Comments on: Defcon 16: MIT Boston transit presentation gagged

By: axllaruse

axllaruse — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 05:26:39 +0000

These kids are heroes.

These kids have showed how careless was the security in this public transportation used by many civilians.

What would append if some nutjob decide to make an attack on the subway?

How many lives we have to put on risk before doing something about it?

Do we need to wait for a disaster to append before we decide to do something about it?

These kids should be rewarded for being good citizens and risk their freedom in order to protect our lives by publishing the security risk on Boston.

By: Boston IT Support

Boston IT Support — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 20:36:11 +0000

interesting stuff here I wish i knew more about this stuff im trying to learn more about it

By: marxc2001

marxc2001 — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 21:50:51 +0000

Interesting point - this has showed up on WikiLeaks...

https://secure.wikileaks.org/wiki/Anatomy_of_a_Subway_Hack_2008

Sapere Aude,

M.

By: Greg

Greg — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:45:57 +0000

If you are interested in their court case you can find copies of all of the court documents and some email correspondence here http://cryptome.org/mbta-v-zack/mbta-v-zack.htm

Also I think the MBTA is taking the wrong approach here. Instead of trying to give a gag order and hide the information (which will never work) they should just hire these kids to fix the system. I mean anyone who can create a "one button party mode"(http://web.mit.edu/zacka/www/midas.html) for their dorm room can fix these problems.

By: craig

craig — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 01:51:07 +0000

Aside from the subway hacks, the presentation says they’ve built alot of really cool tools to help with their research.

One particular one is a toolchain to easily program ‘multi-core’ FPGAs to assist with their brute forcing of the subway RFID chips.

Even if the gag order continues, hopefully they’ll be able to post some of the tools that they developed that aren’t to do with subway systems directly.

By: M4CGYV3R

M4CGYV3R — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 19:08:51 +0000

If you give a crap about freedom of speech, download, copy, and distribute these slides at every opportunity. Don’t let some corrupt judge tell us what we can and can’t see or read.

By: Eddie

Eddie — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 16:51:58 +0000

Yeah, but the application of the exploits acts as a proof of concept. If these vulnerabilities were ignore-able, the transit authority wouldn’t have fought so hard to shut the kids up. If they didn’t actually apply the exploits, it becomes the kids’ word against the transit authority’s. The fact that they applied the exploits proves to everyone that the vulerabilities actually exist. Let’s just hope this whole ordeal acts as a wake-up call to the transit authority, as it very well should. But it’s Boston, so there’s a good chance it won’t. (Remember, same place a bunch of LED’s thrown together on a PCB was misconstrued as a bomb.)

By: David Cranor

David Cranor — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 11:24:47 +0000

Anybody make a copy of the “updated slides and code” from the website before it was pulled?

By: eric

eric — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 11:14:53 +0000

I think the real problem is they went beyond simply finding the vulns. They *applied* them. This puts them in a very sticky legal situation, especially since their own slides act as admission of guilt.

By: John Adams

John Adams — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 08:08:41 +0000

Let’s give thanks to the EFF for staying up all night and attempting to fight this gag order over the last 24 hours. Although they failed, the EFF is continuing to fight for these students right to speak.

By: Eddie

Eddie — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 05:24:20 +0000

“We have a bunch of security vulnerabilities, but are too lazy to be bothered with them, so shut up. Don’t let the public know that they’re being screwed. If you do, we’ll take you to court. Yeah, I told you to shut up, but you didn’t listen, so now I’ll court-order you to stop talking. Our problems don’t exist!” Yet another reason I don’t like Boston.

By: Shadyman

Shadyman — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 04:41:56 +0000

Warcarting! I love it!