Germany’s Chaos Computer Club has announced the theme for their annual Chaos Communication Congress: “Nothing to hide“. Like last year’s “Full steam ahead!“, it’s open to many interpretations. People striking down privacy laws often say citizens shouldn’t mind since they have “Nothing to hide”. The phrase is also connected to the inability to hide data, as the CCC demonstrated this year by publishing the German Home Secretary’s fingerprint. On a more positive side, “Nothing to hide” is also about the free exchange of information that happens at hacker conventions. The Congress is in its 25th year and promises to be as good as ever. At last year’s 24C3, we saw great talks like [Drew Endy]’s biohacking talk and the original MiFare crypto presentation. 25C3 will be held in Berlin December 27th to 30th. The wiki is already up and they’ve published a call for participation, if you’re interested.
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Black Hat 2008: NIC Based Rootkit
While Black Hat and Defcon have both concluded, we’re going to post a few more talks that we think deserve attention. [Sherri Sparks] and [Shawn Embleton] from Clear Hat presented Deeper Door, exploiting the NIC chipset. Windows machines use NDIS, the Network Driver Interface Specification, to communicate between the OS and the actual NIC. NDIS is an API that lets programmers talk to network hardware in a general fashion. Most firewalls and intrusion detection systems monitor packets at the NDIS level. The team took a novel approach to bypassing machine security by hooking directly to the network card, below the NDIS level.
The team targeted the Intel 8255x chipset because of its open documentation and availability of compatible cards like the Intel PRO/100B. They found that sending data was very easy: Write a UDP packet to a specific memory address, check to make sure the card is idle, and then tell it to send. The receive side was slightly more difficult, because you have to intercept all inbound traffic and filter out the replies you want from the legitimate packets. Even though they were writing low level chipset specific code, they said it was much easier to implement than writing an NDIS driver. While a certainly a clever way to implement a covert channel, it will only bypass an IDS or firewall on the same host and not one on the network.
[photo: Big Fat Rat]
Defcon 16: Glimpses Of The Network Operations Center
Wired’s Threat Level takes us on a photo tour of the Defcon Network Operations Center, giving a unique behind-the-scenes perspective of one of the largest computer security conventions. The Defcon Network Operations Center is run by a volunteer group named the “Goons”. They keep operations running smoothly and securely with both high and low-tech resources, like a Cisco fiber switch and an armed guard, to protect the router and firewall.
Defcon 16: Covert Warballooning Flight
Since last month, when the Defcon warballooning event was announced, [Rick Hill] finished building his rig and even got FAA approval for the flight. Just when everything seemed set, the Riviera Hotel management decided not to allow the takeoff from their property. So, naturally, [Rick] and his team rented a moving truck and covertly inflated the balloon inside. They launched it in an abandoned parking lot and drove through the Vegas strip. They were surprised to find that about one third of the 370 wireless networks they scanned were unencrypted.
[photo: JoergHL]
[via /.]
Defcon 16: Pacemaker-B-Gone
A collaboration of various medical researchers in the academic field has led to proof that pacemakers can be remotely hacked with simple and accessible equipment. [Kevin Fu], an associate professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, led the team. [Kevin] first tried to get documentation from the manufacturers, believing they would support the effort, but they were not interested in helping. They were forced to get access to an old pacemaker and reverse engineer it. They found that the communication protocol used to remotely program the device was unencrypted. They then used a GNU radio system to find access to some of the machine’s reprogrammable functions, including accessing patient data and even turning it off.
Although this was only done with one particular pacemaker, it proves the concept and should be taken seriously by the medical companies who produce these devices. If you are interested in the technical aspects, check out the paper the team released in May disclosing the methods.
Fun With Barbie Karaoke Machines
[Peter Edwards] at Casper Electronics built a modular synth and integrated it with the Barbie karaoke machines we saw at Notacon last April. The complete unit consists of 25 modules which are wired together using banana cables. He’s using this homebrew step sequencer to control the bent karaoke machines which then feed into the rest of the synthesizer. If you’d like to bend your own barbie karaoke machine, [Peter] was kind enough to post schematics and instructions for his bends.
Defcon 16: MIT Boston Transit Presentation Gagged
[Zack Anderson], [RJ Ryan], and [Alessandro Chiesa] were sued by the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority for an alleged violation of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act after copies of their presentation slides were circulated at Defcon 16. The slides give an eye widening glimpse into the massive security holes present in the Boston subway system. There are at least 4 major security flaws in the subway, which allowed them to get free subway rides by finding unlocked, back door routes into the subway, spoofing magnetic and RFID cards, and attacking the MTBA’s network. Judge Douglas P. Woodlock has issued a gag order, stopping the trio from giving the presentation at Defcon or disclosing sensitive information for ten days. However, the MIT school newspaper, The Tech, has published a PDF of the slides online. The research culminated in the trio warcarting the MTBA’s headquarters and being driven off by police.
