Re: How secure are dongles for copy-protection?

Hi Harold and all,

The following message was sent by "Harold Thimm" <haroldthimm_at_hotmail.com>
on Mon, 04 Jun 2001 19:43:35 -0000:

> I'm looking for any information on incorporating dongles into a
> software package for copy protection. In particular, I'm looking for
> information on the Rainbow Technologies Sentinel, but advice on
> dongle-based copy protection in general is appreciated.

OK, you asked for it ... if you take a look at "The futility of digital
copy prevention" (http://www.counterpane.com/crypto-gram-0105.html#3)
you'll have a look at it.

> How easy/difficult is it to break this kind of copy-protection?
> Are there any known weaknesses in the dongle-type systems themselves
> (as opposed to implementation weaknesses?)

One thing that can be done is look at the dongle as a black box, monitor
the answers to the stimuli, and build a software piece that can trap
these stmuli and perform like the dongle (just a thought).

BTW, have you made a search in http://www.phrack.com or any other
search engine ?? Perhaps using "dongle" or "copy protection" you'll have
some good look.

Cheers

--
Victor A. Rodriguez (http://www.bit-man.com.ar)
El bit Fantasma (Bit-Man)
"aMail: a lot of fun in a bunch of Perl scripts"