Switch: Hacker Kate Temkin shares FAQ on upcoming Fusée Gelée release
Nintendo Switch hacking team Reswitched have announced they will be releasing a Custom Firmware solution compatible with all firmwares of the Switch (for the current hardware revision of the console). The release is expected around this summer.
The release will consist in Fusée Gelée (an exploit chain relying on faults on the Nvidia Tegra) and the actual Custom Firmware, Atmosphere.
In the light of this announce, Kate Temkin, who is behind some of the exploits used in the hack, has published a lengthy FAQ on her blog.
This stream of announces happens in the context of Team Xecuter stating they have an upcoming hardware hack for the Nintendo Switch. KTemkin makes it clear in the FAQ that preventing Team Xecuter from turning a profit is a nice side effect of this upcoming release:
“Not just do they publicly endorse piracy, and seek to profit from keeping information to a few people, but they’re also willing to drop a 0-day that affects a broad swathe of devices on the public without any responsible disclosure.
All in all, I think that Team Xecuter seems to be without morals or scruples, and I am happy to do as much as I can to reduce their profitability and thus disincentivize these kinds of awful behaviors.”
From an outsider’s perspective, some of the answers in the FAQ actually bring more questions than they try to answer. I’m still not sure if the exploit will require some hardware modification or not. Its seems it will require some, but light. But there’s also a software version of the exploit.
What matters for now is the statement that current hardware revisions of the Nintendo Switch are all hackable, independently of their firmware version. However the exploit has been disclosed to NVidia and Nintendo by the hackers, and there definitely will be a hardware revision to patch it. It is unknown at this point if there will be any consistent way to dissociate the new hardware from the old. (Raise your hand if you remember the good old days of unhackable motherboards on the PSP)
Source: @ktemkin
Good times are coming! My Switch has been collecting dust, can’t wait to hack it this summer. Thanks Nintendo for having garbage security haha, CFW coming soon!
This is nice! I do not own a Switch (Yet) But will get one in the future ” for my son ” lol
Wow. I’m conflicted on how to feel about Kate Temkin.
On the one hand, this hacker is doing a great service to the community.
On the other hand, the hacker condemns capitalism, condems copyright infringement, and promotes helping console manufacturers fix their DRM by disclosing all your hacks before anything is even released.
Is this person on the side of freedom, or not? Would the scene be better off without people like that? I’m super conflicted.
This is hilarious ” condems copyright infringement” and yet they openly reverse engineer/modify copy-writen code.
That’s what it means to be a white hat… And they have a good reason for it… Whether they release it or not a hack is coming anyways… It’s just a matter of letting the black hackers earn a profit from it or destroying them by releasing a free version and in the end making all their efforts to waste.
Unless you are referring to something she posted elsewhere, you have completely twisted the developer’s words.
“condems copyright infringement” – There is no mention of copyright infringement in that FAQ. If you’re talking about where she says she dislikes Team Xecutor for endorsing piracy, well piracy and copyright infringement are not synonymous. In some cases it is infringing, but don’t conflate the two.
“condemns capitalism” – Again, where do you get this? She does indicate that she dislikes TX for “profit[ing] from keeping information to a few people”. So you could say she is against their capitalistic ventures… But her statement was for a very specific circumstance and you’ve broadened it to a much wider scope that what she actually said.
“promotes helping console manufacturers fix their DRM” – Not DRM, hardware vulnerabilities. This vulnerability is not unique to consoles, either. NVIDIA has dozens of portable devices with Tegra chips, including smartphones. Publicly releasing the details of the hack will open the door for more nefarious individuals to create weaponized implementations for purposes such as data and identity theft. It would be irresponsible to disclose this information without notifying the manufacturer and giving them a chance to rectify the situation for the consumer’s protection. The reason many hackers are fine with releasing game console exploits is because we don’t typically store sensitive information on our gaming consoles, but our laptops and smartphones are another story…
This person’s not helping us. They’re literally out to hurt and slow down hack releases.
Xecuter were the only ones willing to provide/sell anything to us instead of sitting on it for years, and this person is only swooping in to crush that. Even if money is Xecuter’s motivation, that at least gives non-hackers a way to make releases happen.
Without Xecuter, this person would sit on hacks for years, just to brag. They’re trying to discourage and destroy anything that lets us buy fast releases, so hacking can be a private bragging club.
It would be better to support Xecuter, instead of this, so paid hacks stay around for future consoles. Inconvenient or not, paid hacks are about releasing instead of bragging.
(And why are all my comments “awaiting moderation”? Are we not free to scrutinize and debate the topics? Did I disagree with the wrong person or something?)
Yes, I actually agree with you. Hackers now days are keeping hack in private even it got patched like PS4 5.05 hacks. I actually would support Xecuter.
I agree as well. If it wasn’t for Team Xecuter they would never release and keep it for themselves or until someone else would come along and release. I find it almost comical she says Team Xecuter is without moral or scubales because it looks like they want to get paid for their work. I think they should since they did it and release it. And they talk about responsible disclosure? The only people that need to take responsibility is Nvidia and Nintendo cause they made platform and components, and it is not anyone’s job but theirs to fix and properly test their stuff, so that this doesn’t happen.
I’ve read her FAQ two or three times and it still sounds inconclusive to me.
What I think she tried to say is that people on 5.0.0 will need to mess with hardware in some extent (think of it as something similar to the 3ds’ recent magnet method necessary to install CFW), whilst 4.1.0 and below will have a simpler solution.
Either way, updating is still not recommended, even though she stated the process will be simple, most people aren’t as tech savvy as a hacker, so I’d take her opinion about the easiness with a grain of salt.
Gotta buy one now then.
We thank team Xecuter a lot for their shady actions.
Without them publishing a paid version of the hack, we wouldn’t have these hackers disclosing them, they would just keep stroling their e-peenus lol
Releasing a software hack is moral but a hardware one is not? I think their issue is that Team Xecuter is aiming for profit which I don’t think is bad when the customers will get what they want.
I had read this article last week via gbatemp and have been keeping up with kate and Michael’s progress, this summer (late summer, July/august) is going to be awesome!!!
For me the team executer is not the bad guy of the movie, they are going to give the option to pirate the console to those who do not have the necessary knowledge to do it by the simplest form
If there’s any people who can’t move a folder to the root of the Switch and follow a few simple steps, I’d say they shouldn’t even be allowed to use any kind of technology.
Honestly, I don’t really care how. I just want my hacks, regardless of whether if i pay for them or not. Because unless the hacks are much more expensive than the games, I’d rather pay for CFW and pirate games than having to put up with the *** prices that the Switch has
Switch Custom Firmware Can Boot Retail Games ?
If not for TX none of the other hackers would release their stuff. we are literally talking about someone who told Nintendo about the vulnerability thus guaranteeing it will get patched in a recent future hardware revision. i thank TX a million times.
Yeah, Temkin is only trying to slow down hacking, and enjoy a private bragging club that never releases anything. He’s only releasing to crush anything that threatens that.
Xecuter said that a lot of her FAQ ‘info’ is not totally correct.
source: http://team-xecuter.com/forums/threads/153620-Team-Xecuter-coming-to-your-Nintendo-Switch-console%21/page17
Without actually saying what is wrong….
I think Xcuter are more scared than they would admit, but hey, pretty sure you
can still support xcuter one way or another…
I would love to see some mod a Switch to get it to run with a high end gpu to see what kind of performance it’s capable of if Nintendo decided to actually release a gpu based dck for the Switch.
>without morals or scruples
sure, how much cost skyrim on switch? £39.90? lol
keep trying xD I won’t buy it anyway but first thing which I would do would be that hack
Yay! Piracy is incoming,time to buy a 256gb Micro SD
Either way, free or a not free cfw solution. I’d gladly support TX and have done since the early xbox days.
Nobody *** moaned years ago buying mod chips to play pirated media when there was Evox dash/hdd installs, tsop and soft mods, so how is it any different now