A New Threat?

Ok, so what with 3.4 and the changes to the EULA, maybe WiiConnect24 should be looked at again as a potential problem?

I was futzing around with my Wii the other day and realized that I had only turned off the Standby Connection, and not WiiConnect24 completely. I did so and here's some things I found:

The New and Forecast Channels not only require WC24 to be on, but the standby connection as well (not that anyone likely cares all that much about that).

The Nintendo & Shop Channels require WC24, but the standby connection can be off.

I would like to have the Nintendo & Shop Channels, but I am now wary of WC24. I know there probably isn't any real definate intel on exactly how the updating without notification will work, but WC24 seems likely to be the means.

Does anyone have any clarifications (i.e. would this only be a risk under 3.4, for those who accepted the new EULA), or is anyone actively monitoring this area of Wii functionality?

I may sound paranoid, but it's only paranoia if they aren't out to get you. :P

Have you checked out this file since you've been on v3.4?

As far as I can tell, this is the WC24 job list of what to update. I was wondering if v3.4 had added an entry, but I haven't upgraded, and nobody seemed willing to send me theirs.

I don't have 3.4, I just wanted to be sure that I wouldn't get auto updated if I had WC24 on.

Preface:

I don't think the EULA change for 3.4 is significant; it appears to just be a slight rewording of an existing statement. That is to say, Nintendo has always given themselves the right to update your system under the EULA, but I do not believe they will ever do it without requiring you click "OK" in some form.

That being said ... the WC24 system can turn the PPC on and off, and it can cause the system menu to run. The system menu does a check before displaying the warning screen, and based on the contents of /shared2/sys/NANDBOOTINFO...

81374900                 addi    %r3, %r29, a_LaunchNANDAppfromWC24 # "Launch NAND App from WC24\n"
81374904                 crclr   4*cr1+eq
81374908                 bl      OSReport

eh. The trend has been from less to more warning (newer versions have that warning that updates will screw over unauthorized software and you can hold the power button to cancel), not the reverse. I just can't imagine unattended autoupdates... what happens if you unplug the Wii with the TV off?

On the other hand, it's more fun to assume (pretend, more like) that Nintendo has unlimited resources and will do everything in their technical power. Is the system menu all that WC24 can load, or are there other possibilities? In the former case, the menu itself can just be patched to remove that functionality; in the latter, you're going to have to patch IOS, and not just IOS36 or some fake IOS version, but each version of IOS that anything uses, in place.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/09/2009 04:21AM by comex.

There's nothing stopping us from patching every IOS except motivation. If we could get a nice "Updater Channel" going with patchmii (what happened to UPF?) we could easily keep a "controlled" environment with a patched System Menu/IOSes. Then we'd just have to worry about "downgrading" from future revisions.

That's sort of a "not quite as cool" alternative to bootmii stuff, though. Although I think it would be more fun :P

The "Updater Channel" never happened, in part, due to my reluctance against having stuff that automatically applies patches.

Comex: WC24 starts the system menu, and tells it to load any channel ("NAND App"). That's all it does; the system menu is just a "stepping stone".

If wiiconnect24 can load the system menu, surely that means if you have a preloader it loads that instead? And if that's the case would it be possible for the preloader to check it's being run by wc24 (as the system menu does) and then run a different .dol based on that? I'm asking because I think it'd be sweet to have FTPii run instead of whatever wc24 runs

edit: well I just installed preloader, and before i had preloader standby disabled the video signal (blue screen on my tv), but now it shows a black screen, so it seems preloader does change the behaviour of standby mode which surely means we can start writing applications for it?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/07/2009 04:19PM by shawabawa.