In a revealing study of the hardware industry, Jack Barradell-Johnsan expert from the PenTestPartners site, has exposed the fraudulent practices behind the SSDs high capacity sold at incredibly low prices on AliExpress.
This security researcher set out to investigate how these devices, which promise capacities such as 32TB for little more than $25 dollars, They manage to convince less informed and confident buyers.
The initial attachment of these High capacity SSDs It is tempting for any user to look for an exceptional offer. Packaged with the appearance of quality and performance promisesthese products are deceptive at first glance, however, according to Barradell-Johns research, the reality is very different.
By connecting one of these SSDs to the PCWindows initially detects and shows a capacity of 32 TB, seeming to confirm the legitimacy of the product. But, to verify the veracity of this ability, Barradell-Johns used a rustic but effective methodology, repeatedly copying a 500 MB file until the disk is full.
This is where discovered the deceptionSince the SSD could only store 97.5GB before reaching its limit, suggesting that directly there was tampering with the SSD firmware.
The expert revealed that they use sophisticated techniques such as alteration of logical block addressing (LBA), the partition table forgery and the creation of fake metadata. These practices they cheat the operating system so that it incorrectly interprets the capacity of the device, showing a figure much higher than what it can physically store.
He SSD disassembly revealed a small PCB which houses a Micro-SD card reader and a port USB of connection. This discovery confirms that the device does not have the capability announced 32 TB native storage, but depends on a Micro-SD card to simulate said capability using firmware tricks.
This case illustrates the risks inherent in purchasing technology products on unregulated e-commerce platforms. AliExpressknown for its low prices and the presence of unverified sellers, It is fertile ground for this type of fraud.
Barradell-Johns warns about the importance of due diligence when purchasing products onlineespecially when it comes to critical storage devices that promise exceptional capabilities at prices that are too good to be true.
Player buys a new RTX 4090, but suffers when he sees that it overheats for weeks for no reason, and when he disassembles it he sees that the GPU did not come complete
A buyer of reddit has revealed a serious problem with his new Palit RTX 4090 graphics cardpurchased for more than $1,000 dollars. According to user kentukky, who shared his experience on the pcmasterrace subreddit, the GPU had overheating problems since its acquisition, which seriously affected its performance.
Given the lack of help from technical support, described by kentukky as insufficient and uncooperative, decided to investigate on his own. It was then that he discovered the cause of the problem when disassembling the graphics card: the thermal pads necessary for effective heat transfer were not installed.
