Everhart, Glenn From: Aleph One [aleph1@NATIONWIDE.NET] Sent: Friday, May 15, 1998 5:35 PM To: BUGTRAQ@NETSPACE.ORG Subject: Re: Toshiba notebooks BIOS password backdoor On Fri, 15 May 1998, Rop Gonggrijp wrote: > The dutch newspaper 'De Volkskrant' has reported about an individual named > Stefan Arts that has a password that will unlock all Toshiba notebook > computers that are locked with the BIOS password function. The password > itself was not published. Mention was made that Toshiba Netherlands has been > threatening to sue Arts if he exposed the password, saying that 'publication > would serve no purpose'. This single password exists for service staff to > help people that have forgotten their password and is known at Toshiba > service centers and dealerships all over the world. The dutch police told > Toshiba that they should ask him to 'name a price' when they were in contact > with him, so that he could be arrested for blackmail/extortion... Backdoor BIOS password are nothing new. They been discussed here back in 1996. In particular it was reported that Award BIOSes had the following backdoor password: "Condo,", "AWARD_SW", "j332", and "589589". Someone also postes a program that will reveal the backdoor passwords in AMI BIOSes. You can find it at http://www.netspace.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9611D&L=bugtraq&D=&H=&T=&O=&F=&P=300 The original message that started that thread is http://www.netspace.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind9611C&L=bugtraq&D=&H=&T=&O=&F=&P=2589 > Grtz, > > -- > Rop Gonggrijp > Aleph One / aleph1@dfw.net http://underground.org/ KeyID 1024/948FD6B5 Fingerprint EE C9 E8 AA CB AF 09 61 8C 39 EA 47 A8 6A B8 01