JTAG Hacking An SSD With A Pi: A Primer

Matthew “wrongbaud” Alt is renowned for his hardware hacking and reverse-engineering tutorials. In his latest project, he introduces the PiFEX (Pi Interface Explorer), showcasing its capabilities for JTAG hacking. This hardware, along with a Pi 4, OpenOCD, and other open-source tools, helps reveal the secrets of mSATA and M.2 SSD testpoint arrays.

The PiFEX hat is a versatile tool, featuring level-shifted bidirectional GPIO connectors for UART, SPI, I2C, JTAG, SWD, and more. It includes an OLED screen for debugging information and a logic analyzer header for monitoring reverse-engineering progress.

The suggested software workflow is comprehensive, offering ease-of-use features like USB-Ethernet gadget mode and Jupyter notebooks. wrongbaud demonstrates how to identify JTAG among the testpads on an SSD, step through its code, and dump its memory. This primer provides a solid foundation in JTAG hacking, even for those with just a Pi and an old SSD.

wrongbaud plans to open source both the PiFEX hardware and software soon. In the meantime, it’s possible to re-implement the hardware yourself to start experimenting with reverse engineering using the Raspberry Pi.

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