HP ink cartridge DRM bypass demonstrated utilizing bodily man-in-the-middle-attack
A refilled HP ink cartridge has been demonstrated utilizing a man-in-the-middle assault to bypass HP’s strict printer ink digital rights administration (DRM), which prevents shoppers from utilizing generic cartridges. YouTube creator Jay Summet shared a video (through Hackaday) displaying this explicit assault that lets customers bypass HP’s user-unfriendly DRM practices.
Ink cartridge hacks have proliferated within the ink cartridge markets, particularly as HP and different printer producers promote their ink at exorbitant costs (presumably to recoup their preliminary funding of their printers) which they reportedly promote at a loss. Due to these excessive costs, many have resorted to utilizing third-party cartridges, which printer makers have tried to cease by embedding chips.
Printers now must detect these embedded chips earlier than recognizing the cartridges; so, third-party-ink makers resorted to refilling outdated cartridges to avoid this safety characteristic. The unique ink cartridges then acquired web page limiters that required end-users to switch the ink after printing a sure variety of pages, even when the cartridge nonetheless had some ink left.
That is the place the man-in-the-middle assault occurs — the ink refiller added a versatile PCB on the cartridge’s unique contacts and routed the sign to a chip. This then alters the unique sign to inform the printer that it hasn’t reached its web page restrict, which is then rerouted to a different set of contacts that overlay the unique ones. Due to this, the printer thinks that it’s speaking to an unique, unaltered cartridge.
The chip hack is the newest try that third-party ink makers have made to assuage the detrimental expertise shoppers have with printers — significantly, HP-branded ones. The corporate is defending its transfer to restrict third-party ink like these, claiming safety points, and has even made advertisements saying its printers are ‘made to be much less hated’. Nevertheless, the corporate’s anti-consumer strikes, significantly within the printer house, are what’s driving them to purchase generic cartridges. Actually, there are quite a few lawsuits towards printer DRM and the like. However because it takes time for circumstances like this to undergo the authorized system, customers need to resort to inventive options to maintain their printers usable with out having to pay by way of the nostril for ink.
