Submitted via IRC for Bytram.
Following a story that we reported a few days ago which covered how the latest software update issued by HP for its printers prevented them from working with other cartridges, HP have responded and promise another update to re-enable other ink cartridges. But HP is still defending its practice of preventing the use of non-HP ink and is making no promises about refraining from future software updates that force customers to use only official ink cartridges.
"We updated a cartridge authentication procedure in select models of HP office inkjet printers to ensure the best consumer experience and protect them from counterfeit and third-party ink cartridges that do not contain an original HP security chip and that infringe on our IP," the company said.
The recent firmware update for HP OfficeJet, OfficeJet Pro, and OfficeJet Pro X printers "included a dynamic security feature that prevented some untested third-party cartridges that use cloned security chips from working, even if they had previously functioned," HP said.
For customers who don't wish to be protected from the ability to buy less expensive ink cartridges, HP said it "will issue an optional firmware update that will remove the dynamic security feature. We expect the update to be ready within two weeks and will provide details here."
While I'm sure that we recognise that HP cannot guarantee the operation of any printer not using their own cartridges, how often are similar techniques used to lock-out fair competition? What are your experiences and views?.
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Martin Brinkmann at gHacks reports
HP released a firmware update on March 12, 2016 for several of the company's Officejet printers that renders non-HP ink cartridges useless.
HP customers began to complain about the issue on September 13, 2016 on various online forums, the official HP forum, and on community sites like Reddit.
All reported that a HP Officejet printer blocked non-HP ink cartridges from working, and that the device displayed one of the following messages to the user:
Cartridge Problem.
The following ink cartridges appears to be missing or [damaged].
Replace the ink cartridges to resume printing.
[Continues...]
Ryan Sullivan cancelled what he thought was a "random charge for $4.99 per month from HP called 'Instant Ink'". Then his printer refused to print:
It turns out that HP requires its customers to enroll HP Instant Ink eligible printers into one of the Instant Ink plans, and continue paying a monthly subscription in order to be allowed to use the device.
But where's the need to come up with different plans coming from, you may wonder? HP explains: the company charges a fee based on the number of pages a customer prints each month, and the page count is shockingly monitored remotely.
Naturally, the scheme is not advertised as a rather unusual application of DRM, but a way for customers to save time and money. Still, it would seem HP has not exactly gone out of its way to explain all the consequences to those customers.
HP's terms of service also say that these eligible, internet-connected printers can be remotely modified in several ways, including by applying patches, updates, and "changes" – without notifying customers.
Another thing HP can see thanks to the Instant Ink program is the type of documents you print, identifying them by extension as Word, etc., documents, PDFs, or JPEG and other types of images.
Additionally, the HP cartridges have been locked to specific printers for quite a while now.
Earlier on SN:
US Customers Kick Up Class-Action Stink Over Epson's Kyboshing of Third-Party Ink (2019)
Xerox Is No More (2018)
Meg Whitman Resigns (2017)
Supreme Court Lets Consumers Refill Ink Cartridges (2017)
HP to Issue "Optional Firmware Update" Allowing 3rd-Party Ink (2016)
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:01PM
If you feel the need to put a chastity belt on your partner, it might be time to rethink the relationship.
(Score: 1) by stretch611 on Thursday September 29 2016, @07:44PM
Actually, in this case, HP was forcing you t wear the chastity belt... so that only they could screw you.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 30 2016, @12:08AM
And a "Virgin alarm"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 30 2016, @03:53AM
It's programmed to go off before you do.
(Score: 3, Funny) by darkfeline on Friday September 30 2016, @03:54AM
Some people enjoy having masochistic partners.
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by meustrus on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:04PM
All the time. This is never a valid security precaution, because any reasonable consumer will recognize that if their printer broke after they put new ink in it, it's the ink's fault. Even if they don't, the response is still to buy new hardware which should benefit HP anyway. The only reason it doesn't is because their business model is back-asswards: instead of selling printers, they're selling ink.
If there isn't at least one reference or primary source, it's not +1 Informative. Maybe the underused +1 Interesting?
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:58PM
They're not on my "avoid" list because of this. Lenovo got added last week. Seems to be a dangerous game basic your business of people having short memories.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:59PM
Sorry, that should be "on my avoid list".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 29 2016, @11:32PM
Seems to be a dangerous game basic your business of people having short memories.Are to those condemned it history forget who repeat.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Friday September 30 2016, @08:16AM
They're not on my "avoid" list because of this. Lenovo got added last week.
Not for me, there's no equivalent to my business-grade Thinkpad. And that's the magic keyword, consumer-grade = you're a patsy who's going to get screwed, business-grade = you're paying more not to get screwed. You'll note that none of Lenovo's crapware and backdoors applied to business-grade gear, only to their consumer-grade stuff. Same with HP, I don't think they've pulled this stunt with any of their commercial printers, only the home-user cheapies.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Friday September 30 2016, @09:50AM
Rewarding company that does this sort of thing seems like a bad idea in the long term. It not only encourages them, but others as well.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Friday September 30 2016, @10:02AM
Yeah, which is why I avoid anything from Sony like the plague. OTOH there really isn't any alternative to my Thinkpad, which perhaps colours my opinion of Lenovo somewhat.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 30 2016, @03:23PM
while i understand your point, it's not completely true. they still continue on with the old ibm practice of using bios/uefi whitelists to only allow "their"(relicensed and rebranded) wwan modems. they sell you a computer with an minipci slot and then they go out of their way to cripple it with bios/uefi malware, which is fraud. this includes the business grade computers. i didn't know any company would still be that stupid in this day and age so i found out they hard way. the fact that people have known about this and still continue to buy them is pitiful.
(Score: 1) by Ken on Thursday September 29 2016, @10:31PM
Everyone wants steady incremental income. Why sell a printer for $200.00 every 5-6 years when you can sell a couple of $30.00 cartridges every 2 or 3 months? Besides, you don't have to spend a bunch on R&D to try to improve the machine to make people want to buy a new one.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anne Nonymous on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:14PM
But you're still a bunch of fuckers.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Grishnakh on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:20PM
I was looking into automatic cat litter boxes recently, and there's one called the "CatGenie", which hooks up to your plumbing and has a hose to dispose of waste into your toilet, so that it actually washes itself out after your cat uses it. But this machine uses proprietary cleaner cartridges (probably just some kind of soap), which have chips embedded. Among other problems, a bunch of reviewers complained that the litterbox would refuse to work when the cleaner cartridge had gotten a little low, because it decided the cartridge was empty even though it was obviously not. (And of course, you can forget about refilling it.)
So this mentality isn't just with printers any more.
I recently saw a toilet at Lowe's that had some kind of proprietary cleaning cartridge in it too; I wonder if that had a chip.
Finally, back to that cat box: don't buy one. Too many reviewers complained that it has a nasty habit of not effectively cleaning turds out, and then when it does the heated drying cycle, ends up cooking the fresh cat shit, which you can probably imagine is just about the worst stench you could even be subjected to in your life.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:41PM
From TFS:
Security? So that is what they are calling it these days?
But don't you want protection from those evil third party (turd party?) cleaner cartridges? Or those sick evil pedo fake printer ink cartridges?
It is for your own protection!! You can't be too safe! Think of the children! If you don't, the terrorists win!
Yea, but how else can you automate posting to Twitter? :P
It's copy protection all over again: "Don't copy that poopy!"
(Score: 2) by t-3 on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:55PM
I foresee a lawsuit; IIRC toxoplasmosis readily aerosolizes (sp?) and many/most cats are infected so...
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday September 29 2016, @04:27PM
I have two cats and one somehow trained himself to pee in the bathtub right next to the drain. Less clumpy piss litter I have to shovel but I am going to try that clumping flushable stuff. Thing is, it's pretty expensive. I'd love to toilet train but im betting its too much hassle. A long time ago one of our cats got locked in the bathroom during the day and he took a dump in the toilet. We were blown away.
(Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Thursday September 29 2016, @04:33PM
You may need to change what you feed your cat.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday September 29 2016, @04:43PM
He just had a vet checkup and is in fine health. The bathtub thing might have been a behavior problem but it was cute when I would come down in the morning and he would follow and the both of us were using the bathroom together. He doesn't seem to do it as much anymore.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday September 29 2016, @05:12PM
Maybe I should quote when I make grade-level jokes.
> he took a dump in the toilet. We were blown away.
(Score: 2) by Kromagv0 on Thursday September 29 2016, @07:38PM
I thought you were referencing this:
Less clumpy piss
T-Shirts and bumper stickers [zazzle.com] to offend someone
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 29 2016, @05:45PM
Maybe some enterprising kick starter project. Or some hackaday project. Once someone builds a similar self cleaning litter box system and publishes plans, it could catch on. Ultimately availability of 3D printed parts make more projects like this become feasible.
Similarly I would love to see a printer company that decides to start a business of selling printers instead of selling ink. That would disrupt this ink selling scam and scum.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday October 03 2016, @02:27PM
The only really good automatic cat litter box I've seen is the Litter-Robot. It'd be cool if you could 3D-print one, because they're very expensive ($450 w/ free shipping), but I don't see how you'd easily 3D-print one of these things because they're quite large, with much of the size being dominated by a large globe. Most 3D printers I've seen are much too small to print anything that size; you'd have to design it to be made of a bunch of snap-together parts, which probably wouldn't work that well. Even so, with the high cost of the 3D printing plastic, I'd expect the 3D-printed version to cost almost as much as the real thing.
(Score: 3, Informative) by bzipitidoo on Thursday September 29 2016, @08:50PM
I was thinking of Keurig's proprietary coffee packs as an example outside of printing. Kirby tries it with their vacuum cleaners, insisting that only genuine Kirby branded shampoo can be used in their shampooing attachment. That one is laughably false, of course. Big Pharma tries to scare the US public away from Canadian pharmacies with vague fearmongering that medicine produced outside the US might not be up to the quality control standards of American products. As if they don't peddle lots of drugs of questionable benefit, so that a pharmacy or drug producer that switched real drugs for sugar pills might in those cases actually be doing the patients a favor. Car parts is another area with strong advertising for Genuine GM/Ford/Toyota Parts, and there's some justification for it, as there are shady car parts providers who will pull crap like cleaning up a worn out used part but not going to the trouble to rebuild it well, so it looks shiny but won't work for long. Then there's the RIAA's schemes to tie the playability of music files to being able to contact a licensing server, only to suffer embarrassment when their servers permanently go down causing irate customers to no longer be able to play their entire music collections. The MPAA and their unskippable commercials and region encoding was another bad one. We all know about Microsoft, as well as Apple, IBM, Oracle, and more. But litter boxes? Wow.
The public successfully bucked Keurig's attempt to shackle their customers. The RIAA also had to back off. However, I would like to see a more coordinated effort, and the establishment of "no locks" and open access as a custom that no manufacturer will dare violate. In the early days of Internet commerce, it became a custom not to bill customers for merchandise until it had actually shipped. Be good to have the same thing happen with lock in schemes.
(Score: 3, Funny) by chewbacon on Thursday September 29 2016, @06:00PM
They want to protect you from saving money.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Thursday September 29 2016, @09:01PM
I have over the past year bought two Samsung laser printers on closeout, a color one for $30 (yes, thirty US Dollars), and a print-scan-fax monochrome for about $100, both of which were on closeout sales at a store nearby.
I don't want to ever own another inkjet printer if I can help it, as I don't print enough to keep the heads flowing freely and that costs me a lot in replacing full ink cartridges and/or having explosive messes or spills when I try to "unclog" the cartridges.
So, it's laser printers, and I got these two very inexpensively.
But alas, Samsung uses screw-you chips on their toner cartridges. To be at least semi-sustainable with my lifestyle, I should at least refill the toner instead of throwing-away-and-replacing the perfectly good receptacle that holds the toner, when it happens to be low.
I don't respect Samsung's opinion as to whether I have toner remaining, as I prefer to judge that by... whether I have toner remaining.
And I'd like to refill from a bottle.
I have found a solution online with respect to my color printer that involves a convoluted fix of soldering an external spst momentary that causes the printer to believe that it has only just been manufactured, has never printed a page, and to assume that it has fresh "starter" lobotomized toner cartridges in it... but firmware that simply lets me reset the toner level would be about 5000% better.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 29 2016, @09:55PM
HP is buying Samsung's printer division. Optional firmware update allowing third-party toner in 3, 2, 1...
(Score: 2) by KritonK on Friday September 30 2016, @01:47PM
I have a Samsung CLP-325 laser printer, and I had no problem getting refilled toner cartriges for it. I say "had", because printing quality was hit and miss with refilled cartridges, so I stopped using them. I now use Q-Connect [q-connect.com] remanufactured cartridges, with which I've never had a problem.
On both refilled and remanufactured cartridges, the chip is exposed, so I assume that it has been tweaked or replaced, so that the cartridge will register as a new one on the printer.
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Friday September 30 2016, @12:06AM
The Apple iPrint is the most paper-friendly device we've ever created. We set out to make the best printer in the world—one that is quiet, clean and reliable. It comes in an incredible variety of colours, so you can find one that reflects your personal style and taste. Because you print with it, we've invented new, intimate ways to connect and communicate directly from all your Apple devices. It works seamlessly with iPod, iPhone, iPad, iMac, MacBook, Apple TV, and Apple Watch! And it's also a comprehensive health and fitness device. We've eliminated the hassles of changing ink and toner cartridges and adding paper: the iPrint comes fitted with built-in paper and pigment—no mess, no fuss. The iPrint.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Friday September 30 2016, @01:57AM
It was wireless, it was color, it scanned, it faxed, it was HP. How could I go wrong?
Well, lemme list the ways.
Got it 5-6 years ago. First year or two was great.
Then, whenever I went to print I got "out of paper, load letter". Pull the paper out, put it back in, press OK, it prints.
Then when I went to scan I couldn't find the scan. Turns out a software update had moved where the scans went. Did that update tell me they moved? Maybe in the EULA, otherwise I didn't notice.
Then, I suddenly had 5-6 printers in my Windows "choose a printer" box. Took a couple of guesses to figure out which one I wanted.
Then, ran out of ink and got it reloaded locally. Printer said "Out of ink", printed in B/W.
Power cycle, it accepted the ink but gives "out of ink" warnings every time I print. Colors are fine.
On top of that, for every problem I've had I've had to download the HP support assistant to figure out why. Nope, that HPSA I downloaded last month wasn't good enough, I needed to download it again. Did I mention it was a good 20 minutes to download and install HPSA? I'm mentioning it now. Fucking pain in the ass.
And here I stand. All my previous printers have been HP (going back some 30 years), this will probably be my last.
The one problem that burns my butt is the "out of paper". I can't reseat the paper before printing. No, I have to try and print, get my ass off my chair, walk to the printer, pull the 1" stack of paper out, put it back in, and hit "OK".
Hard to believe I go through all this shit to print 1 page twice a month.
My ducks are not in a row. I don't know where some of them are, and I'm pretty sure one of them is a turkey.
(Score: 2) by mendax on Friday September 30 2016, @04:47AM
And in honor of their decision, I'm placing an order for yet another 3rd-party toner cartridge for my HP LaserJet printer. Why? Because it's 1/3 the cost of the HP branded and works just as well, and HP has yet to address this discrepancy. Why should I pay $60 for something I can get for less than $20 that is just as good and works just as well? Furthermore, I feel justified given that HP had the audacity to try to do some after-the-sale DRM bullshit. Allow me to punish them by guaranteeing that they will never make a profit from the sale of this printer.
It's really quite a simple choice: Life, Death, or Los Angeles.