It's possible to find workarounds for things like this. One example: https://www.autoharnesshouse.com/69018.html

Reverse engineering like this is black magic to me. The writeup is good. It's detailed and I could follow along with what the author was doing even though I'm too stupid to ever attempt something like this. Nice job author.

I liked bullet 2 in the Introduction.

Reverse engineering the way they do it is very satisfying and time consuming. If you want the same results but without the sweat, LLMs are the way to go now. They eat this kind of stuff for lunch. You could literally ask one for a table with all the CAN bus messages and it would figure it out.

I wrote a blog posts where I first did it the traditional way and then, a few months later, the lazy way: https://tomverbeure.github.io/2026/04/12/AMIQ-License-Key-Ge....

LLMs are fun until you have to break up a devices that use encrypted firmware files and non-documented interfaces.. that you are back in the past ;-)

But for the rest: Yes. They will be eaten alive by the latest generation of LLMs. I use DS-Flash 4.1 a lot for this. A big helper.

Make a custom harness, literally give the AI access to as much data as possible in terms of the device and it will crack it wide open like an egg.

AI is driving digital ownership again and its formidable

Clearly you are in the past. I have reverse engineered some very difficult undocumented things. I can not go in to details but these were heavily hardened hardware. Custom SoC. of course without datasheets, involved multiple different levels of encryption and architectures of connected devices, broke all of it. All that is left is cryptocell pwn.

With very little steering from me

eta: passive aggressive winky face

Take it one step at a time. I’ve had a fun time just intercepting the Bluetooth communication part for little devices.

Most of the time the protocols are not locked down, and if it’s a popular device chances are someone else already did it for you.

You can get help by decompiling the Android app for the device which should give more info about the content of the Bluetooth messages.

That’s the level I’m at right now. Oscilloscopes and all that look intimidating to me too!

But you are a "high-computer-skill" person.

Also, the lazy sysadmin forgot to set a quote for today.

It has multiplayer, but I don't know how to find the other players.

I managed to get stuck in a courtyard.

A San Francisco with no other players is so nice.

It gets pretty close irl on Christmas Day - so quiet and flawless!

It’s the typical MMO dilemma. I want to know other players are possible, other than that leave me alone xD

They said "I discussed with my family at the dinner table," but it looks more like "I discussed with my roommates after we got super high."

> the world of Internet advertising just doesn't run like that at this point.

They're doing it though.

Why?

Sarcasm, I guess.

Ministry for the Future ch. 1 scenario?

https://www.scribd.com/document/979965270/Robinson-Kim-Stanl...

There's also the matter of police accessing this massive data trove "for personal purposes, including tracking romantic partners, relatives or acquaintances."

https://www.newsweek.com/flock-camera-police-arrests-1226378...