Recently, Nintendo hastily released a new firmware update (version 3.0.1) for the Nintendo Switch. There weren’t much patch notes to go along with the update. The peeps at Switchbrew, who are working on bringing homebrew to Switch, have discovered the real reason.

According to Switchbrew, there was an exploit prior to 3.0.1 which gives full permissions to any user to any service on the Switch operating system. Here’s the technical nitty gritty:

Prior to 3.0.1, the service manager (“sm”) built-in system module treats a user as though it has full permissions if the user creates a new “sm:” port session but bypasses initialization.
In 3.0.1, “sm” returns error code 0x415 if Initialize has not been called yet.

Switch and 3DS hacker SciresM has this to say regarding the exploit.

It can’t be understated how big this bug was. If you want switchhax, don’t update to 3.0.1. It might take significantly longer if you do.

For context: the sm bug is what’s enabled basically everything from game-romfs/savefile/sysmodule code dumping to even other known bugs. RIP

What does this essentially mean? The Nintendo Switch has been hacked, and homebrew is coming sooner than everyone thought.