Shoutbox

http://pspupdates.qj.net/2005/10/f-secure-demonst...-bricking-psp.html

How...nightmary..

ha ha ha

umm Paperless i have this thing that makes your PSP 3x faster than it already is, i'll send it to ya and then upload it to your PSP

haha "your psp is now as useful as a brick" < gotta love that quote

* SikStyles goes back to figuring out how to send this kind of thing to Paperless's PSP

It won't download...
It just says "Error:" and nothing else....

Tried disabling my firewall too...

quote:

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Originally posted by Mike
It won't download...
It just says "Error:" and nothing else....

Tried disabling my firewall too...

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because the video has a wrong file extension. The extension should be '.wmv', instead it is '.wmv.txt'...

So instead of directly executing the video, save it to your HDD first and rename the file... (in fact, this should be a common safety practice, always save to HDD first instead of directly attempting to execute something you're downloading)

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quote:

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Originally posted by paperless
How...nightmary..

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Though, there is absolutely nothing nighmary about that. If you downgrade, just read the instructions first and make sure you didn't downloaded the desguised PSPBrick trojan instead of the perfectly working downgrades.

I'm not sure what the purpose of that video is tbh. It just seemed like those guys had nothing better to do than to make some kind of video (without decently explaining what they did, why they did it or what they downloaded and where)...

It would be the same if we made a video how you could destroy your HDD in windows. It would have no functional value, and a viewer might have many questions about it and dismiss it as *beep*. Yet, to the PC newbie it might be a scary video...

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PS: using those downgrade firmware patches is illegal

It gives a bad image of homebrew stuff..

quote:

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
using those downgrade firmware patches is illegal

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How can it be illegal?

Do you have a PSP? ( )

Anyway, im not downgarding i just want the homebrew coders to improve homebrews for 2.0 because im not giving away my browser...

quote:

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Originally posted by paperless

quote:

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
using those downgrade firmware patches is illegal

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How can it be illegal?

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1) Because those downgrade patches are not from Sony and made by hackers.
2) Patching your PSP (with unofficial stuff) is not legal
3) Patching your PSP (with unofficial stuff) voids the warrenty
4) etc...

quote:

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Originally posted by paperless
Do you have a PSP? ( )

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What has that todo with it?

quote:

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
What has that todo with it?

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Watch it Cookie he wants to brick you

quote:

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Originally posted by CookieRevised
Though, there is absolutely nothing nighmary about that. If you downgrade, just read the instructions first and make sure you didn't downloaded the desguised PSPBrick trojan instead of the perfectly working downgrades.

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I suppose the only thing that could be nightmarey about it is if the file could be spread through the wireless network the PSP could be connected to, and randomly infects files on the network by hiding in normal executables. Until one gets onto the PSP and "bricks" it.

However I've never heard of a strain or version of the PSPBrick that does this.

Just out of curiosity, if all this does is corrupt the firmware and does no physical damage. Couldn't the firmware just be reinstalled from scratch onto the PSP by someone who knows what they're doing.

quote:

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Originally posted by Anubis
Just out of curiosity, if all this does is corrupt the firmware and does no physical damage. Couldn't the firmware just be reinstalled from scratch onto the PSP by someone who knows what they're doing.

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Yeah, good question...

Also, how did they make that virus...

Its the first time I hear about a virus for a game console and even worse, a portable one!

The trojan can't spread thru the network you're connected on (at least that what I've read and remembered). Hence it is a trojan, not a virus.

(one of the mandatory characteristics of a virus is that it spreads)

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Firmware isn't like a standard piece of software which runs on top of an OS or something. Firmware controls the hardware directly and is written into the hardware directly; it is machine code. Without firmware (or faulty firmware) the hardware does absolutely nothing.

Firmware is directly written to chips (eeproms, flash-proms, whatever they're called); if those chips contain nothing they do not work anymore.

The possebility to upgrade/downgrade/etc is also controlled by this firmware. Hence the only thing you could do is replace the erased chips (and no store will do that, as you will have voided the warrenty).

You can compare "firmware" with the "BIOS" of a PC. Without the BIOS your PC is a big brick also. And you also wouldn't be able to start another program to update/fix your bios as the PC doesn't do anything more in the first place.

The only thing you could try is to replace the bioschip. But also know that such chips are often welded onto the board; they can't be replaced.

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The PSPBrick virus is extremely simple, it simply erases 3 "system files" (aka system code modules) which control the whole thing.

A virus (whether on a PC or console or on whatever) does actually nothing more then doing stuff which a normal decent program wouldn't do. A virus is nothing magical at all, it simply uses the available code for malicious practices...

I could write a program where the user is asked for a file to overwrite. Instead I could delete the routine which ask the user for a file, and simply start overwriting every file I find. The code would be not much different, however the result to the user would be very different...