ROCKEY 4

Smart Card Chip based Software Protection Dongle

 

rockey4-2017

Intro

ROCKEY4 is an innovative software defense system that affixeds to the parallel or USB port of a computer system. Your software application might be replicated, however it will just run when your ROCKEY4 dongle is connecteded to the computer. Your application will connect with ROCKEY4 at start-up and during runtime, No Dongle indicates No License to execute your software. You can also limit the use of your software which is very typical in the software market for DEMO functions or SHAREWARE.

When it come to software application designers providing multiple modules, ROCKEY4 permits you to safeguard approximately 16 applications per dongle at any one time (ROCKEY4ND now support 64 modules). Because every ROCKEY4 dongle has an one-of-a-kind ID, software designers can even limit the application to just permit to execution with a certain dongle.

Unlike some competing products, ROCKEY4 is in fact a powerful mini computer system, with a CPU, memory and specialized firmware that permits durable communication with your application. You may write algorithms that are firmly stored in the dongle, and then call those algorithms from time to time in your application. This method for software application protection is virtually impossible to crack. Although made for high level protection, it is likewise fairly simple to carry out.

Why Rockey4?

Low Cost

Why pay more when you can get something better at a cheaper price. ROCKEY4 costs you 50% or less than most of the competing Dongles available in the market. With ROCKEY4, you do not need to employ expensive software security experts but still enjoy high security on your software.

High Reliability

ROCKEY4 is built under a perfect customer management system in which every customer is guaranteed to own a unique password, and every dongle come with a unique hardware ID. Both the password and hardware ID are burnt into the CPU inside the dongle, it is absolutely impossible to change them, even for us – the manufacturer. On the other hand, with our high level of Quality Control during production, we are maintaining less than 0.5% faulty rate which is much more lower than the industry standard.

Protection across networks

ROCKEY4 is a well designed software protection system that comes with user friendly interface and useful sample source codes in most programming languages, so that you will have no difficulty learning how to integrate it into your software application. In most cases, just within few days a programmer can become the master of using ROCKEY4.

High Security

ROCKEY4 implements two-level security system to segregate users who need read only access from those who need administrative privileges. To combat hackers, ROCKEY4 has a built-in time gate to prevent software tracking and debugging on its protection system. In addition, ROCKEY4’s protected memory + user defined algorithm works within the dongle and is almost impossible to crack.

High Compatibility

ROCKEY4 LPT dongle is not only transparent to printers, scanners, but can also be cascaded with up to maximum of 16 dongles, even from other manufacturers. ROCKEY4 is also designed to process even very complex algorithms with minimal delay for your application. Broad support of ROCKEY4 include Operating Systems like DOS, Windows 3.1/95/98/NT/2000/ME/XP/ Server/Vista, Linux, and Mac; thus enables you to implement it onto almost any platform available in the market.

Product Detail

  • Powerful CPU + Secure momory + User define Algorithms = Secure Program Calculator
  • 2 levels 4×16-bit Password System
  • Globally Unique Hardware ID
  • Fully support IEEE1284 for maximum LPT compatibility applications
  • Protect upto 16 software modules with a single dongles
  • Built-in 24 bytes User Data Zone
  • 32 User Definable Algorithms
  • Support upto 16 ROCKEY4 dongles on the same PC
  • Low level encryption to prevent Emulation and Play Back Hacking
  • Time Watch Dog prevents Tracing Attack
  • Password Protect System prevents Brute-Force Attack
  • Ready tool include Enveloper, Editor, Data Recorder and Remote Update
Product Memory
Memory Zone Memory Zone Description Rockey4
User ID Zone User defined identifier 32-bit
Module Zone Non-readable memory spaces (16) Used with arithmetic calculations 16 modules (16-bit)
Zero Attribute Indicates if a module is “0” or not “0” 16 modules (2-bit)
Decrement Attribute Indicates if a module can be decreased 16 modules (2-bit)
User Data Zone User defined memory space 24-byte
User Algorithm Zone Instruction storage for user defined algorithms 32-instructions
Product Hardware Specification
Interface Type USB Type A, LPT
Interface Standard Standard USB 1.1. USB 2.0 compliant
Processor 8 bits CPU
Protection Mechanism Envelope tool
Working Temperature 0°C to 70°C
Storage Temperature -10°C to 80°C
Cascade Up to 16
Power Consumption <250mw
Working Voltage V
Working Current <50mA
Data Retention At least 10 years
Supported OS Windows, Linux and MAC
Latest Software Developer Kit (SDK)
Detail Size Date
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Complete SDK Request
Device Drivers:
Detail Size Date
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for Windows 32bit NEW! 375KB 28 Nov 2013
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for Windows 64bit NEW! 696KB 28 Nov 2013
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for Windows 7 32bit 375KB 23 Mac 2010
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for Windows 7 64bit 426KB 23 Mac 2010
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for DOS 490KB 23 Apr 2007
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for All 32bit Windows with Windows Vista Signature 665KB 23 Apr 2007
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for x64 Windows with Windows Vista Signature 903KB 23 Apr 2007
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for WinNT 217KB 23 Apr 2007
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Driver for Novell 37KB 15 May 2004
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Drivers for FreeBSD 61KB 24 Mar 2005
Utilities and Software:
Detail Size Date
ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 Editor 254KB 18 May 2007
ROCKEY4 Envelope Engine 958KB 18 May 2007
ROCKEY4 Flash swf Envelope Engine 1,810KB 02 Nov 2007
ROCKEY4 Remote Update 654KB 18 Nov 2005
ROCKEY4 Data Recorder 524KB 18 Nov 2005
NetROCKEY4 Service-Window 123KB 29 Aug 2008
NetROCKEY4 Service –Linux 229KB 28 Aug 2008
NetROCKEY4 Complete package (incl. Windows & Linux’s Tool, Utilities & API Sample Source code) 4,193KB 28 Aug 2008
API Libraries & Sample Source Codes:
Detail Size Date
ROCKEY4 API Samples for DOS Request
ROCKEY4 16 bit API Samples for Windows Request
ROCKEY4 32 bit API Samples for Windows Request
NetROCKEY4 API Samples for Windows Request

FAQ

This FAQ or frequently asked questions section will help you resolve some questions you or your customers may run into when using ROCKEY4 Software Protection products. We have listed the questions and the answers here for your reference.

1. What is the developer’s kit or evaluation kit?

The Developer’s Kit or DK is a preset package we send to developers for the purpose of evaluation. It includes one Developer’s Guide, SDK CD-ROM, and DEMO ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles. The only difference between these DEMO dongles and the commercial dongles is that their passwords are publicly known. When the user decides to purchase and use ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 after evaluation, we will provide ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles with secure and unique passwords.

The purchase code is intended for order management. You should use it if you need to reorder dongles with the same passwords as your previous order. This Purchase Code is unique for all of ROCKEY’s customers.

ROCKEY’s manufacturing process guarantees that each ROCKEY4 dongle is unique. The Hardware Identifier (HID) is a globally unique serial number that is burned into each dongle and cannot be changed by anyone, including the manufacturer. Passwords are specific to a customer and cannot be duplicated for another customer. It is our mission to protect the assets of our customers and we will requre separate security agreement with our customers if required.

Yes, it is very secure. The ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 password is actually a set of four individual passwords that authorize two security levels. The two Basic passwords authorize read-only access to the dongle. Read and Write access is authorized only with the combination of the Basic and Advanced password sets. The Advanced password set is meant for the developer and should not appear in the software that goes to the end user.

Each Dongle has 4 16-bit passwords. If a hacker wants to crack the dongle by exhaustion, the number of possible combinations is 264. If one computation takes 10-20 seconds, it would take 58 years to try every combination.

“Same-number” ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles are a set of dongles that have the same passwords. There will be a Purchase Code that corresponds to the “same-number” dongles. Most of our customers have all their respective dongles share the same password, so that they only need to compile their programs once before distribution.

The simplest way is to order new dongles with new passwords. Another way is to provide proof that you are the legitimate holder of the purchase code. Only the legitimate purchase code holder may obtain the passwords from ROCKEY.

ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 operates the parallel port through the device driver, and uses error correction technology at the communication protocol level. Therefore, it is compatible with most printers. However, there are a few models of printers that receive a large amount of current or electricity when powered off. This can cause a voltage shortfall to the dongle and result in a communication problem with the dongle driver. This problem can be easily solved by turning on the printer or removing the printer cable from the dongle.

  • The older version of the ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 drivers only supported normal printing modes. The newer version support normal, EPP and ECP modes. Be sure you are using the latest version of our driver. You may download the driver from our product page download section. Another solution to this problem would be to simply switch to the USB version of the ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongle. There is no extra programming required to switch to USB.
  • The compatibility of the LPT dongle and printer may be enhanced by setting the port in the CMOS or BIOS setup to EPP or ECP. An example using the AWARD system BIOS is given below:“Reboot the computer, press the DEL key to enter CMOS Setup. Select the menu option “INTEGRATED PERIPHERALS”. Then use either PAGEUP or PAGEDOWN key to change the “Parallel Port Mode” option.”

There are emulation programs that record all of the port accesses between the dongle and the driver. The emulation software then attempts to replicate the accesses after the dongle is removed. ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 has built in countermeasure for this sort of emulation. Lower layer communications between the dongle, driver and application is encoded. There is also “random noise” applied to the protocol communications so that any information recorded by the emulation program will be invalid from session to session. In addition, emulation software of this type will not work with USB devices. You may implement your own countermeasures to enhance this protection. The judicious use of seed code protection methods will make such attacks very difficult to implement successfully.

It is quite easy to prevent data sharing devices from doing this. Just generate a random number when the program starts, and write this number in a specific address in the ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongle, then check for the number in that specified address when the program is running or executing to see if it is the same number you have written. If another computer is also running the program during this period, and is using the same dongle, another random number would have been written to this address.

No. According to the results of our tests, the performance difference between the simplest algorithm and the most complex is within a dozen milliseconds. You will not notice any difference as long as you do not call the algorithm too frequent.

USB stands for Universal Serial Bus. Now it is a very common interface standard and is already implemented in many devices. Please visit www.usb.org for more details. Its advantages include plug and play capabilities, hot-swap support and high transfer rate. It can support up to 127 USB devices connected through extensions. USB eliminates conflict problems with printers and other peripheral devices.

No. They are fully compatible, other than the requirement that you install the USB drivers. The USB device will prompt you, automatically, to install the driver.

It may be caused by interference or bad contact points. Try unplugging the device and then plugging it in again.

It is possible that the USB support option inside the BIOS has been disabled. You can enable USB support in the CMOS functions menu when your computer is booting up.

If you are using or testing ROCKEY products, we will send our updates to you when there are any. You may also download the latest development packages and updates from our product page download section.

There are 4 possible causes for this:

A: The printer attached to ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 is powered off.

If a printer or any other peripheral device is attached to the parallel port ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4, you should turn the power of that device on. ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles require a voltage of about 2.2 volts, and this power is supplied by the mainboard through the parallel port so if a peripheral device is attached to the ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongle, the dongle may not receive enough power to be activated.

B: ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 does not support the parallel mode.

The diversity of computers leads to many different parallel modes, ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles support most modes, but for some special modes it is possible that the system cannot find ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4, or ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongles do not work well with them. What you need to do is change the parallel modes, eg. set the port mode in the CMOS setup to ECP. If the operating system is Windows NT/2000, you may have to reinstall the system after you have changed the parallel port modes.

C: The drivers are not properly installed.

ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 requires the installation of drivers, so the settings of drivers may affect the operation of ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4. There are 4 options when installing the drivers: “Install ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 USB driver”, “Detect-print-busy mode” and “Not-detect-print-busy mode”, we suggest users to choose “Install ROCKEY parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY USB driver”, and “Detect-print-busy mode”. In Windows NT/2000 only the administrator has the privilege to install drivers.

D: ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 is not compatible with other devices.

The parallel port was not designed to connect many devices at the same time, and in theory only one device can be attached to the parallel port at any one time. With the users in mind, ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 was designed to allow the standard devices, such as printers and scanners, to attach to it, but we cannot guarantee that ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 is compatible with all these devices. Unplug the device attached to ROCKEY/NetROCKEY to see if it is a compatibility problem.

Perhaps the drivers are not properly installed. Please refer to solution C for Question 18.

The indicator LED may help you to find the reason for this. If the indicator is bright all the time, it indicates that the dongle works well; if it blinks once every second, it indicates that the drivers are not properly installed or something is wrong with the USB port, or the dongle is defective. If the indicator is not bright and the system prompts “Found USB Device”, it indicates the dongle is defective, otherwise there is a bad connection or something is wrong with the USB port.

To check the USB port: when you first attach ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 to the computer the system should prompt “Found USB Device” and install the drivers for it, otherwise the USB port might have problem, which is usually caused by incorrect installation of the drivers for the USB controller or the USB function is disabled in CMOS setup, or there is a hardware failure in the USB port of the mainboard. You should test the USB port with another USB device, such as a USB mouse.

Because the parallel or LPT port ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 works between the computer and peripheral device, it is affected by both of them. The number one cause for ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 damage is because of over-voltage. In order to avoid damage by this, you should make sure that the ground wire is connected to the ground, and it is also connected to the computer casing. When you connect the devices together, you should turn off the power in advance. If you cannot connect the ground wire to the ground, then you should turn off the power and unplug the power plugs in advance to avoid power operation problems.

When users have several applications protected with different ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4s, they may cascade these dongles together. In most cases there is no problem for them to work together, but sometimes when you try to use one application you are given the message “Can not find ROCKEY”.

When system sends its request to ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4, a value will be returned to specify the next operation. If several dongles are cascaded, every dongle will receive the request and respond to it, so it is possible the return signals interfered one another, making the system confused, thus make it cannot recognize the dongle.

If restarting the computer solves this problem, it indicates that you did not set a value for p3 and p4 when you wrote the program. So after a period of time it returns the error “Too many dongles opened”, and you cannot open it again. Set a value, such as “0”, to p3 and p4 to resolve this problem. If restarting your computer does not resolve the problem, then some of the possibilities are: the dongle is defective, your computer is infected with a virus, the parallel port settings have been changed, some other device is attached to the ROCKEY4/NetROCKEY4 dongle, or the system has been reinstalled.

Troubleshotting

This section provides some troubleshooting suggestion related to technical support issues arises from end user implementation on ROCKEY4.

Useful Tips for Diagnosing ROCKEY4 problems, please try below before proceed to the FAQs.

Step 1 : Unplug ROCKEY4 dongle from PC, uninstall ROCKEY4 driver completely and reboot the system.

Step 2 : Reinstall ROCKEY4 driver, please make sure you are using latest ROCKEY4’s driver, to download click download tab above.

Step 3 : Plug ROCKEY4 to the PC and run ROCKEY4 Editor to change on the dongle, if ROCKEY4 is found, then ROCKEY4’s driver is working fine. Else uninstall -> reboot -> reinstall -> reboot then repeat Step 3. If problem, try with another port or PC.

1. I received an error -1 or the system can’t detect the dongle at certain times when I try to run my program using ROCKEY4. What is that?

For the error -1, it means that the error is an unknown error, but it is not serious, such as when a PC hangs or freezes, you only have to restart it and if that does not solve the problem you have to look for alternative solutions.

There can be several possible causes for this:

A: The printer attached to ROCKEY4 is powered off.

If a printer or any other peripheral device is attached to the parallel port ROCKEY4, you should turn the power of that device on. ROCKEY4 dongles require a voltage of about 2.2 volts, and this power is supplied by the mainboard through the parallel port, so if a peripheral device is attached to the ROCKEY4 dongle, the dongle may not receive enough power to be activated.

B: ROCKEY4 does not support the parallel mode.

The diversity of computers leads to many different parallel modes, ROCKEY4 dongles support most modes, but for some special modes it is possible that the system cannot find ROCKEY4, or ROCKEY4 dongles do not work well with them. What you need to do is to change the parallel modes, eg. set the port mode in the CMOS setup to ECP or vice versa. If the operating system is Windows NT/2000, you may have to reinstall the driver after you have changed the parallel port modes.

C: The drivers are not properly installed.

ROCKEY4 requires the installation of drivers, so the settings of drivers may affect the operation of ROCKEY4. There are 4 options when installing the drivers: “Install ROCKEY parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY USB driver”, “Detect-print-busy mode” and “Not-detect-print-busy mode”, we suggest users to choose “Install ROCKEY parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY USB driver”, and “Detect-print-busy mode”. In Windows NT/2000 only the administrator has the privilege to install drivers.

D: ROCKEY4 is not compatible with other devices.

The parallel port is not designed to connect many devices at the same time, and in theory only one device can be attached to the parallel port at any one time. With the users in mind, ROCKEY4 was designed to allow the standard devices, such as printers and scanners, to attach to it, but we cannot guarantee that ROCKEY4 is compatible with all these devices. Unplug the device to see if it is a compatibility problem.

E: ROCKEY4 is not compatible with certain PCI-based Parallel Add-on cards

Another issue is that ROCKEY4 LPT cannot work with certain PCI-based parallel port cards. ROCKEY4 will treat the card as a sort of hack attack and therefore refuse to communicate with it or the card does not supply enough power to the dongle for it to operate efficiently. If this is the case, we suggest using a USB port ROCKEY4 instead.

F: There may be a driver or software conflict on the system

Sometimes, the PC drivers may be conflicted or it may be conflict with any of the programs although this is highly rare. Solution: Restart the PC and run the program again. If it still cannot run, try starting up the PC with minimal drivers and programs and check to see if it can run. If it can, this means that it is a software conflict.

G: Driver is busy

This error can occur when the driver or dongle is busy and/or communications between the dongle and PC are interrupted. To rectify this situation, you can add a loop to your program when checking for the dongle. This will ensure that the program will check for the dongle more than once and be able to recognize it properly.

ROCKEY4 requires the installation of drivers, so the settings of drivers may affect the operation of ROCKEY4. There are 4 options when installing the drivers: “Install ROCKEY parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY USB driver”, “Detect-print-busy mode” and “Not-detect-print-busy mode”, we suggest users to choose “Install ROCKEY parallel driver”, “Install ROCKEY USB driver”, and “Detect-print-busy mode”. In Windows NT/2000 only the administrator has the privilege to install drivers.

The indicator LED may help you to find the reason for this. If the indicator is lit all the time, it indicates that the dongle works well; if it blinks once every second, it means drivers are not installed or something wrong with the USB port; otherwise the dongle is defective. If the indicator is not lit at all and the system prompts “Found USB Device”, it indicates the dongle is defective, otherwise there is a bad connection or something wrong with the USB port.

To check the USB port: when you first attach ROCKEY4 to the computer the system should prompt “Found USB Device” and install the drivers for it, otherwise the USB port must have a problem, which is usually caused by the incorrect installation of the drivers for the USB controller or the USB function is disabled in CMOS setup, or there is a hardware failure in the USB port of the mainboard. You may test the USB port with another USB device, such as a USB mouse.

ROCKEY works fine with most USB hubs. On rare occasions the dongle may not be detected through the hub due to inadequate output voltage. Please check the integrity of the USB port by trying a different USB device in the same port. For USB 2.0 hubs in particular, please make sure that the power supply is connected.

It may be caused by interference or bad contact points. Try unplugging the device and then plugging it in again.

It is possible that the USB support option inside the BIOS has been disabled. You can enable USB support in the CMOS functions menu when your computer is booting up.

Although the file RYDLL32.DLL is under the same directory as the program, FoxPro and VB programs will only search for DLLs under the system directory, so you should copy the file RYDLL32.DLL into the system directory.

When users have several applications protected with different ROCKEY4s, they may cascade these dongles together. In most cases there are no problem for them to work together, but sometimes when you try to use one application you are given the message “Cannot find ROCKEY”.

  • When the system sends its request to ROCKEY4, a value will be returned to specify the next operation. If several dongles are cascaded, every dongle will receive the request and respond to it, so it is possible the return signals interfered by one another, making the system puzzled, and will not be able to recognize the dongle.

ROCKEY4 does not currently support enveloping on DOS-based programs, only Windows-based programs can be enveloped at this point.

You will still need to install the drivers for the dongles either using the InstDrv.exe installation file or InstDLL.dll file. Otherwise, the dongles will not be able to be detected by the system and your program will give you an error. If you have already installed the proper drivers, please refer to question 2 above.

There should be no discernible difference between the two. Both are equally effective.

It is quite easy to prevent ROCKEY sharing between shared devices. Simply generate a random number when the program starts, and write this number in a specified address on ROCKEY dongle. During program execution, check the number in the specified address to verify that it is the number you had previously written. If another computer runs this program during this period, and tries to use the same dongle, a different random number will have been written to this address.

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