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Breaking VISA PIN

Jul 02, 2008 in Banking and EFTPoS

Below is an article I found recently. This one of the most comprehensive descriptions of Value () .

I thought I would replicate it here for my local reference.

As comment have been made regarding the grammar used in the original , I have corrected some of the obvious errors whilst maintaining the context of the original material.

http://69.46.26.132/~biggold1/fastget2you/tutorial.

——– Original ———-

Foreword
Have you ever wonder what would happen if you lose your or and someone finds it. Would this person be able to withdraw cash from an ATM guessing, somehow, your ? Moreover, if you were who finds someone’s would you try to guess the and take the chance to get some easy ? Of course the answer to both questions should be “no”. This work does not deal with the second question, it is a matter of . Herewith I try to answer the first question.

All the information used for this work is public and can be freely found in . The rest is a matter of and programming, thus we can learn and have some fun. I reveal no secrets. Furthermore, the aim (and final ) of this work is to demonstrate that algorithms are still strong enough to provide sufficient . We all know is not the .

This work analyses one of the most common algorithms, , used by many ( and cards) and tries to find out how resistant is to guessing attacks. By “guessing” I do not mean choosing a random and trying it in an ATM. It is well known that generally we are given three consecutive trials to enter the right , if we fail ATM keeps the . As is four digit long it’s easy to deduce that the chance for a random guessing is 3/10000 = 0.0003, it seems low enough to be safe; it means you need to lose your more than three thousand times (or losing more than three thousand cards at the same time :) until there is a reasonable chance of losing .

What I really meant by “guessing” was breaking the so that given any you can immediately know the associated . Therefore this document studies that possibility, analyzing the and proposing a method for the . Finally we give a tool which implements the and present results about the estimated chance to break the system. Note that as long as other related algorithms (other formats such as IBM or validation signatures such as or CVC) are similar to , the same analysis can be done yielding nearly the same results and conclusions.



One of the most common algorithms is the Value (). The customer is given a and a . Encoded in the is a four digit number, called . This number is a cryptographic signature of the and other related to the . When a user enters his/her the ATM reads the , encrypts and sends all this information to a central computer. There a trial is computed using the customer entered and the information with a cryptographic . The trial is compared with the stored in the , if they match the central computer returns to the ATM authorization for the . See in more detail.

The description of the can be found in two documents linked in the previous page. In summary it consists in the of a 8 byte (64 bit) string of , called Transformed Parameter (TSP), with (DEA) in Code Book mode (ECB) using a secret 64 bit key. The is derived from the output of the process, which is a 8 byte string. The four digits of the (from left to right) correspond to the first four decimal digits (from left to right) of the output from when considered as a 16 hexadecimal character (16 x 4 bit = 64 bit) string. If there are no four decimal digits among the 16 hexadecimal characters then the is completed taken (from left to right) non decimal characters and decimalizing them by using the conversion A->0, B->1, C->2, D->3, E->4, F->5. Here is an example:

Output from : 0FAB9CDEFFE7DCBA

: 0975

The strategy of avoiding decimalization by skipping characters until four decimal digits are found (which happens to be nearly all the times as we will see below) is very clever because it avoids an important bias in the distribution of digits which has been proven to be fatal for other systems, although the impact on this system would be much lower. See also a related problem not applying to .

The TSP, seen as a 16 hexadecimal character (64 bit) string, is formed (from left to right) with the 11 rightmost digits of the PAN ( number) excluding the last digit (check digit), one digit from 1 to 6 which selects the secret encrypting key and finally the four digits of the . Here is an example:

PAN: 1234 5678 9012 3445
Key selector: 1
: 2468

TSP: 5678901234412468

Obviously the problem of breaking consists in finding the secret encrypting key for . The method for that is to do a brute force search of the key space. Note that this is not the only method, one could try to find a weakness in DEA, many tried, but this old standard is still in wide use (now been replaced by AES and , though). This demonstrates it is robust enough so that brute force is the only viable method (there are some better attacks but not practical in our case, for a summary see LASEC memo and for the dirty details see Biham & Shamir 1990, Biham & Shamir 1991, Matsui 1993, Biham & Biryukov 1994 and Heys 2001).

The key selector digit was very likely introduced to cover the possibility of a key compromise. In that case they just have to issue new cards using another key selector. Older cards can be substituted with new ones or simply the ATM can transparently write a new (corresponding to the new key and keeping the same ) next time the customer uses his/her . For the shake of all users should be asked to change their PINs, however it would be embarrassing for the to explain the reason, so very likely they would not make such request.

Preparing the


A brute force consists in encrypting a TSP with known using all possible encrypting keys and compare each obtained with the known . When a match is found we have a candidate key. But how many keys we have to try? As we said above the key is 64 bit long, this would mean we have to try 2^64 keys. However this is not true. Actually only 56 bits are effective in keys because one bit (the least significant) out of each octet was historically reserved as a checksum for the others; in practice those 8 bits (one for each of the 8 octets) are ignored.

Therefore the key space consists of 2^56 keys. If we try all these keys will we find one and only one match, corresponding to the secret key? Certainly not. We will obtain many matching keys. This is because the is only a small part (one fourth) of the output. Furthermore the is degenerated because some of the digits (those between 0 and 5 after the last, seen from left to right, digit between 6 and 9) may come from a decimal digit or from a decimalized hexadecimal digit of the output. Thus many keys will produce a output which yields to the same matching .

Then what can we do to find the real key among those other false positive keys? Simply we have to encrypt a second different TSP, also with known , but using only the candidate keys which gave a positive matching with the first TSP- pair. However there is no guarantee we won’t get again many false positives along with the true key. If so, we will need a third TSP- pair, repeat the process and so on.

Before we start our we have to know how many TSP- pairs we will need. For that we have to calculate the for a random output to yield a matching just by chance. There are several ways to calculate this number and here I will use a simple approach easy to understand but which requires some background in of .

A can always be seen as the ratio of favorable cases to possible cases. In our problem the number of possible cases is given by the of 16 elements (the 0 to F hexadecimal digits) in a group of 16 of them (the 16 hexadecimal digits of the output). This is given by 16^16 ~ 1.8 * 10^19 which of course coincides with 2^64 (different numbers of 64 bits). This set of numbers can be separated into five categories:

Those with at least four decimal digits (0 to 9) among the 16 hexadecimal digits (0 to F) of the output.

Those with exactly only three decimal digits.

Those with exactly only two decimal digits.

Those with exactly only one decimal digit.

Those with no decimal digits (all between A and F).

Let’s calculate how many numbers fall in each category. If we label the 16 hexadecimal digits of the output as X1 to X16 then we can label the first four decimal digits of any given number of the first category as Xi, Xj, Xk and Xl. The number of different combinations with this profile is given by the product 6 i-1 * 10 * 6j-i-1 * 10 * 6k-j-1 * 10 * 6 l-k-1 * 10 * 1616-l where the 6’s come from the number of possibilities for an A to F digit, the 10’s come from the possibilities for a 0 to 9 digit, and the 16 comes from the possibilities for a 0 to F digit. Now the total numbers in the first category is simply given by the summation of this product over i, j, k, l from 1 to 16 but with i < j < k < l. If you do some math work you will see this equals to the product of 104/6 with the summation over i from 4 to 16 of (i-1) * (i-2) * (i-3) * 6i-4 * 16 16-i ~ 1.8 * 1019.

Analogously the number of cases in the second category is given by the summation over i, j, k from 1 to 16 with i < j < k of the product 6i-1 * 10 * 6j-i-1 * 10 * 6k-j-1 * 10 * 616-k which you can work it out to be 16!/(3! * (16-13)!) * 103 * 6 13 = 16 * 15 * 14/(3 * 2) * 103 * 613 = 56 * 104 * 613 ~ 7.3 * 1015. Similarly for the third category we have the summation over i, j from 1 to 16 with i < j of 6 i-1 * 10 * 6j-i-1 * 10 * 616-j which equals to 16!/(2! * (16-14)!) * 102 * 614 = 2 * 103 * 615 ~ 9.4 * 1014. Again, for the fourth category we have the summation over i from 1 to 16 of 6i-1 * 10 * 616-i = 160 * 615 ~ 7.5 * 1013. And finally the amount of cases in the fifth category is given by the of six elements (A to F digits) in a group of 16, that is, 616 ~ 2.8 * 1012.

I hope you followed the calculations up to this point, the hard part is done. Now as a proof that everything is right you can sum the number of cases in the 5 categories and see it equals the total number of possible cases we calculated before. Do the operations using 64 bit numbers or rounding (for floats) or overflow (for integers) errors won’t let you get the exact result.

Up to now we have calculated the number of possible cases in each of the five categories, but we are interested in obtaining the number of favorable cases instead. It is very easy to derive the latter from the former as this is just fixing the combination of the four decimal digits (or the required hexadecimal digits if there are no four decimal digits) of the instead of letting them free. In practice this means turning the 10’s in the formula above into 1’s and the required amount of 6’s into 1’s if there are no four decimal digits. That is, we have to divide the first result by 104, the second one by 103 * 6, the third one by 102 * 62 , the fourth one by 10 * 63 and the fifth one by 64 . Then the number of favorable cases in the five categories are approximately 1.8 * 1015, 1.2 * 1012, 2.6 * 1011 , 3.5 * 1010, 2.2 * 109 respectively.

Now we are able to obtain what is the for a output to match a by chance. We just have to add the five numbers of favorable cases and divide it by the total number of possible cases. Doing this we obtain that the is very approximately 0.0001 or one out of ten thousand. Is it strange this well rounded result? Not at all, just have a look at the numbers we calculated above. The first category dominates by several orders of magnitude the number of favorable and possible cases. This is rather intuitive as it seems clear that it is very unlikely not having four decimal digits (10 chances out of 16 per digit) among 16 hexadecimal digits. We saw previously that the relationship between the number of possible and favorable cases in the first category was a division by 10^4, that’s where our result p = 0.0001 comes from.

Our aim for all these calculations was to find out how many TSP- pairs we need to carry a successful brute force . Now we are able to calculate the expected number of false positives in a first search: it will be the number of trials times the for a single random false positive, i.e. t * p where t = 2^56, the size of the key space. This amounts to approximately 7.2 * 10^12, a rather big number. The expected number of false positives in the second search (restricted to the positive keys found in the first search) will be (t * p) * p, for a third search will be ((t * p) * p) * p and so on. Thus for n searches the expected number of false positives will be t * p^n.

We can obtain the number of searches required to expect just one false positive by expressing the equation t * p^n = 1 and solving for n. So n equals to the in base p of 1/t, which by properties of logarithms it yields n = log(1/t)/log(p) ~ 4.2. Since we cannot do a fractional search it is convenient to round up this number. Therefore what is the expected number of false positives if we perform five searches? It is t * p^5 ~ 0.0007 or approximately 1 out of 1400. Thus using five TSP- pairs is safe to obtain the true secret key with no false positives.

The


Once we know we need five TSP- pairs, how do we get them? Of course we need at least one with known , and due to the nature of the , that’s the only thing we need. With other systems, such as IBM, we would need five cards, however this is not necessary with . We just have to read the and then change the four times but reading the after each change.

It is necessary to read the of the to get the and the encrypting key selector. You can buy a commercial or make one yourself following the instructions you can find in the previous page and links therein. Once you have a see this description of standard magnetic tracks to find out how to get the from the read. In that document the field in tracks 1 and 2 is said to be five character long, but actually the true consists of the last four digits. The first of the five digits is the key selector. I have only seen cards with a value of 1 in this digit, which is consistent with the standard and with the secret key never being compromised (and therefore they did not need to move to another key changing the selector).

I did a simple C program, getpvvkey.c, to perform the . It consists of a loop to try all possible keys to encrypt the first TSP, if the derived matches the true a new TSP is tried, and so on until there is a mismatch, in which case the key is discarded and a new one is tried, or the five derived PVVs match the corresponding true PVVs, in which case we can assume we got the secret key, however the loop goes on until it exhausts the key space. This is done to assure we find the true key because there is a chance (although very low) the first key found is a false positive.

It is expected the program would take a very long time to finish and to minimize the risks of a power cut, computer hang out, etc. it does checkpoints into the file getpvvkey.dat from time to time (the exact time depends on the speed of the computer, it’s around one hour for the fastest computers now in use). For the same reason if a positive key is found it is written on the file getpvvkey.key. The program only displays one message at the beginning, the starting position taken from the checkpoint file if any, after that nothing more is displayed.

The is a key point in the program, it is therefore very important to optimize its speed. I tested several implementations: libdes, SSLeay, openssl, cryptlib, nss, libgcrypt, catacomb, libtomcrypt, cryptopp, ufc-crypt. The functions of the first four are based on the same code by Eric Young and is the one which performed best (includes optimized C and x86 assembler code). Thus I chose libdes which was the original implementation and condensed all relevant code in the files encrypt.c (C version) and x86encrypt.s (x86 assembler version). The code is slightly modified to achieve some enhancements in a brute force : the initial is a fixed common steep in each TSP and therefore can be made just one time at the beginning. Another improvement is that I wrote a completely new setkey function (I called it nextkey) which is optimum for a brute force loop.

To get the program working you just have to in the corresponding place five TSPs and their PVVs and then compile it. I have tested it only in UNIX platforms, using the makefile Makegetpvvkey to compile (use the command “make -f Makegetpvvkey”). It may compile on other systems but you may need to fix some things. Be sure that the definition of the long64 corresponds to a 64 bit integer. In principle there is no dependence on the endianness of the processor. I have successfully compiled and run it on Pentium-Linux, Alpha-Tru64, Mips-Irix and Sparc-Solaris. If you do not have and do not want to install Linux (you don’t know what you are missing ;-) you still have the choice to run Linux on CD and use my program, see my page running Linux without installing it.

Once you have found the secret key if you want to find the of an arbitrary you just have to write a similar program (sorry I have not written it, I’m too lazy :) that would try all 10^4 PINs by generating the corresponding TSP, encrypting it with the (no longer) secret key, deriving the and comparing it with the in the of the . You will get one match for the true . Only one match? Remember what we saw above, we have a chance of 0.0001 that a random matches the . We are trying 10000 PINs (and therefore TSPs) thus we expect 10000 * 0.0001 = 1 false positive on average.

This is a very interesting result, it means that, on average, each has two valid PINs: the customer and the expected false positive. I call it “false” but note that as long as it generates the true it is a as valid as the customer’s one. Furthermore, there is no way to know which is which, even for the ATM; only customer knows. Even if the false positive were not valid as , you still have three trials at the ATM anyway, enough on average. Therefore the we calculated at the beginning of this document about random guessing of the has to be corrected. Actually it is twice that value, i.e., it is 0.0006 or one out of more than 1600, still safely low.

Results


It is important to optimize the compilation of the program and to run it in the fastest possible processor due to the long expected run time. I found that the compiler optimization flag -O gets the better performance, thought some improvement is achieved adding the -fomit-frame-pointer flag on Pentium-Linux, the -spike flag on Alpha-Tru64, the -IPA flag on Mips-Irix and the -fast flag on Sparc-Solaris. Special flags (-DDES_PTR -DDES_RISC1 -DDES_RISC2 -DDES_UNROLL -DASM) for the code have generally benefits as well. All these flags have already been tested and I chose the best combination for each processor (see makefile) but you can try to fine tune other flags.

According to my tests the best performance is achieved with the AMD Athlon 1600 MHz processor, exceeding 3.4 million keys per second. Interestingly it gets better results than Intel Pentium IV 1800 MHz and 2000 MHz (see figures below, click on them to enlarge). I believe this is due to some I/O saturation, surely cache or memory , that the AMD processor (which has half the cache of the Pentium) or the motherboard in which it is running, manages to avoid. In the first figure below you can see that the breaking speed of all processors has more or less a linear relationship with the processor speed, except for the two Intel Pentium I mentioned before. This is logical, it means that for a double processor speed you’ll get double breaking speed, but watch out for saturation effects, in this case it is better the AMD Athlon 1600 MHz, which will be even cheaper than the Intel Pentium 1800 MHz or 2000 MHz.

In the second figure we can see in more detail what we would call intrinsic break power of the processor. I get this value simply dividing the break speed by the processor speed, that is, we get the number of keys tried per second and per MHz. This is a measure of the performance of the processor independently of its speed. The results show that the best processor for this task is the AMD Athlon, then comes the Alpha and very close after it is the Intel Pentium (except for the higher speed ones which perform very poor due to the saturation effect). Next is the Mips processor and in the last place is the Sparc. Some Alpha and Mips processors are located at bottom of scale because they are early releases not including enhancements of late versions. Note that I included the performance of x86 processors for C and assembler code as there is a big . It seems that gcc is not a good generator of optimized machine code, but of course we don’t know whether a manual optimization of assembler code for the other processors (Alpha, Mips, Sparc) would boost their results compared to the native C compilers (I did not use gcc for these other platforms) as it happens with the x86 processor.

Update

Here is an article where these techniques may have been used.

http://redtape.msnbc.com/2008/08/could-a-hacker.html

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Technology is always being challenged

Jun 18, 2008 in RFID

I read a very interesting paper created by the University of Massachusetts,  Laboratories and Innealta, Inc.<<

This paper primarily relates to the compromise of contact less technologies () if the and/or have not been implemented correctly or the solution provider has used an inappropriate of and discusses the challenges around and with respect to financial transactions e.g. and compliance.

Additionally, the paper describes a method which is being discussed within many forums around the world and we have now begun to see equipment being produced for the /clonners to use for malicious means.

The overarching point of this paper is to use an appropriate & solutions which supports the / of the user and purpose of the  (financial or non financial)<<

The paper can be found at http://prisms.cs.umass.edu/~kevinfu/papers/-CC-manuscript.pdf

In modern & solutions, newer devices can be used which possess a high degree of power and are therefore able to execute strong cryptographic methods (such as signatures) to protect the and information whilst the is occurring.

These systems often utilise between the / scanner and the tag/ prior to performing the . These methods and are accepted and proven to work within the traditional markets.

As mentioned in the paper, some solution store static digitally signed and/or encrypted which is provided to the / when queried, but this never changes from one to another. This may allow a malicious individual to capture and re-inject the into the at a later stage. The alternative to storing static digitally signed and/or encrypted is to negotiate a key exchange at the time of the in which the /value information is encrypted and subsequently transmitted. With this method the transmitted
changes on every and therefore even if a malicious individual was to capture the encrypted from one , this would not be accepted by the if re-injected at a later stage.

Although this is the case today, older / solutions often use technologies which are not appropriate for financial transactions and therefore may be compromised easily and in some cases without the knowledge of the holder, or .

I find this interesting how some of these less secure solution have been approved for use by acquiring banks and the schemes around the world (if they were told) in recent years, where it has been seen that these solutions have utilised techniques or deployment methods which can be compromised. These technologies and techniques would never be approved within the Point of Sale (PoS) or traditional markets.

It can only be assumed that the need to get product to market quickly at the expense of proper testing, understanding and with due consideration to industry lessons learnt has succeeded again.

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ISO 14443 contactless card

Mar 24, 2008 in RFID

An international standard for or contactless smart communication

contactless

is an international standard which describes how and terminals should work to ensure industry-wide compatibility, for example in , , , mass-transit and control applications.

ISO are developed by the ISO, the International Organization for Standardization. committees comprising experts from the industrial, and business sectors develop the to increase levels of quality, reliability and interoperability on a global scale.

Gemplus has always had a strong involvement in ISO definition of the , and has been represented in the of this international standard. The is divided into 4 separate parts outlining physical characteristics, power and signal , initialization and anti-collision and protocol.

Gemplus has developed a wide range of contactless solutions based on the international standard. The speed and convenience of contactless has created a significant demand for this sort of solution in environments such as fast food restaurants, gas stations, , banks and many others.

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Bluetooth - Security

Mar 24, 2008 in Bluetooth

Redirected from Bluetooth

Source

1
2 Wireless- History
3 Wireless- Technologies
4 - Introduction
5 - Advantages
6 - Applications
7 - Issues
7.1 The
7.2 The
7.3 The BLUEBUG
7.4
7.5 Warnibbling
8 Future of
9 See also:
10 Reference List

is a new that utilises waves as a way to communicate wirelessly between devices. It sets up that incorporate all of a persons devices into one system for both convergence and convenience.

Wireless- History

Many people put the invention of [wireless] down to Guglielmo Marconi, who in 1895 sent the first telegraph across the English Channel. Only twelve years later began being used in the public sphere. [Mathias, p.2] Up until then however, many wireless pioneers conducted trials across lakes where the used to transmit the signal was longer than the distance across the lake. [Brodsky, p. 3] After its introduction the main use of wireless was for military where its first use was for the Boer War. [Flichy, p. 103] The invention of ensured the feasibility of wireless technologies. [Morrow, p. 2] By the 1920s, had become a well-recognised mass medium. [Flichy, p. 111] From the 1980s until now, wireless have been through several stages, from 1G (analogue signal), 2G ( signal) and 3G (always on, faster rate). [Lightman and Rojas, p. 3] The history of is a much more recent one, with the first -enabled products coming into existence in 2000. Named after Harald Blatand the first, king of Denmark around twelve hundred years ago, who joined the Danish and Norwegian kingdoms, is founded on this same unifying principle of being able to unite the computer and telecommunication industr[ies]. [Ganguli, p. 5] In 1994 the Company began looking into the idea of replacing cables connecting accessories to and computers with wireless links, and this became the main inspiration behind . [Morrow, p. 10]

Wireless- Technologies

is not the only wireless currently being developed and utilised. Other wireless technologies, including 802.11b, otherwise known as Wi-Fi, Infrared Association (IrDA), Ultra- Wideband (UWB), and Home RF are being applied to similar technologies that use with mixed results. 802.11 is the most well known , excluding , and uses the same , meaning that they are not compatible as they cause interference with each other. 802.11 is being implemented into universities in the US, Japan and China, as well as food and beverage shops where they are being used to identify students and customers. Even airports have taken up the 802.11 , with airports all over America, and three of Americas most prominent airlines promoting the use of it. [Lightman and Rojas, p. 202-3] Infrared Association is extremely inferior to that of . Its limitations include only being able to communicate point-to-point, needing a line of sight, and it has a speed of fifty- six kilobytes per second, whereas is one megabyte per second. [Ganguli, p. 17] The Ultra- Wideband is superior to that of in that it can transmit at greater lengths (up to 70 metres), with only half of the power that uses. [Ganguli, p.17] HomeRF is a that is not very well known. It is used for and voice communication and targeted for the residential market segment and does not serve - class WLANs, public systems or fixed wireless . [Ganguli, p.17-18]

- Introduction

is a short- range device that replaces cables with low power waves to connect devices, whether they are portable or fixed. The device also uses hopping to ensure a secure, quality link, and it uses ad hoc networks, meaning that it connects peer-to-peer. It can be operated worldwide and without a because it uses the unlicensed Industrial- Scientific Medical (ISM) band for that varies with a change in location. [Ganguli, p. 25-6] The user has the choice of point-to-point or point-to-multipoint links whereby communication can be held between two devices, or up to eight. [Ganguli, p. 96] When devices are communicating with each other they are known as piconets, and each device is designated as a master unit or slave unit, usually depending on who initiates the connection. However, both devices have the potential to be either a master or a slave. [Swaminatha and Elden, p. 49]

- Advantages

There are many advantages to using wireless technologies including the use of a , the inexpensive cost of the device, replacing tedious cable connections, the low power use and implemented measures. The use of an unlicensed ensures that users do not need to gain a license in order to use it. Unlike Infrared which needs to have a line of sight in order to work, waves are omnidirectional and do not need a clear path. The device itself is relatively cheap and easy to use, one can be bought for around ten American dollars, and this price is currently decreasing. Compare this to the expensive cost of implementing hundreds of cables and wires into an office and there is no competition. Of course, this is the main reason for the take -up in -enabled devices; it does away with cables. Another of Bluetooths advantages is its low power use, ensuring that battery operated devices such as and personal assistants wont have their battery life drained with the use of it. This low power consumption also guarantees minimal interruption from other operated and wireless devices that operate at a higher power. has several enabled measures that ensures a level of and , including hopping, whereby the device changes sixteen hundred times per second. Also within the tools are and that guarantee little interference by unauthorised hackers. [Ganguli, p. 330] One of the best advantages of devices, especially the hands free device that connects to a mobile , is that it removes from the brain region. [Tsang, p.1]

- Applications

The applications that are in or current use for the include such areas as automotive, medical, industrial equipment, output equipment, -still cameras, computers, and systems. [Lightman and Rojas, p. 201] is an ad hoc user, and therefore it may be used for social networking, i.e. people can meet and share files or link their devices together to play games or other such activities. [Smyth, p. 70] Using , a mobile can become a three- way , where at home it connects to a landline for cheaper calls, on the move it acts as a mobile and when it comes in contact with another -enabled it acts as a walkie- talkie. This walkie- talkie option allows for free interaction and communication, as is not connected to any telecommunications . [Gupta, p.1] also allows automatic synchronization of your desktop, mobile computer, notebook and your mobile for the user to have all of their managed as one. [Gupta, p.1]

- Issues

has several which range in level of risk and how widespread the action is. These have the ability to provide criminals with sensitive information on both and personal levels. The only way to avoid such is for manufacturers, distributors, and consumers to be provided with more information on how they are committed, current activity and how to combat them. This information can be used on a level for manufacturers, it can be used by distributors at retail levels to teach consumers the risks and it can be used directly by consumers to be aware of the . The outcome of such research will allow end users of products to have an upper hand in this wireless warfare. is in early stages with regards to both the attackers, their techniques and consumers understanding of these attacks. Some research has been conducted into what the attackers are doing and how they do it. Adam Laurie of A.L Ltd http://www.thebunker.net/release-bluestumbler.htm is leading the research race in and is often linked to academic resources. Laurie’s research has uncovered the following capabilities of attacks:

  • Confidential such as the entire book, calender and the ’s IMEI.
  • Complete memory contents of some can be accessed by a previously trusted (”paired”) device that has since been removed from the trusted list.
  • can be gained to the AT command set of the device, giving full to the higher level commands and channels, such as , voice and messaging.

Attacks on devices at this stage are relatively new to consumers, and therefore are not widely seen as a real . Attacks such as the Bluejack are probably more recognised by consumers due to its perceived humorous and novelty nature as well as the ease to Bluejack someone. Users who allow their to be Bluejacked open the door to more attacks, such as the which have a low level of awareness amongst consumers as attackers can attach to the device with out the users knowledge. Corporations are starting to understand the risks devices pose, Michael Ciarochi (in Brewin 2004) stated that ‘ radios were included in laptop PCs that were being configured by an IT Engineer. It raises the possibility of opening a wireless back door into stored on the PCs. Such a weakness would be extremely attractive to hackers. Although invites hackers to such attacks; Venders are playing down the risks, Brewin (2004) said that ‘ advocates last week dismissed growing fears about the short-range wireless , saying any flaws are limited to a few mobile- models. They also detailed steps that users can take to secure devices’. There are many methods of attacks, the , the , Bluebug, Bluejack and Warnibbling are the only recognised attacks at this early stage. Below are explanations of such attacks.

The

It is possible for attackers to connect to the device without alerting the user, once in the system sensitive can be retrieved, such as the book, business cards, images, messages and voice messages.

http://www.salzburgresearch.at/research/gfx/bluesnarf_cebit2004.pdf

Local Copy: BlueSnarf_CeBIT2004.pdf

The

The is a higher concern for users; it allows attackers to establishing a trust relationship through the “pairing” mechanism, but ensuring that the user can not see the target’s register of paired devices. In doing this attackers have to all the on the device, as well as to use the modem or ; WAP and GPRS gateways may be accessed without the owner’s knowledge or consent.

The BLUEBUG

This gives to the AT command set, in other words it allows the attacker to make premium priced calls, allows the use of , or connection the . Attackers can not only use the device for such fraudulent exercises it also allows theft to impersonate the user.

Dibble (2004) explained that ‘Just as was spawned, there’s a new craze that’s spreading across parts of Europe. Reportedly, it’s more prominent in the UK, but popular elsewhere too’. allows attackers to send messages to strangers in public via . When the phones ‘pair’ the attacked can write a message to the user. Although it may seem harmless at first, there is a downside. Once connected the attacker may then have to any on the users device, which has obvious concerns. Powell (2004: 22) explained that ‘Users can refuse any incoming message or , so Bluejackers change their username to a short barb or compliment to beat you to the punch. For example, you might receive along the lines of “Incoming message from: Dude, you’ve been Bluejacked.” Or, “Incoming message from: ROI is overrated.” is regarded as a smaller to as users being attacked are aware they have been Bluejacked. This does not mean however that they are aware that sensitive information is being accessed and used in a malicious manner.

http://www.bluejackq.com/

Warnibbling

Warnibbling is a using Redfang, or similar software that allows hackers to reveal or personal sensitive information. Redfang allows hackers to find devices in the area, once found, the software takes you through the process of accessing any that is stored on that device. Redfang also allows non-discoverable devices to be found. Whitehouse explains when testing Redfang ‘One of the first obstacles we had to overcome was the discovery of non-discoverable devices (it was surprising to see the number of devices that dont by default implement this measure)’. http://www.atstake.com/research/reports/acrobat/atstake_war_nibbling.pdf

Future of

Further information, and somewhat speculation is required for consumers and stakeholders on the future of . Such information will provide a clearer understanding of why of must be improved. Luo and Lee (2004) provide a short term prediction of where is heading, Europe and Asian countries already offer newspapers, subway tickets, and car parking fees via wireless devices. Collins (2003) says that devices ‘appear to be more secure than 802.11 wireless LANs. However, this situation may not last, as the becomes more widespread and attracts greater interest from the community’.

http://www.arraydev.com/commerce/jibc/0402-10.htm

See also:

Reference List

  • Brodsky, I. (1995) Wireless: The Revolution in Personal Telecommunications, Massachussetts, USA: Artech House Inc, ISBN 0890067171 (Erin Watson)
  • Collins, G. (2003) . Byte.com [], Available: Academic Search Elite, ISSN:0360-5280 [Accessed 6/9/04]. (Ben Henzell)
  • Dibble, T (2003) ‘Bluejack city: a new wireless craze is spreading through Europe’ []. Available: http://www.sys-con.com/Wireless/article.cfm?id=710 [Accessed 4/8/04. (Ben Henzell)
  • Finn, E. (2004) Be carefull when you cut the cord. Popular Science [], vol. 264, issue. 5, p30. Available: Ebsco Host: Academic Search Elite, ISSN:0161-7370 [Accessed 6/9/04]. (Ben Henzell)
  • Flichy, P. (1995) Dynamics of Modern Communication, London: Sage