3 ms·

All they need to do is open it up and take a look inside. There should just be a USB port and a pair of wires, maybe a pair of resistors. If there's anything el

All they need to do is open it up and take a look inside. There should just be a USB port and a pair of wires, maybe a pair of resistors. If there's anything else, this is a Trojan Horse. You can probably open this up with a butter knife, maybe a small pair of pliers to open up the USB connector. A reasonable security assessment of this device could be done in two minutes. It would take longer to take pictures of the disassembly and post the pics on twitter.

DaiPlusPlus 8y ago
I imagine if this really is an attack the attacker would expect these devices to be subject to scrutiny - perhaps the first set of fans released to journalists are safe, but as the summit goes on and the initial reports cleared them then just bribe hotel staffers to surreptitiously replace them with Trojan Horse devices. Or have just a small subset of devices as THs and hope the ones that get opened up are the safe ones.
- redog 8y ago
  They're might only be one intended target.
- Semirhage 8y ago
  This is just what I was thinking. Make it highly targeted to a few people, and swap it out at two points. Swap it for the hot unit mid-summit, then swap back for a normal unit at the end. If they’re really lucky this could become a normal or expected thing, and be useful as a vector in the future.
- toomanybeersies 8y ago
  In that case, couldn't the attacker just attach bugs to journos' computers or other electronics instead?
noja 8y ago
Can you disguise other components to look like resistors?
- wanderingjew 8y ago
  I'm not going to say 'no', but I would highly doubt it. If you're wondering what the 'state of the art' in disguising components to look like other components is, this [1] is probably the best example. It's a guy that turned a LED into an LED and an inductor, and put transistors inside of switches. What you're proposing -- basically putting a USB-capable microcontroller inside something that looks like resistor -- isn't impossible. I can imagine that it could be done, but I would have no idea how. You would probably go with a very small (physically) microcontroller, maybe one of the SOT-23-6 PIC or AVR packages. I don't think it's possible to write a USB stack for those, and you only have 1-2kB to implement a BadUSB [2] sort of thing. It might be possible, but I doubt it. Still, that size of package could be disguised as a (large) SMD resistor, although the PCB would look odd with the addition of extra traces. To be honest, it really wouldn't make sense to disguise a microcontroller as passive components. It's already been demonstrated journalists will gladly plug random USB devices into their computer. If you wanted the device to just pass a cursory investigation, you'd just put a glob of black epoxy over the USB port. Hiding a microcontroller as a pair of resistors might be possible, but it's far more effort than what is really needed. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=RkTvDjhImwo https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=RkTvDjhImwo [2] https://opensource.srlabs.de/projects/badusb https://opensource.srlabs.de/projects/badusb

DaiPlusPlus 8y ago

I imagine if this really is an attack the attacker would expect these devices to be subject to scrutiny - perhaps the first set of fans released to journalists are safe, but as the summit goes on and the initial reports cleared them then just bribe hotel staffers to surreptitiously replace them with Trojan Horse devices. Or have just a small subset of devices as THs and hope the ones that get opened up are the safe ones.

redog 8y ago
They're might only be one intended target.
Semirhage 8y ago
This is just what I was thinking. Make it highly targeted to a few people, and swap it out at two points. Swap it for the hot unit mid-summit, then swap back for a normal unit at the end. If they’re really lucky this could become a normal or expected thing, and be useful as a vector in the future.
toomanybeersies 8y ago
In that case, couldn't the attacker just attach bugs to journos' computers or other electronics instead?

noja 8y ago

Can you disguise other components to look like resistors?

wanderingjew 8y ago
I'm not going to say 'no', but I would highly doubt it. If you're wondering what the 'state of the art' in disguising components to look like other components is, this [1] is probably the best example. It's a guy that turned a LED into an LED and an inductor, and put transistors inside of switches. What you're proposing -- basically putting a USB-capable microcontroller inside something that looks like resistor -- isn't impossible. I can imagine that it could be done, but I would have no idea how. You would probably go with a very small (physically) microcontroller, maybe one of the SOT-23-6 PIC or AVR packages. I don't think it's possible to write a USB stack for those, and you only have 1-2kB to implement a BadUSB [2] sort of thing. It might be possible, but I doubt it. Still, that size of package could be disguised as a (large) SMD resistor, although the PCB would look odd with the addition of extra traces. To be honest, it really wouldn't make sense to disguise a microcontroller as passive components. It's already been demonstrated journalists will gladly plug random USB devices into their computer. If you wanted the device to just pass a cursory investigation, you'd just put a glob of black epoxy over the USB port. Hiding a microcontroller as a pair of resistors might be possible, but it's far more effort than what is really needed. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=RkTvDjhImwo https://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=RkTvDjhImwo [2] https://opensource.srlabs.de/projects/badusb https://opensource.srlabs.de/projects/badusb