6 ms·

New 5G flaws can track phone locations and spoof emergency alerts

191 points by kumaranvpl 7y ago

rshnotsecure 7y ago
Spoofed phone alerts are the new leaflet propaganda. They will be used to generate a significant amount of confusion and some terror abroad by whoever just decides to do it first: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airborne_leaflet_propaganda https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airborne_leaflet_propaganda
- jimmaswell 7y ago
  The same vulnerability has existed a long time in the possibility of broadcasting over FM/AM stations too.
TheUndead96 7y ago
"flaws"
- g105b 7y ago
  It's not a flaw, it's a feature!
llarsson 7y ago
Given how common government surveillance is these days, enabled especially by certain companies that consider themselves pioneers in the 5G space, I am not overly convinced that this functionality is unintentional. Interesting how the GSMA claim that these vulnerabilities are "judged as nil or low-impact in practice". It doesn't sound like low-impact if used to target specific people.
- rusk 7y ago
  > Interesting how the GSMA claim The GSMA is an industry body for coordinating interoperating standards. You couldn’t even say it has been “compromised” because it doesn’t really have any social mandate.
  - Nokinside 7y ago
    GSMA represents network operators. They don't coordinate standard. 3GPP makes the spec and sends it for ITU for ratification. 3GPP has 7 organizational partners: USA represented by ATIS, ETSI for EU and CCSA for China. GSMA is one of the 17 invited market representation partners who can provide advice and participate in consensus decision making but have no vote.
    - rusk 7y ago
      Sure. But the substance of what I was saying still stands no?
totoasticot 7y ago
As did 4G. Nothing new.
- 0b0001 7y ago
  The authors mention the headline attacks in a side note only. Their paper is about formal verification of the standard. That is indeed something new. Their framework finds a couple of new issues -- and also old ones, which made it to the headline.
9dl 7y ago
Good news everyone
Grangar 7y ago
Oh boy here we go. What are the odds Chinese vendors have designed these as bugdoors? That'd give them a good motive to push so hard for this adoption.
- maeln 7y ago
  US, Europe and almost any country have police using fake cell-site, some also have mass surveillance program. Why blame only the Chinese when "3-letter agency" might be as happy to have possibility to snoop on 5G traffic?
  - Grangar 7y ago
    Since it's Chinese vendors such as Huawei pushing their implementation. Supposedly it's resistant to such interference, now it turns out it's not. Surprise surprise.
    - _jal 7y ago
      They are protocol vulnerabilities, not implementation vulnerabilities. I also tend to think the evidence suggests being wary of nation-state intelligence influence on networking systems - the only ones who haven't done it are the ones who lack the capabilities. Cisco's apparent inability to stop its code base from constantly regrowing backdoors will compromise you just as quickly as whatever Huawei may be up to.
- Someone1234 7y ago
  Considering these are vulnerabilities in the underlying protocol/spec created by 3GPP (US, South Korea, majority Japan, with a single Chinese partner) and ratified by the UN's ITU, and exist on handsets that implement 5G as spec-ed from all over the world, nearly 0% chance. What's your basis for the claim "Chinese vendors" did it?
Jonahgay 7y ago
This is old.
jeltz 7y ago
Anyone doing this would of course risk jail time but I wonder if not the only thing which would force them to fix the security issues in the cell phone protocols would be some large scale attacks from ordinary citizens. The cell phone protocols just seem like a total mess with security issues left in them for legacy reasons and various vulnerabilities used by police forces.
- nkrisc 7y ago
  > Anyone doing this would of course risk jail time I think the folks who would be most likely to be be using these exploits are the last people who would ever face fail time for it: folks working for some three letter agency. They're not going to go to jail for their government-sanctioned abuse of these flaws.
  - jeltz 7y ago
    Maybe I expressed myself poorly but I think you missed my point. My point was that the only way to force people to fix the issues is if ordinary hackers who are not working for any three latter agency start attacking the infrastructure too. And if you do that you risk prison time, even if you only do harmless exploits to highlight weaknesses.
    - seph-reed 7y ago
      As an individualist nation, there's little likelihood anyone will throw themselves away for the collective. Doubly so because the collective is super fucking thankless and turns everything it gets into garbage. I've really been debating the idea if there's any point of trying to help at all at this point, and my current conclusion is: we're already wayyyy down the dystopia line. The only hope at this point is AI which will either save us or (hopefully) bring the great filter sooner (which means less suffering). But I no longer believe in protest.
throwawaymanbot 7y ago
I thought the whole push behind this was exactly due to the ability to track phones etc?
macawfish 7y ago
Just wait until people realize it can track human bodies too.
- wearenotsafe 7y ago
  Are you referring to the MIT studies using wifi signals to track people through walls? https://people.csail.mit.edu/fadel/wivi/ https://people.csail.mit.edu/fadel/wivi/ I'm pretty sure I first read about that on HN, and was immediately reminded of the govt plan to cover the country in wireless transmitters.
TaylorGood 7y ago
Was there a need for 5G? Or is this akin to the ever-increasing TV sizes?
- crowtoe76 7y ago
  The "need" for 5G was so the govt-backdoored telecom companies can put wireless transmitters in every single neighborhood, to achieve more granular control in mass surveillance for profit and for targeted harassment. The FCC-sponsored transmitters are interacting with every "smart" device they can reach and reporting everything back to HQ. They're probably busy brute-forcing everyone's wifi passwords while they're at it, because why wouldn't they? But maybe that's just crazy. Maybe in reality they're just the good guys who care about streamlining our movie watching experiences.

191 points by kumaranvpl 7y ago

Spoofed phone alerts are the new leaflet propaganda. They will be used to generate a significant amount of confusion and some terror abroad by whoever just decides to do it first: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airborne_leaflet_propaganda https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airborne_leaflet_propaganda

jimmaswell 7y ago
The same vulnerability has existed a long time in the possibility of broadcasting over FM/AM stations too.

TheUndead96 7y ago

"flaws"

g105b 7y ago
It's not a flaw, it's a feature!

llarsson 7y ago

Given how common government surveillance is these days, enabled especially by certain companies that consider themselves pioneers in the 5G space, I am not overly convinced that this functionality is unintentional. Interesting how the GSMA claim that these vulnerabilities are "judged as nil or low-impact in practice". It doesn't sound like low-impact if used to target specific people.

rusk 7y ago
> Interesting how the GSMA claim The GSMA is an industry body for coordinating interoperating standards. You couldn’t even say it has been “compromised” because it doesn’t really have any social mandate.
- Nokinside 7y ago
  GSMA represents network operators. They don't coordinate standard. 3GPP makes the spec and sends it for ITU for ratification. 3GPP has 7 organizational partners: USA represented by ATIS, ETSI for EU and CCSA for China. GSMA is one of the 17 invited market representation partners who can provide advice and participate in consensus decision making but have no vote.
  - rusk 7y ago
    Sure. But the substance of what I was saying still stands no?

totoasticot 7y ago

As did 4G. Nothing new.

0b0001 7y ago
The authors mention the headline attacks in a side note only. Their paper is about formal verification of the standard. That is indeed something new. Their framework finds a couple of new issues -- and also old ones, which made it to the headline.

9dl 7y ago

Good news everyone

Grangar 7y ago

Oh boy here we go. What are the odds Chinese vendors have designed these as bugdoors? That'd give them a good motive to push so hard for this adoption.

maeln 7y ago
US, Europe and almost any country have police using fake cell-site, some also have mass surveillance program. Why blame only the Chinese when "3-letter agency" might be as happy to have possibility to snoop on 5G traffic?
- Grangar 7y ago
  Since it's Chinese vendors such as Huawei pushing their implementation. Supposedly it's resistant to such interference, now it turns out it's not. Surprise surprise.
  - _jal 7y ago
    They are protocol vulnerabilities, not implementation vulnerabilities. I also tend to think the evidence suggests being wary of nation-state intelligence influence on networking systems - the only ones who haven't done it are the ones who lack the capabilities. Cisco's apparent inability to stop its code base from constantly regrowing backdoors will compromise you just as quickly as whatever Huawei may be up to.
Someone1234 7y ago
Considering these are vulnerabilities in the underlying protocol/spec created by 3GPP (US, South Korea, majority Japan, with a single Chinese partner) and ratified by the UN's ITU, and exist on handsets that implement 5G as spec-ed from all over the world, nearly 0% chance. What's your basis for the claim "Chinese vendors" did it?

Jonahgay 7y ago

This is old.

jeltz 7y ago

Anyone doing this would of course risk jail time but I wonder if not the only thing which would force them to fix the security issues in the cell phone protocols would be some large scale attacks from ordinary citizens. The cell phone protocols just seem like a total mess with security issues left in them for legacy reasons and various vulnerabilities used by police forces.

nkrisc 7y ago
> Anyone doing this would of course risk jail time I think the folks who would be most likely to be be using these exploits are the last people who would ever face fail time for it: folks working for some three letter agency. They're not going to go to jail for their government-sanctioned abuse of these flaws.
- jeltz 7y ago
  Maybe I expressed myself poorly but I think you missed my point. My point was that the only way to force people to fix the issues is if ordinary hackers who are not working for any three latter agency start attacking the infrastructure too. And if you do that you risk prison time, even if you only do harmless exploits to highlight weaknesses.
  - seph-reed 7y ago
    As an individualist nation, there's little likelihood anyone will throw themselves away for the collective. Doubly so because the collective is super fucking thankless and turns everything it gets into garbage. I've really been debating the idea if there's any point of trying to help at all at this point, and my current conclusion is: we're already wayyyy down the dystopia line. The only hope at this point is AI which will either save us or (hopefully) bring the great filter sooner (which means less suffering). But I no longer believe in protest.

throwawaymanbot 7y ago

I thought the whole push behind this was exactly due to the ability to track phones etc?

macawfish 7y ago

Just wait until people realize it can track human bodies too.

wearenotsafe 7y ago
Are you referring to the MIT studies using wifi signals to track people through walls? https://people.csail.mit.edu/fadel/wivi/ https://people.csail.mit.edu/fadel/wivi/ I'm pretty sure I first read about that on HN, and was immediately reminded of the govt plan to cover the country in wireless transmitters.

TaylorGood 7y ago

Was there a need for 5G? Or is this akin to the ever-increasing TV sizes?

crowtoe76 7y ago
The "need" for 5G was so the govt-backdoored telecom companies can put wireless transmitters in every single neighborhood, to achieve more granular control in mass surveillance for profit and for targeted harassment. The FCC-sponsored transmitters are interacting with every "smart" device they can reach and reporting everything back to HQ. They're probably busy brute-forcing everyone's wifi passwords while they're at it, because why wouldn't they? But maybe that's just crazy. Maybe in reality they're just the good guys who care about streamlining our movie watching experiences.