Could hackers spoil it for us?

[mark_calgary]

It seems to be some sort of open "secret" that FTA dishes and receivers are meant to be used for stealing satellite TV. One that I wasn't privy to. In February when I was putting up my first dish I was confused as to why my neighbour asked me to run a line to his house too. At first I had no idea what he was referring to. He quickly lost interest when I told him I was using it to get BVN off of IA5 for my Dutch wife.

Now it is motorized and last weekend I put in a 10ft C-band dish which is pointing right over the same neighbour's yard!!!

I was jumping for joy when all the criminals started crying about losing channels. Now I am bit sad again. These people are no better than car thieves yet they justify it by calling it "testing" and all sorts of other rubbish. Try telling that to the judge...."Honest sir, I didn't steal that mercedes, I was just testing it."

 

[rkrenicki]

Yea, I dont even really use the E* or BEV music anymore.. I will probably take my Phase2 down this weekend

 

[Mr Tony]

I was jumping for joy when all the criminals started crying about losing channels. Now I am bit sad again.

just hang tight folks...Dish doesn't give up that easy

 

[rkrenicki]

I think they will push their MPEG4 conversion up a bit.. once that happens, things will be good again.

 

[RedSavina]

Madder than hell

This is infuriating!!!

[rant]
I've been a Dish Network customer for about 10 years now and plan to continue as a customer unless they totally botch the MPEG4/HDTV stuff next year. I'm interested in FTA for the same reasons I'm a ham: I want to experiment and "play", push the envelope of what's possible (microBUD), etc. in addition to simply enjoying programming that would not otherwise be available to me.

And now this.

It hurts both as a hobbyist about to enter the FTA world and as a legit Dish Network subscriber. Not to mention my SkyAngel subscription. Ultimately, who will pay for these idiot hackers? Big companies like Dish Network pass it on to their customers, smaller companies like SkyAngel risk going out of business (their customers ultimately lose), and FTAers have to pay inflated prices for their gear.

Iceberg and others have suggested that Dish Network needs to change their encryption. But, what can we do? One thing that comes to mind is taking action with our wallets (retailers such as Sadoun require a "Declaration of Intent" statement before purchasing). What else can we do? Maybe Scott would consider running a banner on the home page speaking out against programming theft? I'd love to hear suggestions!
[/rant]

Regards,
Red

PS: Something else that pisses me off is the hi-jacking of the term hacker. There was a time this word would have properly described the honest FTA enthusiast. Nowadays, it is almost universally known as a term for high tech criminals. *sheesh*

 

[mark_calgary]

I kept mine up for Gol and the Dish 100 screen
The rest (101, NASA, Angel One) I get with my subscribed receiver

I'm lucky. I can get GolTV with my linear LNB so I don't need to use the salvaged Expressvu LNB I got from a friend. NASA will now come off of C-band when I get my receivers all set up properly (I haven't yet figured out how to prevent the Toshiba analog receiver I'm using from trying to fine tune the dish position when configuring satellite locations. It has no signal input as I'm looking at DVB signal quality with the Pansat).

 

[mattb]

I think they will push their MPEG4 conversion up a bit.. once that happens, things will be good again.

They should change first the HDTV to MPEG4 (get receivers out there) then go after the porn channels, then work their way thru the movie channels and international chanenls then the AT channels and locals (which is the hardest to move to MPEG4 due to the mass amount of customers)

I also think E* should move away from Nag2 when they go to MPEG4, there are other methods to scramble they could use which are not easly targeted.

I never understood the need to steal.

 

[RedSavina]

I never understood the need to steal.

While I don't condone it, I understand the need to steal for essential survival (as no doubt some did in New Orleans). As far as I'm concerned, though, television programming -especially "premium" is not a need.

Red

 

[rkrenicki]

They can Nag2 the MPEG4 stream all they want.. there is no FTA reciever that can decode MPEG4.. It will get the bad boys and girls out of our backyard.

If they have a problem with people hacking the Dish recievers at that point (card sharing, etc), then they can worry about a new encrypt..

Once they move away from MPEG2 DVB as a transport, everyones problems will disappear overnight, at least for the immediate future.

 

[RedSavina]

They can Nag2 the MPEG4 stream all they want.. there is no FTA reciever that can decode MPEG4..

Isn't there a 912S that is upgradable to mpeg4 out there (can't remember, exactly)? There is also a Dreambox DM-8000 in the works that will have dual-tuner, ethernet, HD, DVR, and MPEG4. The Dreamboxes have cool features and run to the high-end. Unfortunately there appears to be an active hacker community using these boxen.

Red

 

[chiodo]

Word has it all of Dish Nets N2 channels on FTA units are now in the dark as of this afternoon.

 

[maddawg]

Dish attacked the hackers today...so they are not sitting down and doing nothing.

 

[rkrenicki]

Isn't there a 912S that is upgradable to mpeg4 out there (can't remember, exactly)? There is also a Dreambox DM-8000 in the works that will have dual-tuner, ethernet, HD, DVR, and MPEG4. The Dreamboxes have cool features and run to the high-end. Unfortunately there appears to be an active hacker community using these boxen.

Red

As of right now, there are no MPEG4 streams out there.. the only ones I could see being able to decode MPEG4 (and this only a possibility) are the PCI Cards, USB boxes, and Dreamboxes.. as those just capture the datastream, and decode is done in software.

but all of the "DVB" set top boxes are locked to MPEG2, which means all of those 3500s's, Coolsat 4ks, and Fortec Ultras will be 100% useless to John Hacker Six-pack.

 

[rkrenicki]

Dish attacked the hackers today...so they are not sitting down and doing nothing.

Apparently there was an "Algorithm Change", according to Blacklist.. Sounds like the hack is useless, pending a re-write .. I hope this change breaks things for longer then the N2 swap did.

 

[RedSavina]

Dish attacked the hackers today...so they are not sitting down and doing nothing.

Woohoo! Let's hope that the new algorithm not only blocks the current hack, but also addresses a weakness in N2 (supposing such a weakness exists). Wouldn't it be great to learn that someone left a door or window open, but the house is otherwise secure?

Red

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

They can Nag2 the MPEG4 stream all they want.. there is no FTA reciever that can decode MPEG4.. It will get the bad boys and girls out of our backyard.

Actually this is not true, at the Satellite Expo I was shown a prototype FTA MPEG4 receiver.

I just got home after being away all day and had some good news in my mailbox from a friend at Dish who tells me that will be shutting the N2 hackers down and it could be down as early as TODAY.

While I believe it is good news, I believe it will be a constant cat and mouse game.

 

[Scott Greczkowski]

I just got home after being away all day and had some good news in my mailbox from a friend at Dish who tells me that will be shutting the N2 hackers down and it could be down as early as TODAY.

I guess I should have read the entire post before posting.

Way to go dish!!!

 

[rkrenicki]

Actually this is not true, at the Satellite Expo I was shown a prototype FTA MPEG4 receiver.

I just got home after being away all day and had some good news in my mailbox from a friend at Dish who tells me that will be shutting the N2 hackers down and it could be down as early as TODAY.

While I believe it is good news, I believe it will be a constant cat and mouse game.

What I ment was no Current FTA MPEG4 reciever..

My point was that once the MPEG4 change over happens, no amount of hacking will ever make the Pansat 2300/2500/2700/3500 or Fortecs, or Coolsats work with E*

 

[Technojunky]

There is a law that would get you for selling it and using it. That is how they got the boot loaders like OJ. When money changes hands and the only known use of the product is to rip off the satellite companies, they have no trouble getting papers to raid a business for their records. Then they only have to visit every home of a person who bought one of the N2 receivers and take them to court.

The people who put those N2 receivers in the paper are the type to end up in prison. They might have already been to prison, but in any case, they are as stupid as they come.

Anyone that tries to buy one of those receivers, is not that bright either. There is a thread somewhere where they talk about how the law watches that sort of activity. They wait until the pickens are good, then they bust as many people as possible so it all ends up in the news. That scares others away from the idea of buying, while they look for another idiot with N2 receivers for sale.

Why pay the high price of a Coolsat when you can buy a Lifetime Ultra for little over $120? What does the Coolsat do that the Lifetime Ultra does not?

Joe

I was planning on picking up a 2nd Coolsat FTA receiver but the price increases has made me want to sit back and wait till everything cools off.

I agree, there should be criminal penalties or fines for advertising receivers as "FTA N2" because they're advertising towards the illegal sat community out there and not the true FTA community.

 

[RedSavina]

Actually this is not true, at the Satellite Expo I was shown a prototype FTA MPEG4 receiver.

Scott,

Are you able to tell us any more about this prototype? Of specific interest would be other features: HiDef, component video, ethernet, HDMI, hard drive, upconversion, blind search, etc.

Red