Anti-Wi-Fi Wallpaper

Alephcat writes "New Scientist is reporting on a wallpaper that can prevent hackers accessing secure networks via Wi-Fi - without blocking mobile phone signals - that's been developed by a British defence contractor. It is based on covert 'stealth' technology that was originally designed to hide military radars."

Comments

Where'd The Town Go?

[ackthpt]

It is based on covert 'stealth' technology that was originally designed to hide military radars."

"Heathrow Tower, we can see London, but RADAR says it doesn't exist, then this weird music starts playing and this guy gets up from his seat with a big book and says we've entered some twilight thingie!"

That's fine... but

[Anonymous Coward]

what's to stop me from establishing a VPN connection over my GPRS cell? Either way, they can't win.

Re:That's fine... but

[Have Blue]

The article says the main threat this targets is outsiders. They don't care if you VPN out from inside the building- physical security is meant stop you from getting in in the first place if you're not authorized. But you won't be able to get on wireless base stations inside the building if you're outside it.

1280x1024?

[spinflip]

Does it come in 1280x1024?

Re:1280x1024?

[DragonMagic]

Real geeks have 3200x1200 desktops, using dual 21" flat panel monitors.

Everyone get ready....

[wolfemi1]

... For an endless barrage of "tin-foil" jokes.

New Hats!

[zrobotics]

Well i guess tinfoil hats are about to be replaced. as an additional bonus, it is now easier to shield your entire body from "the man"!

What, you want me to put wallpaper on my windows?

[radiumsoup]

Or on the ceiling? (Think multi-story apartment complex) Carpet?

Get real... the people who want security in the first place WON'T USE WIFI.

It'll never make it to market.

Does it go both ways?

[NanoGator]

Can they make wallpaper that enhances my wifi instead of killing it?

Re:Does it go both ways?

[Anonymous Coward]

No problem. See, you just need to install it upside down.

Anti Military Radar...

[CODiNE]

Heh... I see an army of wallpapered tanks crossing the battlefield. :-)

Re:Deja Vu

[AKAImBatman]

I did! I did see the Puttee Tat! I did!

OK, I Admit It

[ReadParse]

Yeah, I thought they meant software wallpaper... like a JPG covering my desktop. "How the hell would THAT work?" I wondered. Feeling silly now.

RP

Same principal as a microwave door.

[Trespass]

Kind of neat, but I worry about the fragility of the wallpaper in any kind of commercial or industrial setting. It seems to me such a material would be far more useful incorporated in a vapor barrier *inside* the wall. I know it would be an expensive retrofit that way, but how else would you deal with drop ceilings and the masses of ducting and cabling therein?

Don't be too hasty...

[ackthpt]

Get real... the people who want security in the first place WON'T USE WIFI.

Uninformed people want security, too, they just don't know it until they've been violated or 0wn3d. One former CIO thought WI-FI was extremely cool until I started showing him the stuff about War-Chalking on Slashdot. Funny reaction, though, seemed I was part of some problem by revealing such things. Must be the PHB self-defense mechanism kicking in... 'didn't make mistake, peon warning of possible security holes is actualy problem, move peon to desk further away, problem solved.'

Re:I don't know ...

[Sheetrock]

Think of it as part of a security solution rather than the whole solution.

I use a firewall, but I also patch my machines. Some people skip the second step until the first or second time someone brings in a laptop from home and connects it to the internal network, which brings me to the point about running software firewalls on individual machines in addition to the one at the router.

I agree that this wallpaper is better as a backup defense rather than a primary one, but plays an important part nonetheless. Home laptops are being pushed with WiFi now.

Cost effective???

[Atryn]

Ok, let me quote a couple spots to see if I understand this correctly...

The technology is designed to stop outsiders gaining access to a secure network by using Wi-Fi networks casually set up by workers at the office.

Ok, so we are talking about stopping "casually set up" convenience networks, not hackers.

But it is also the work of moments then for an outsider to breach that company's computer security using the Wi-Fi connection.

Ok, so it only takes moments to detect if an employee has done this.

Until now, the only way to ensure people are not illicitly gaining access to company secrets has been to turn offices into a signal-proof "Faraday cage", by lining the walls with aluminium foil, and using glass that absorbs radio waves in the windows.

Clearly this solution is expensive and unsightly.

The wall covering can be mass produced at relatively low cost. A square metre will cost about £500: peanuts to big business.

$921 / square meter?!?!?! That's what, roughly $175,000 worth of wallpaper for a 200 square meter open cubicle-filled office space.

Wouldn't it be easier and less expensive to:

1. Train workers not to set up Wi-Fi
2. Have IT periodically scan for active networks

Helps wardrivers find the good stuff...

[dpbsmith]

...they'll beam a wifi and a cellphone signal at a building and measure the reflections. If the building is much more reflective at wifi frequencies than cellphone frequencies, they've found something really worth finding. How they get it once they've found it is another matter, of course.

Re:What, you want me to put wallpaper on my window

[silas_moeckel]

How to stop people from connecting an AP. First off dissalow any remote switches particualy dumb ones. Only allow one MAC address per port. Turn the port off if you see spanning tree. Run 802.1x auth and vlan selection with a 2 factor login (secure ID etc). Only allow one login per person. Not that hard to do with modern Cisco gear, expensive but not hard.

Smells like a conspiracy to me.

[MarkGriz]

That damn paint-and-wallpaper trade group is just trying to scare everyone so they can unload a warehouse full of surplus foil wallpaper that went out of style in the 70's

Anti Wi-Fi neighbor!!

[ron_ivi]

I can beat that... I had a anti-wi-fi neighbor.

Set up my wireless access point as a deliberatelly unprotected box and watched packets fly by my router... Seems one of my neighbors was quite into high-bandwidth images and videos - guess he had a script or something to make downloading faster. Pretty effective denial of service attack on the WiFi access point.

Who needs wallpaper when you can just fight back?

[vizualizr]

Maybe I'm the only one who ran across http://www.evilscheme.org/defcon/ this little gem , but this seems like a very good low-budget option for striking back at your friendly neighborhood wi-fi swipers.