4 ms·

Rogue communication devices found in Chinese solar power inverters

45 points by colinprince 1y ago

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
neom 1y ago
If it's there for espionage, is cell the right technology to use? Seems BT or wifi would be better for someone to drive by and yoink the data, surly using the cell network introduces a lot of issues from an espionage perspective?
- ceejayoz 1y ago
  > surly using the cell network introduces a lot of issues from an espionage perspective? Like what? Having to physically drive within Wifi/Bluetooth range has even greater issues, like "getting your spy caught and executed".
  - neom 1y ago
    One would presume these things would need to be quite long lived (Stuxnet for example took years to execute iirc?), maybe I'm thinking about it wrong/over thinking it, but the logistics of China maintaining cell backhaul in foreign countries for solar farm telemetry seems... I dunno, just doesn't add up for me, seems easier to lora and pay some kid $500 to drive by the site and yoink.
    - ceejayoz 1y ago
      You just put it on the public cell network. You can get an IoT SIM for $3, pay per gig. https://docs.korewireless.com/en-us/supersim https://docs.korewireless.com/en-us/supersim
      - neom 1y ago
        So if this was for espionage, is that how you would do it? I've never tried state level espionage before, but I can still see many issues with using cell (ok, at least 3 more). I also still think this is weird data to collect, feels much more to me like someone discovered the blank button covers on a feature they didn't upgrade to.
        ceejayoz 1y ago
        If it's for espionage, the use case is less "harvest data" and more "shut down the enemy power grid if there's a war".
        neom 1y ago
        See, this is why I like your comments ceejayoz, you always humble me. Good point.
ggm 1y ago
I wouldn't build national strategic dependencies without more control over the supply chain if I could avoid it, but that said, the article has zero evidence this is nefarious and is light on detail. Lots of things have diagnostic additions which make little or no sense out of context. If the units include equipment meant for deployment in rural and remote China, having multiple comms modalities would be net beneficial. all modern high end vehicles now come with the risk of a low bandwidth feed on all the time. A friend was told to drive to a garage because they remote detected issues in lubrication before he got an in car diagnostic message. Take the equipment out of context, that comms feature might be built in even if not requested.
hnthrowaway0315 1y ago
> Over the past nine months, undocumented communication devices, including cellular radios, have also been found in some batteries from multiple Chinese suppliers, one of them said. Since solar power inverters are not exactly military and high security stuffs. I'd appreciate that they at least give the brands and models so that we can check by ourselves.
- rjmunro 1y ago
  > solar power inverters are not exactly military and high security stuffs I'm only familiar with the UK grid, but yesterday, the UK generated a peak of about 11GW of electricity from Solar power. If you can control 10% of that, and turn it all off simultaneously, you will probably kill most of the UK grid for about 24 hours, similar to the breakdown that happened in Spain recently. I imagine that other parts of the world will be similar.
  - hnthrowaway0315 1y ago
    I agree with this. But I don't think they are sensitive enough to be, say, censored, like you can't even talk about the brand and you can't buy from the market.
rasz 1y ago
Pretty much all Solar inverters call home nowadays. All the configuration is thru the cloud :|
suraci 1y ago
[flagged]

45 points by colinprince 1y ago

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

neom 1y ago

If it's there for espionage, is cell the right technology to use? Seems BT or wifi would be better for someone to drive by and yoink the data, surly using the cell network introduces a lot of issues from an espionage perspective?

ceejayoz 1y ago
> surly using the cell network introduces a lot of issues from an espionage perspective? Like what? Having to physically drive within Wifi/Bluetooth range has even greater issues, like "getting your spy caught and executed".
- neom 1y ago
  One would presume these things would need to be quite long lived (Stuxnet for example took years to execute iirc?), maybe I'm thinking about it wrong/over thinking it, but the logistics of China maintaining cell backhaul in foreign countries for solar farm telemetry seems... I dunno, just doesn't add up for me, seems easier to lora and pay some kid $500 to drive by the site and yoink.
  - ceejayoz 1y ago
    You just put it on the public cell network. You can get an IoT SIM for $3, pay per gig. https://docs.korewireless.com/en-us/supersim https://docs.korewireless.com/en-us/supersim
    - neom 1y ago
      So if this was for espionage, is that how you would do it? I've never tried state level espionage before, but I can still see many issues with using cell (ok, at least 3 more). I also still think this is weird data to collect, feels much more to me like someone discovered the blank button covers on a feature they didn't upgrade to.
      - ceejayoz 1y ago
        If it's for espionage, the use case is less "harvest data" and more "shut down the enemy power grid if there's a war".
        neom 1y ago
        See, this is why I like your comments ceejayoz, you always humble me. Good point.

ggm 1y ago

I wouldn't build national strategic dependencies without more control over the supply chain if I could avoid it, but that said, the article has zero evidence this is nefarious and is light on detail. Lots of things have diagnostic additions which make little or no sense out of context. If the units include equipment meant for deployment in rural and remote China, having multiple comms modalities would be net beneficial. all modern high end vehicles now come with the risk of a low bandwidth feed on all the time. A friend was told to drive to a garage because they remote detected issues in lubrication before he got an in car diagnostic message. Take the equipment out of context, that comms feature might be built in even if not requested.

hnthrowaway0315 1y ago

> Over the past nine months, undocumented communication devices, including cellular radios, have also been found in some batteries from multiple Chinese suppliers, one of them said. Since solar power inverters are not exactly military and high security stuffs. I'd appreciate that they at least give the brands and models so that we can check by ourselves.

rjmunro 1y ago
> solar power inverters are not exactly military and high security stuffs I'm only familiar with the UK grid, but yesterday, the UK generated a peak of about 11GW of electricity from Solar power. If you can control 10% of that, and turn it all off simultaneously, you will probably kill most of the UK grid for about 24 hours, similar to the breakdown that happened in Spain recently. I imagine that other parts of the world will be similar.
- hnthrowaway0315 1y ago
  I agree with this. But I don't think they are sensitive enough to be, say, censored, like you can't even talk about the brand and you can't buy from the market.

rasz 1y ago

Pretty much all Solar inverters call home nowadays. All the configuration is thru the cloud :|

suraci 1y ago

[flagged]