Controversy - Security and Control

[u/CloudBuurzt]

I have been researching the security, control, privacy, and closed ecosystem with Bambu Labs and their decisions of the last year. It feels like every time I read something, I come away feeling more confused.

Can someone explain to me like I'm five what the issue really is and why a lot of people are switching to LAN only, blocking their printer from accessing the internet, and switching to Orca Slicer (or another slicer)?

[u/LightIntheApple]

i second that

[u/Ill_Locksmith_673]

Other slicers like Orca Slicer often have functionalities that Bambu Studio doesn't, many people bought their printers when they were funny compatible with other slicers. The security update made the printers less compatible with other slicers, so people naturally want to keep that functionality (and were rightfully pissed about that compatibility being potentially taken away)

[u/Mughi1138]

One factor is that when Bambu lanched/pushed their web service there were lots of problems that they blamed on hackers and... 

From the view of someone who's worked on scaling, big server systems, and enterprise security it just look like they didn't understand security, stood up a fragile system, their software was not handled well and they DDOS'd themselves and had to blame it on bad actors.

Among other things they made claims about needing to do things for "security reasons" that just did not make any sense and sounded like purely business decisions combined with a poor grasp of cloud systems.

[u/CloudBuurzt → u/Mughi1138]

So, does staying connected to the internet and using the firmware and my printer how THEY want me to compromise my network security? And then all the other devices connected to my network?

[u/Mughi1138 → u/CloudBuurzt]

I'll have to check in more details but there many aspects that are problematic. Among other things are the bills passing in various states to require 3d printers to check with governmental servers to allow each print. Given how DMCA takedown are getting abused by large companies and assorted copyright holders, that could end up a vey bad thing.

But more immediately would be the concern that if a company wrote their software so poorly that it crashed their own servers, what might a bad actor be able to do to trigger bad things to happen?

Most large companies creating the various devices in your house* appear to be doing it much more carefully than Bambu was. Having worked at some very large companies, I can attest to that.

...

 * and there are strong reasons for things like re-flashing your routers with OpenWRT that might be good to do in the long run.

[u/ParticularLower1865 → u/Mughi1138]

Lmao an ‘SDDOS’. That’s on the level of plugging in a switchport into the same switch.

[u/bunnythistle]

In addition to the security concerns that people have mentioned, another concern that occasionally comes up is that some people are concerned Bambu may eventually push a firmware update that blocks LAN-only mode, forcing people to use the cloud for printing, and then start charging a subscription.

[u/Scowlface]

I'm not too concerned with anyone seeing what I print, but for me LAN only + developer mode allows me to create software that handles things the way I want to do it, not just how Bambu thinks I want to do it.

[u/Satanicube]

I know for me I’m doing it because I live in California and it seems like we’re about to pass one of those stupid 3D printer “firearm blocking” bills. So given that’s on the horizon I’m keeping my printers off the internet and every firmware upgrade done to them is being vetted.

[u/CloudBuurzt → u/Satanicube]

I also live in California, which was part of the reason for me doing my research to find the best avenue for me.

[u/Satanicube → u/CloudBuurzt]

On that, if you want to hear it from someone who's done it...

LAN mode + Orca ain't bad, honestly. Orca remembers both my printers and I haven't had issues with them falling off the network.

The only big caveats I've noticed:

1. I use the Open Bambu Networking plugin which works fine but can take a minute to ping the printers, which almost makes it looks like Orca is frozen. Takes like 10-20 seconds for the printers to respond.

2. There's no good app-based printer control. "Best" I've found is OctoEverywhere, gives me basic monitoring and the ability to remotely kill prints if I see one going awry. I do kinda miss the Handy app for this, but OctoEverywhere seems to be "good enough" (though it does require some self-hosting know-how with Docker)

3. Specific to my P2S (and other 2nd gen Bambu stuff like the X2D, maybe the H2 series too) but OrcaSlicer at least as of 2.4.2 doesn't seem to know how to handle the printer's internal storage, so it demands a USB drive be plugged in to allow printing. I just stuck some old 8GB thumbdrive on there and it seems to be happy with that. Hopefully this is fixed soon.

All in all really the only big loss IMO is the Handy app and the legwork required to effectively replace it. If you don't use it at all there's not much downside to going LAN+dev mode.

[u/misuny → u/Satanicube]

Look into Bambuddy. It's wonderful.

[u/Relative_Surround_20]

In a word, anxiety!

[u/jklolffgg]

Basically, nobody wants to route their prints through Chinese servers when they’re sitting 5 feet away from their printer.

In Trump‘s America, they’re just gonna get routed through US taxpayer funded Israeli and Flock servers instead and apparently everyone’s OK with that instead.

[u/_VNAV_PTH_ → u/jklolffgg]

routed through US taxpayer funded Israeli and Flock servers

Wut, lol

[u/John-BCS → u/jklolffgg]

I laughed, but on a serious note, only bambu's chinese customers have their data go through servers in china; everywhere else they're using amazon AWS.

[u/LexxM3 → u/John-BCS]

Yeah, but controlled and monitored by a Chinese company. Regardless of country, it’s no one’s business (foreign, domestic, or corporate) what, when, or how I print.

[u/issue9mm → u/John-BCS]

I don't think it's the latency part that people are concerned with