Hacking group fail0verflow has discovered a vulnerability in the Nintendo Switch that allows Linux, thus opening the door to something the parent company hopes would never happen: pirated games.
In a Twitter earlier this week, fail0verflow revealed that the Nintendo Switch comes with a bug that cannot be fixed with firmware updates and which can be exploited at any time to install Linux.
More specifically, the exploit targeted a bug in the boot ROM, suggesting that software fixes are not possible. This means that if Nintendo wants to prevent this hack, the only way to do so is to work with Nvidia to create new Tegra X1 chips that don't include the vulnerability, although the company could find other ways to mitigate the problem.
At first glance, the main advantage of jailbreaking a Nintendo Switch is the ability to install homebrew apps and pirated games, although Nintendo is surely already working on methods to address the problem.
Meanwhile, things are much simpler than they seem. If Nintendo can figure out which consoles have been compromised, it could ban those users from online play, running a series of checks before each device connects to its servers. The company could also release new firmware updates to address this bug, at least to some extent.
At this point, Nintendo has not taken a position on the matter and opinions are divided on whether this is a useful finding or not.
