Black Hat: Lots of hacks and a patriotic plea

Research reveals vulnerability to a key router protocol, as well as threats to critical infrastructure

Celebrating its 15th anniversary, Black Hat this year went beyond technical hacking and entered the realm of politics and patriotism with its choice of keynote speaker Cofer Black, former counterterrorism chief at the CIA, who called on attendees to consider joining government anti-cyberterrorism programs.

 

The implications are severe enough that he briefed the Department of Homeland Security about the problem, and he says the department is following up with vendors of vulnerable gear as well as owners of the critical infrastructure that might be at risk as a result.

Bailey says he and fellow researchers took a look at devices that are attached to phone networks for the purpose of receiving control messages and discovered two types. Then they figured out how to distinguish these devices from the less-interesting devices connected to phone networks such as phones, modems and faxes.

By following clues in owner’s manuals or with a little reverse engineering of some hardware, they were able to send control messages to individual devices. He says they were able to compromise the car alarm in about two hours.