How can I read the serial number directly from the broadcom chip instead of via /proc/cpuinfo?

Question

There's numerous posts about reading the Pi's serial number from /proc/cpuinfo. I'm considering using the serial number as a unique id for licencing commercial software but am concercned that /proc/cpuinfo could possibly be faked (I stumbled on a few links that suggested it was easily possible but I haven't verified them: https://www.raspberrypi.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=541842#p541842, Editing Serial Number etc.).

I also verify that /proc/cpuinfo reports a size of zero, but I'm not sure if that can also be worked around.

Is there a way to programmatically read the serial directly from the broadcom chip?

using the serial number as a unique id FYI: the 'serial' number is not unique. They are randomly generated and people have seen the same ID come up already... — Dirk, Dec 05 '19 at 05:50
@Dirk - Do you happen to know if the serial is programmed by the raspberry pi foundation or the chip manufacturer (broadcom?)? — NickD2039, Dec 06 '19 at 01:24
The number is programmed in the OTP register as part of the Pi production process. — Dirk, Dec 06 '19 at 12:50

Milliways · Accepted Answer · 2022-10-29T23:33:24.517

2

The serial number is programmed into the OTP register

This can be read with vcgencmd otp_dump

edited Oct 29 '22 at 23:33

answered Dec 05 '19 at 07:58

Milliways

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How can I read the serial number directly from the broadcom chip instead of via /proc/cpuinfo?

1 Answers1