Went to HackCon
Gadgetman
Posts: 2,436
HackCon is a security conference held in Norway.
(It's not the same size as defCon, but what it lacks in size, it gains in quality... )
Guess who spoke about security in embedded systems...
Ryan Clarke.
(The name should ring a bell for most Propellerheads... )
I'd like to use this opportunity to apologise publicly for being a bit of overexcited fanboy...
Anyway... The guy has a mind that's scarily sharp!
One example he showed was a computer where a LED was lit.
Or so we thought...
It was actually flashing too fast for the human eye to see, and not in aa regular pattern, but as in transmitting DATA.
And no, it wasn't a LED set aside for optical data transfer.
just another diagnostic LED such as you can find on many motherboards, or as POWER or OK indicator on any box you have on the net.
What he didn't say then, but as he mentioned in the brief chat afterwards(and as most of the Propellerheads and serious Stampers here already know), a LED can also be used as a receiver.
Imagine that someone could send a 'delayed shutdown' command to your Firewall/router/valued piece of kit/ just by pointing with what looked like a simple laserpointer to it?
And the 'small' servers he showed us...
Those were downright scary.
He's a Professor of robotics at University of Advancing Technology now.
The presentation will probably show up on http://www.hackcon.org some time in the near future.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
Don't visit my new website...
(It's not the same size as defCon, but what it lacks in size, it gains in quality... )
Guess who spoke about security in embedded systems...
Ryan Clarke.
(The name should ring a bell for most Propellerheads... )
I'd like to use this opportunity to apologise publicly for being a bit of overexcited fanboy...
Anyway... The guy has a mind that's scarily sharp!
One example he showed was a computer where a LED was lit.
Or so we thought...
It was actually flashing too fast for the human eye to see, and not in aa regular pattern, but as in transmitting DATA.
And no, it wasn't a LED set aside for optical data transfer.
just another diagnostic LED such as you can find on many motherboards, or as POWER or OK indicator on any box you have on the net.
What he didn't say then, but as he mentioned in the brief chat afterwards(and as most of the Propellerheads and serious Stampers here already know), a LED can also be used as a receiver.
Imagine that someone could send a 'delayed shutdown' command to your Firewall/router/valued piece of kit/ just by pointing with what looked like a simple laserpointer to it?
And the 'small' servers he showed us...
Those were downright scary.
He's a Professor of robotics at University of Advancing Technology now.
The presentation will probably show up on http://www.hackcon.org some time in the near future.
▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔
Don't visit my new website...