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Comment by watsonc73 | Hacker News Reader

"I do not have an xbox one and cannot verify that the exploit indeed works. With that being said, there’s enough hints pointing to this being real so if you have an XBox running on the affected firmware, feel free to give it a try and comment."

I've no doubt this exploit is legit but it would be nice for reporters to actually verify these issues themselves before posting online.

The above basically reads to me I'M TOO LAZY TO CHECK MYSELF

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I would struggle to call wololo a reporter. The site is more of a "scene" blog so I don't actually know what resources he has.

For example, you might expect Ars Technica to own an Xbox One but wololo may not have one himself but yeah, I know what you mean.

EDIT: Oh, I overlooked the part where he says "yup, I still don’t have an Xbox One…" so there ya go

He said he doesn't have an xbox one in TFA. What do you want him to do? Go buy one so he can make a blog post?

He could have ask a friend to apply the exploit, is a matter of responsibility because you need proofs to support your statements. What would happen if the exploit is not real and he called it out incorrectly?

The author stated that a proof of concept was released. This is a verifiably true fact. Nowhere was it claimed it worked, and in fact that's quite clear by the "unconfirmed" in the title and the "[w]e have not confirmed if this exploit works" in the first paragraph.

Probably nothing of importance.

Holy shit mate, this is one fucking dude blogging on the console hacking scene. This isn't some fucking news organization.

He called out nothing incorrectly, he said there's this stuff circulating that I think seems credible because of blah, but we don't know.

He told you the facts and his opinion on them.

I know it @lawl, I was also expressing my opinion. You don't have to be so aggressive to do the same.

Wasn't supposed to be agressive, just wanted to make sure It's clear I completely disagree with you. Sorry if that came off as agressive, that certainly wasn't the intention.

Let someone who tried it do the reporting?

Yes! Emphatically yes! Particularly in the security community this has become quite a problem. People will report on stuff and make claims without actually doing the research and it contributes to some very bad practices over time as things which are factually untrue become accepted as fact.

Alternatively, he did try it, and just doesn't want to admit it because there is no Xbox One bug hunting program so he could be charged under the existing computer hacking laws.

There is an exemption for security research when it comes to violating the DMCA by breaking crypto & also, it would be his device so honestly, no one is going to really care. Even when it was technically illegal to break device encryption I was doing it and reporting vulns to vendors with no issues because it was in good faith. Low risk.

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/techftc/2016/10/dmca-s...

Xbox One bug hunting program

It is not about this case in particular, but what often "bugs" me is the fact that there are people discovering exploits in these locked-down devices --- which could open them up significantly --- and actually advocate/report to get them fixed, making them even more locked-down. I understand that some of them are in it for the $$$, but even when there isn't, they still do it. The phrases "digging your own grave" and "locking yourself out" come to mind... it all seems rather Orwellian.

https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.en.html

You cannot be charged for hacking something you own under any existing hacking law. In that case it would be an authorized access, so there is no crime.

Looking around, this appears to be a hobbyist news and discussion site. Here's the news portion:

http://wololo.net/category/news/

Even if this were the New York Times talking about an exploit, I'd expect their reporters to, well, report, not necessarily directly verify something themselves. And this is quite clear that it's unconfirmed. What he does do is report what the developer is saying, adding sufficient context for non-experts to understand, and giving links so those interested can learn more. Presumably once it's verified, there will be another article saying so.

Given that, it seems like perfectly fine amateur journalism. Why do you expect it to be something else?

Sounds more like a liability thing to me. "I've never actually done it wink wink"

Liability? Would he take legal action against himself for exceeding authorization against himself?

DMCA is no joke

Nothing about it would apply to this case

It reminds me of the Knuth quote: "Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proved it correct, not tried it."

+1 Sums up my point beautifully - to be clear I'm not trying to clamp down on free speech and would encourage reporters to "report" breaches like this. The main issue I have is that there's a first to post mentality without adequate fact checking. Speed is beating substance. The incentives in media are unfortunately all lined up the wrong way. Maybe I'm just being nostalgic but I miss the days when any journalist (amateur or not) would pride themselves on the accuracy of their statements. I've basically just stopped believing what I read after the FB fake news revelations.

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