On Mon, 24 Apr 2000 21:45:43 +0200, Anthony Atkielski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
> Not every machine on the Internet has an Ethernet card with a MAC address,
> otherwise it might not be such a bad idea. I think using the MAC address is
> an excellent idea for software protection schemes (it's a lot more elegant
> than a hardware key such as a dongle), but nobody seems interested in that.
Nobody is interested in it because it doesn't work.
The Ethernet spec requires that each card have a unique MAC address
that's burnt onto the card. However, due to some truly wierd stuff
done by DecNet "way back when", cards were *also* required to support
loading a new MAC address on the fly.
So to pirate a softare package that locks based on the MAC address, all
you have to do is pirate it off any compatible machine on any subnet
other than your own. You can even pirate it off your own subnet
if you don't care about ARP working. ;)
Valdis Kletnieks
Operating Systems Analyst
Virginia Tech
