Exactly. Going after Coolsat was an unnecessary move. The rollout of N3 eliminated them from the playing field. The HD boxes never did the Turbo mode, and the company (mgmt) and manufacturing (contracted) had a number of reorganizations, so in the end for Nagra 3 decryption they were done for anyway.
Echostar has not been so quick to swing the axe, and it's been after the small time or down and out players. Viewsat is like Coolsat in that thier product line no longer poses a threat. The newest exploit requires IP connectivity
and a subscription.
Dont fel too sorry for Charlie and his losses.....
As long as Echo equipment was needed they were still a leg up on the competition and for every package or PPV that he didnt get paid for, neither did Comcast or DTV, but he did have the basic subber, until the FTA exploit became so widespread. "Business is good" might not be the most accurate statement, but the hacked service hurt DTV and cable far worse, and in big biz, that logic actually makes things show up in the plus column.
The current exploit, card sharing, requires a subscription. The industry knows about sub sharing, multiple IRDs on one account at different locations, and does little about it. The card sharing concept is very similar so I dont expect a big push for it's resolution anytime soon, unless it's some half-assed token gesture to apease stockholders.
Detection of the FTA based systems is possible, but it is a zero growth industry and should burn itself out in time, although Echo's move to all MP4 will likely breathe some new life into it.
Detection of the home LAN, or neighborhood WAN/wireless or VPN setups will be much more of a challenge, but we are back to the same math, -10 for Comcast, -10 for DTV, -9 for Charlie, and it's possible that loss is even less for Echo if you factor in card sharing replacing the (already counted as lost) sub sharing setups.
Fortec, Traxis, Coolsat, Viewsat etc, none of these companies manufacture anything, it is all sub-contracted out to Asian engineering and manufacturing facilities. The Blackbird and the Fortec were some of the front runner FTA hack boxes. The Traxis is likely just a Coolsat 4000 or similar clone. It is possible that some 3rd party FW would have allowed it to be used for signal theft too. Hell, when you can use modified Pansat FW to make a DP 301 or a DTV (DSS) box receive DVB FTA signals anythings possible.
Personally I'm waiting for the ATSC to DCII hack......
would be nice alternative for those FP and ZK channels.......