer should address the problem, though, I think that a stern warning of the risks would suffice.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
A warning is just going to be ignored:
http://www.sltrib.com/home/1878004-155/byu-study-show-most-people-ignore
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Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
Not all rooting is done through vulnerabilities, some are tho and it is only the rooting through vulnerability that I am referring to.
I would not advocate that a company leave a security vulnerability in a product for the sole purpose of allowing users to exploit that vulnerability to root the device.
If a company fixes a vulnerability thats a good thing, we should encourage companies to care about security of their products. The fact it prevents future people from using the vulnerability to root the device is irrelevant.
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Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
However, you've helped me to realize, just now, that by companies imposing hardcoded root restrictions they can leverage the public to find specific vulnerabilities for an attacker to gain root access thus increasing security.
However, they need to stop punishing those who wish to have root access and instead reward them for their efforts.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
If they assembled hackathons upon each new release/iteration, then security innovation in the mobile market 'could' leap by huge bounds if enticements (monetary, prestige, physical goods, etc) were promised...
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Re: Two sides of the coin
You are confusing "security" with knowing who the bully with the skeleton key to the appartment block is.
If I rent an appartment, I don't want the landlord go snooping through my drawers regularly "for security reasons". Or change back door locks that I have replaced for whatever reason.
Let alone if I buy an appartment. The previous owner has no business at all with my drawers, even if he built them himself.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
You're buying a freaking tablet, not a device that's critical to national security!
Wow...comments like that show how much this country's turned into a bunch of chicken littles, scared shitless of their own shadows.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
There is a tremendous difference between dangerous vulnerabilities to malware, and a process (vulnerability) that requires multiple user interactions, with physical access to the device. I encourage you to explore the concept behind said root vulnerability. An excellent starting point would be the canonical source of said exploit.
Of course, the idea of Kindle owners, i.e. affected people, having the right to an opinion is probably quite foreign. I expect most people here would rather chant wisely about security theory.
Personally, I find it depressing in the extreme that the apparent experts here have not bothered to find out any actual facts.
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Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
For the grayscale Kindles...
(and for the Kindle add-ins offered by the site I frequent, mobileread.com ...)
The device system is **not** "rooted", we add another package certificate to the system's certificate store.
That (as we distribute it) is only done from a file(s) placed on the user visible storage. The same place the user would place their own books.
Even so, nothing is every done "automatically" - everything requires the user's interaction.
A user is free to shoot themselves in the foot if they wish, but we aren't taking any shots at the users from OTA ambush.
There are two (2) update package handlers provided by Amazon in the standard firmware.
One of them handles OTA (Over The Air) updates.
None of our packages have ever been packaged such that the OTA updater will recognize them. None, Ever.
The certificate and packaging used by our add-ins **only** work with the **manual** package updater that Amazon provides.
The (rather new) bulk package installer, released to install our existing packages on the 5.6.x series firmware, also uses **only** the **manual** package updater.
So much for concerns about our "Jail breaking" (freeing the grayscale Kindles from being limited to Amazon packages) opening a door for OTA malware.
- - - - -
The real concern, as seen by myself, is the question if the owner of a device by purchase also owns the behavior of the device.
**NOT** who owns the I.T. rights to the firmware that provides the behavior, but the ownership of the device's behavior.
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Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
What does this mean? Since "owning behavior" makes no logical sense, I think that I'm not understanding this point.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
It is separate from whether anyone has the right to (mass) distribute a specific piece of code, or whether such a code exist yet.
At least that is how I interpreted it.
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Re: Re: Two sides of the coin
If it's my box that I legally own, it should be under my control.
The blistering controversy here about rooting vs. jailbreaking is just noise. I consider it honorable to leave your stuff up right or wrong. "Sure, see what I did. Note the "Update:" at the end of the article."
Meh. Don't believe anything you read on the web, isn't that the old saw?
Some of us are here to try to learn.
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Re: Two sides of the coin
However, in the operating system world, there isn't a continuum, there isn't a spectrum, and it definitely isn't black & white.
Why is this so?
Premise: "If a device can be rooted through software"
Inference/Conclusion: "1. Malware can take advantage of that"
The Inference/Conclusion is false given the operating system in use.
Without going into the details with every Linux distro ever created(hundreds, maybe thousands), Fire OS(Amazon's Android adopted OS) follows the same basic rules regarding root access. At least if security is a real concern of theirs.
If there was a way for malware to take advantage of Fire OS, but not other Linux distros, especially its most closely related OS, Android, Malware would also be able to take advantage of all Linux OS's.
But they cannot.
The fact of the matter is, not a single piece of Malware has every been able to infect a Linux system in any "meaningful" way, "meaningful" being used in this case meaning harmful in such a way as being able to recover personal data such as identity or financial.
Consider why someone would want to create malware for Linux systems in the first place. Distros of the Linux OS are used in more databases than any other OS. This includes databases which contain large amount of financial information like hundreds to thousands to millions of people's personal and credit card info.
If Fire OS does have such a vulnerability, it is because they didn't follow the one rule which Linus Torvalds has repeated said is the one thing he would NEVER compromise in the Linux Kernal, which is "breaking the userspace." A quote directly from Linus Torvalds himself.
If Fire OS has a vulnerability that allows malware to take advantage of the device, it is because Fire OS has deviated from the one single reason the Linux Kernal is "relatively" immune to malware that can cause "meaningful" harm.
Consider that Fire OS while originally based off of Android, making it a Linux OS, isn't considered a Linux OS anymore, they have changed too much, yet there is only a few, probably 1 thing they really needed to keep which would protect against malware even after a person gains root access to their Fire OS device.
In short, Amazon, having created a OS based on the Linux kernel, shouldn't punish their customers because Amazon may have created a vulnerability by breaking the userspace. A proper fix would be one that would correct the userspace issue and not one that "bricks" their own customers' devices.
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I'd prefer to just shoot the politicians and lawyers who let them get away with this. I'd love to be able to carry around my $10,000.00 worth of books with me everywhere I go, but that's infeasible. An e-reader could let me do that, but Amazon won't let me. Why? Because they insist I remain in their walled garden, ignoring my personal reasons for purchasing it.
I resent their intention to interfere with my personal affairs which are none of their damned business.
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I'd also like a Nokia N-800 Linux box in my shirt pocket running Cyanogen, while I'm asking. Sad I missed that.
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This.
Before eBooks, my technical library took a LOT of physical space, and searching for whatever piece of information I happened to need at the moment was time-consuming. Now, my entire technical library lives on my phone, and I can find anything I need within seconds. There is simply no comparison.
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This doesn't address the issue at all.
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Brick?
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Re: Brick?
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Re: Re: Brick?
That being said, the "jailbroken" Kindle is being bricked by this update. After the update, the Kindle can no longer be rooted, which means that the core functionality gained by rooting is lost. If, for example, I had a smart phone that I expected to be able to surf the internet, but an update removed that functionality and only let me make calls, I would consider that a bricked phone; the partial functionality removes key uses for which I purchased the device.
So if I bought a Kindle Fire expecting an inexpensive Android tablet with good reading capability and suddenly the "tablet" part of the equation was removed I'd be pretty upset, especially since the Fire is not really any cheaper than other equivalent Android tablets. They advertise it as a tablet, and while they mention their proprietary OS, it is "built on Android with enhancements." What if I want some of those enhancements, but not everything? What if I want stuff other than their 100,000 apps in their appstore? Their is nothing in their hardware that prevents me from doing so; it's purely a software lock.
Therefore, if I bought the device knowing I had these options, and then the company removes those options, that device has lost its core functionality due to a software issue, not a hardware one. Which is the definition of "bricking."
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Re: Re: Re: Brick?
Removing unofficial features and limiting the device to just the advertised functions may be a shitty thing to do, but calling it "bricking" is overdramatic. Words have power precisely because they have agreed meanings. Co-opting a word to give it your own definition for use in a discussion does nothing to further the discussion.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Brick?
While using "bricking" may not be the common understanding of the word it is accurate to say a device that has expected functionality removed due to a firmware change or error is "bricked."
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Brick?
In those cases, the device is unable to perform one or more advertised features of the product[1]. In this case, the device is unable to perform an unofficial feature.
Again, not saying that removing the feature isn't wrong, but a device that still does everything it's advertised to do really isn't "bricked". It may be useless to you, but that's a different thing.
FWIW, if you were to say that it's now as useful to you as a brick for what you purchased it for, that's completely accurate and understandable. Bricking means that the device is as functional (as opposed to useful) as a brick.
[1] - and is still IMHO a dramatic misappopriation of the term "bricked". Damaged, impaired, restricted, even broken - all better words.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Brick?
the Techdirt forum/comments board *desperately needs* another option/button in addition to "insightful" and "funny" -- namely "unintentionally funny" (or maybe just "unintentionally", as I suppose that there are occasionally "unintentionally insightful" comments, as well).
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Why do people even buy there? It's overpriced, their support/CS is non-existent, and they're so bad at hidden fees that even Visa/MC employees are so mad at them that they'll do a charge-back no questions asked as soon as you mention them.
If people would only lighten up, they'd just due the horrible death they deserve and someone better can take over.
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Because despite all of these things, and everything else that they do badly and make us hate them...
1. They make a good device - the e-ink kindles with 3G are currently unbeaten in terms of convenience and quality.
2. They have enabled more authors to publish more good work than any other single publisher in history. Amazon is nearly solely responsible for a shadow industry that puts as much royalty dollars in authors' pockets as the rest of the publishing industry combined.
3. Their customer support simply beats many of their competitors. Even if you don't like it, most of the rest of the world is worse.
If people would only lighten up, they'd just due the horrible death they deserve and someone better can take over.
Why should people stop using the best option currently available? Someone else can build something better, then everyone will migrate across without needing to moralise about anything.
So yes, they strongly push for DRM on their content to tie their customers to them. They go too far in trying to protect their IP. But who is better?
--"Beelzebezos is my dark god"
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I don't see how devices became bricked
Exactly same goes for iPhone, Xbox and so on.
Author probably should learn what "bricked" means, before embarrassing himself in writing.
Meanwhile, back on planet Earth, even least technically inclined knows that you can't install stuff on iPhone without Apple's approval. Don't like it - don't buy iPhone; there's hundreds of Android phones on the market.
Similarly, if one don't like Amazon's locked deal - just you know, don't buy it. Other people may find this "locked down" thing useful.
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Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
You're saying it's appropriate for the manufacturer to make it difficult or impossible for customers to take control of the devices they've purchased?
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Re: Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
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Re: Re: Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
Exactly!
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Re: Re: Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
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Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
Really, the reading is available in the links provided in the article.
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Re: Re: I don't see how devices became bricked
Additionally, the headline implies merely jailbreaking on the current firmware will brick the Kindle ereader.
I assure you, no Kindle ereaders have been reported as being bricked by the 5.6.x line of firmware. All they have done is prevent users from newly-jailbreaking the KV, KT2, and KPW2 (and use NiLuJe's latest jailbreak with root elevation builtin).
For more details, read a long list of discussion threads HERE.
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Not sold, just rented...
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Re: Not sold, just rented...
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Re: Not sold, just rented...
That's not the way I look at it. I paid $99 for my Kindle PaperWhite, so as far as I'm concerned, I own it.
My solution against Amazon's walled garden is simple. Switch to airplane mode and give it a hard reboot (hold power button for 30 seconds). That removes all of Amazon's annoying advertising.
Any e-book I purchase I download to my PC and remove the DRM with Calibri and side-load it to my Kindle because I prefer the actual cover images on my books as opposed to Amazon's default cover. It also gives me the advantage of having a saved copy of what I purchased just in case Amazon decides to arbitrarily remove anything from my library.
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both approaches involve soldering
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The original source
Note that:
a) No Kindle ereaders have been bricked as the headline assures us they have. This is because the author of the article seems to have conflated Kindle ereaders with Kindle FireTVs.
b) Any previously-jailbroken KPW2 that received the 5.6.x line of firmware has a trivial hotfix that restores complete functionality.
c) As NiLuJe says: "And the cat and mouse game is nothing new, it's been a constant battle since the Kindle 2.x days. Although, granted, it's now hit a serious standstill."
d) The KV/KT2 began on fw5.6.x, so the only way to jailbreak them is by the serial port method referenced in the article -- twice????
e) Having confused one of our members already, there is now a MobileRead thread discussing this article, which may serve to give a little background: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=257717
-- A long-time MobileRead member and Kindle Developer's Corner lurker
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this is a nasty trend
I see some nasty rumors that MSFT wants to remove the option to switch UEFI off. the next step of course is to use the keys to control what o/s you are allowed to install.
I don't think they will get too far
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Re: this is a nasty trend
Those aren't rumors. They fact from the mouth of Microsoft itself. However, what they're doing isn't quite as extreme as you're saying. What Microsoft has done is to no longer require OEMs to provide a mechanism to disable UEFI. They are not demanding that OEMs remove that mechanism.
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Re: Re: this is a nasty trend
That is what they are saying in public, but behind the scenes could be somewhat different.
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Re: Re: Re: this is a nasty trend
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Re: Re: this is a nasty trend
And now Microsoft is going the extra mile to "relax" the UEFI/Secure Boot requirement so that it's up to the OEM whether or not UEFI/Secure Boot is implemented properly -- or merely well enough to run Windows, but prevent the user (a.k.a. owner) from running some competing operating system on their own hardware.
(They tried to do this with Windows 8, but there was enough blow-back that Microsoft made a tactical retreat, required a proper implementation (at least officially -- in practice, deficient implementations didn't hinder the granting of Microsoft certification or participation in Windows 8 Logo "co-marketing" programs.)
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Re: this is a nasty trend
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UEFI Secure Boot module
Terry Myerson, runs Microsoft’s operating systems unit
Though, whether Microsoft just crave to serve the Chinese a Trojan horse, or if they also have been served a NSL, who knows? Who can say if the main objective is peeping tom or making it difficult to ever choose software that does not force the citizens hands?
Using hardware or software produced in the five-eyes is like patting a helicopter on the head, you have been told it isn't wise by people in the know, refrain from doing it while you still have time.
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Return all throngs Amazon
Into my home and soled my devi d
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There's no way Amazon (or any vendor) can guarantee further updates to the device it if no longer operates as they designed it.
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The Virtues of Printed Books vs Digital Ones
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Instead people are lining up, just waiting to fall to their knees and beg Amazon to place more limits on them. As they are with Apple...
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Amazon Bricking Kindle
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potential piracy?
I do know that most companies install software in order to benefit. Such as pay per clicks, pay per installs and such. This is why many app developers have ads in the app, unless you pay them a price for the app and they take the ads away.
TV stations and movie stations, etc. They charge subscription rates and when things are unlocked and jail broken, or rooted. Wouldn't this be considered piracy from these media companies? Which if you have an Amazon Fire Stick and you subscribe to the stations you would have to pay and odds are Amazon gets a kickback from that from the station you subscribe to. If you completely avoid having to pay, Amazon and the station you stole loses the money. So you are getting free media that is not intended to be free.
How would rooting your products to do just so exempt you from piracy laws?
I'm not trying to create confrontation, I'm really just trying to understand.
Thanks.
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Re: potential piracy?
What is the scenario where people are avoiding paying by rooting a device? I'm not aware of how that works.
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Re:
(Written before dope was legal)
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