South Pole Research Station Hacked Twice

Marda writes "It's been known for a while that Romainian cyber extortionists cracked the computer network at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station last year. Now SecurityFocus is reporting that another computer intruder penetrated the station just two months before, and cracked the data acquisition system for the Degree Angular Scale Interferometer (DASI), a radiotelescope that measures properties of the cosmic microwave background. It turns out the station was insecure 'purposely, to allow for our scientists at this remotest of locations to exchange data under difficult circumstances,' according to internal reports."

Comments

On purpose for a reason...

[Q-Hack!]

The main reason for running unsecure, is that the data pipe running to the South Pole is only open for just a few seconds at a time. You have to be able to transfer your data packet in little bitty windows of opportunity. If you have your data packaged in nice large security packets it will take forever to transfer your files, if at all. As soon as they come up with a better way to communicate with those stations I think they will be the first to secure there data.

Here's a view from the pole

[Raetsel]

I just found Big Dead Place a couple days ago, and read their account of one of these 'hacker attacks' and Raytheon Polar Services' (RPSC) reaction to it.

Short version: Everyone at the pole was pissed. Denver (RPSC headquarters) took away their porn^H^H^H^Hnet access, and thus made a bunch of already deprived individuals even more deprived.

There's a ~500 K newsletter-spoof PDF on the site that expresses some of their feelings.

• "Kudos to the Denver IT staff for quickly responding to a hacker attack on South Pole Station. The attack occurred Friday night Denver time and our crack professional team denied the attacker access by immediately pulling the plug on Pole. They got back to dealing with the aftermath of this knee jerk response sometime Wednesday shortly after the last chocolate sprinkle donut had been eaten but shortly before nap time."

There's also: Top Ten Reasons South Pole Can't Access the Internet

Some other interesting things on the site:

• Raytheon says Antarctica is a 'foreign nation' for purposes of the Fair Labor Standards Act (overtime) and OSHA (asbestos exposure, etc.)

• However... the IRS considers wages earned while working there the same as if they'd been earned inside the US.

• Some people working there question whether or not the US Constitution applies (specifically the First Ammendment)

• The whole bit about the Symmes Antarctic Intelligencer

• Frontierwatch is a terrifically Dilbert-esque look into the day-to-day goings-on at the Pole.