Yes, it did put people and property at risk -- and also forced their hand. It cost them an enormous amount of money to fix the bug, and if I had not gone publi

Yes, it did put people and property at risk -- and also forced their hand. It cost them an enormous amount of money to fix the bug, and if I had not gone public with it and put substantial pressure on them, it's very likely that we would be in a courtroom right now, as they attempt to keep it secret. The bug existed for nearly 20 years, affecting over 4 million hotel rooms. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they knew about this vulnerability at least 10 years prior to my disclosure, having seen proof of that (in the form of a diagnostics device for dumping the memory of the locks, produced by TESA, the precursor to Onity). I've never seen proof that it was known before then, but given the nature of the bug, I'd be amazed if this wasn't known when the protocol was designed. In short, this was the only way that I knew to guarantee that people would be made aware of this bug. Three years later, I couldn't be more confident that I made the right decision.