The World of Underground Tractor Hacking

[kamalktk]

American farmers are buying hacked software for farm tractors from private Ukrainian websites.

https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/...acking-their-tractors-with-ukrainian-firmware

More at link above (on my mobile, i will get it properly linked later)
--------------------------------------------------------
A dive into the thriving black market of John Deere tractor hacking.
To avoid the draconian locks that John Deere puts on the tractors they buy, farmers throughout America's heartland have started hacking their equipment with firmware that's cracked in Eastern Europe and traded on invite-only, paid online forums.

Tractor hacking is growing increasingly popular because John Deere and other manufacturers have made it impossible to perform "unauthorized" repair on farm equipment, which farmers see as an attack on their sovereignty and quite possibly an existential threat to their livelihood if their tractor breaks at an inopportune time.

 

[TheLeeds]

Can't say I blame them. I'm not entirely sure of the legal position regarding ownership of vehicles, tractors, etc in the US, but from a British viewpoint, contract law here is very complicated.
Whether any EULA would actually be legally binding on a purchaser of a physical machine is debatable, especially considering the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 and the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations. With chattels, if you own them, then that's it, they are yours to do with as you wish, within the confines of the law and morality. There can be exceptions with land and property, in the form of positive and restrictive covenants, which in some cases can bind subsequent purchasers who were not party to the original contract for sale of that land or property, but even with this, there have been exceptions (Hepworth v Pickles).

I've often said with regard to second hand computer hardware that any EULA which may have been binding on an original purchaser would not necessarily be binding on any subsequent purchaser of that hardware, even if for example it still had a Windows operating system installed and running on it, because only in some (but certainly not all) cases has the original owner of a computer ticked a box to say they agree to the terms and conditions (but their ticking of a box cannot bind anyone who is not party to this). If I buy a second hand computer with XP,, Vista, Windows 7,8, 10, whatever, I am not a party to any contract with Microsoft because I have never purchased anything from the company or it's agents, I have never agreed to their terms or conditions and as far as I'm aware, there is no statute which says I am bound by conditions I didn't agree to.
If the people who own these tractors didn't buy them directly from the manufacturer, or manufacturer's agent, it could be argued that any terms and conditions relating to main dealer servicing etc are not binding. It would be interesting to see where this leads and look at any precedent cases which emerge.