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posted by chromas on Saturday July 11 2020, @01:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the tsk-tsk-tsk dept.

Hacking Ventilators With DIY Dongles From Poland:

As COVID-19 surges, hospitals and independent biomedical technicians have turned to a global grey-market for hardware and software to circumvent manufacturer repair locks and keep life-saving ventilators running.

The dongle is handmade, little more than a circuit board encased in plastic with two connectors. One side goes to a ventilator’s patient monitor, another goes to the breath delivery unit. A third cable connects to a computer.

This little dongle—shipped to him by a hacker in Poland—has helped William repair at least 70 broken Puritan Bennett 840 ventilators that he’s bought on eBay and from other secondhand websites. He has sold these refurbished ventilators to hospitals and governments throughout the United States, to help them handle an influx of COVID-19 patients. Motherboard agreed to speak to William anonymously because he was not authorized by his company to talk to the media, but Motherboard verified the specifics of his story with photos and other biomedical technicians.

William is essentially Frankensteining together two broken machines to make one functioning machine. Some of the most common repairs he does on the PB840, made by a company called Medtronic, is replacing broken monitors with new ones. The issue is that, like so many other electronics, medical equipment, including ventilators, increasingly has software that prevents “unauthorized” people from repairing or refurbishing broken devices, and Medtronic will not help him fix them.

[...] Delays in getting equipment running put patients at risk. In the meantime, biomedical technicians will continue to try to make-do with what they can. “If someone has a ventilator and the technology to [update the software], more power to them,” Mackeil said. “Some might say you’re violating copyright, but if you own the machine, who’s to say they couldn’t or they shouldn’t?”

I understand that there is an ongoing debate on the "right to repair". However, many manufacturers increasingly find ways to ensure that "unauthorised" people cannot repair their devices. Where do you stand on this issue? During the ongoing pandemic, do medical device manufacturers have the right to prevent repair by third parties?

Previously (Medtronic):
(2020-04-14) Raspberry Pi to Power Ventilators as Demand for Boards Surges
(2020-03-31) Professional Ventilator Design "Open Sourced" Today by Medtronic
(2019-11-18) US-CERT Warns of Remotely Exploitable Bugs in Medical Devices
(2018-10-17) Medtronic Locks Out Vulnerable Pacemaker Programmer Kit
(2018-08-15) Hack Causes Pacemakers to Deliver Life-Threatening Shocks
(2014-10-28) US Security Agencies Look at Medical Device Security

Previously (right to repair):
(2020-07-06) Fixers Know What "Repairable" Means--Now There's a Standard for It
(2020-04-21) 'Right to Repair' Taken Up by the ACCC in Farmers' Fight to Fix Their Own Tractors
(2020-03-13) Europe Wants a 'Right to Repair' Smartphones and Gadgets
(2020-01-09) Popularity of Older Tractors Boosted by Avoidance of DRM
(2019-06-21) Hackers, Farmers, and Doctors Unite! Support for Right to Repair Laws Slowly Grows
(2019-04-30) Reeducating Legislators on the Right to Repair
(2019-02-22) Right to Repair Legislation Is Officially Being Considered In Canada
(2018-10-13) 45 Out of 50 Electronics Companies Illegally Void Warranties After Independent Repair, Sting Reveals
(2018-09-21) John Deere Just Swindled Farmers Out of Their Right to Repair
(2018-04-17) Apple Sued an Independent iPhone Repair Shop Owner and Lost
(2018-03-08) The Right to Repair Battle Has Come to California
(2018-02-02) Tractor Hacking: The Farmers Breaking Big Tech's Repair Monopoly
(2018-01-28) Washington State Bill Would Make Hard-to-Repair Electronics Illegal
(2017-05-25) Apple, Verizon Join Forces to Lobby Against New York's 'Right to Repair' Law
(2017-03-08) Right to Repair


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  • (Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 11 2020, @10:49AM (2 children)

    by sjames (2882) on Saturday July 11 2020, @10:49AM (#1019453) Journal

    This is a bit different from the trolley problem. In this case you see an empty trolley careening towards someone tied to the tracks. If you throw the switch, it has a 50% chance of switching the trolley to a spur harmlessly. The other 50%, the handle breaks and it kills the poor guy anyway. Or you do nothing and his death is certain.

    That version isn't very popular in ethics since the answer is free of dilemma. The worst case for action is identical to the only case for inaction.

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  • (Score: 2) by FatPhil on Sunday July 12 2020, @08:43AM (1 child)

    You say "the trolley" problem as if there is only one dilemma being posed. There are almost as many different dilemmata as there are researchers.
    --
    Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
    • (Score: 2) by sjames on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:09AM

      by sjames (2882) on Sunday July 12 2020, @09:09AM (#1019782) Journal

      All of them offering some variant on an ethical dilemma between passively allowing people to die or taking an active role in choosing who dies (or actively choosing to place people at great risk of death). None match this situation. The only choice is certain death or possible death for the very same person.

      Put directly, someone you care about will surely die without a ventilator. The only ventilator available anywhere has a 50% chance of failing. Do you choose the sure death because the ventilator is out of spec or try it and hope it's close enough?