Infrastructure concerns with grobo

Community
#1

I have already pulled the trigger and ordered my grobo premium but as I look into the “app” I am starting to get a little concerned. For one, the app does not appear to be an “app” at all but really just a webpage. It concerns me that you essentially can not tell your grobo to do anything without this website which means that if that server goes down, or the business goes under, or even if my internet service goes down for a period of time, the grobo is rendered useless. Is there a way to control the grobo over a wifi network even if the internet is down?

Not having the grobo yet, I can’t do my own security audit but I obviously have concerns there too. I am wondering if any savvy grobo owners can tell me what ports are open on the grobo when it sits on your network. Are there any ssh capabilities? does it have it’s own direct web interface etc…

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#2

The device OS is basically a thin client on queue (or similar), it sends telemetry upstream and commands come downstream.

There’s not much that can be done locally besides configuring the wifi to bring it online or using the rear button to unlock/toggle light mode.

Port scanning the grobo causes it to reboot - it’s either a tripwire or hardware limitation (I believe the latter).

EDIT: there’s likely more to be found but that’s where I stopped.

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#3

Port scanning causes a reboot? Wow… even with a passive scan or port knocking disabled? They should definitely make this open source so people can spin up their own servers/API

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#4

This has been one of the biggest complaints, and requests.

They won’t open settings for us, so the Grobo is basically a black box we cannot see into.

My hope is they eventually open this up, through say an Advanced Mode Tab or something.

I have enjoyed by Grobo so far, but the biggest complaint has been lack of software updates.

They seem more focused on acquiring new customers, then providing software updates this machine really needs. Like the ability to see your data, instead, you have to put in a ticket with them if something is wrong.

The more people that complain, and request this, my hope is they eventually will cave to the requests

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#5

Its not just about seeing my data, its about how this machine would be rendered useless should they shut down their servers… Its kind of awful!

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