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Hardware Hacking Guide — Citizen Engineer

Solderingfool writes "MAKE Magazine's Phil Torrone and open source hardware hacker Ladyada from Adafruit Industries have a new video series called 'Citizen Engineer.' In the first video they show how a SIM card works, then build a SIM card reader which could be used to clone a SIM card. They also show how to use an old payphone as a regular home phone, later with coins, and for their final hack — how to 'Redbox' it. They released all the projects as open source, and the video is well produced."

26 of 100 comments (clear)

  1. How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by VincenzoRomano · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I understand that they are just exploiting holes in design and implementation of telco stuff (SIMs, payphones, telco billing system),
    Maybe the fact that a hole is there doesn't mean you can expoit it.
    And, finally, does FBI understand it?

    --
    Maybe Computers will never be as intelligent as Humans.
    For sure they won't ever become so stupid. [VR-1988]
    1. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by Shaitan+Apistos · · Score: 5, Funny

      Maybe the fact that a hole is there doesn't mean you can exploit it.

      I've seen a lot of videos on the internet that suggest there's no such thing as a hole you can't exploit.

    2. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by VoyagerRadio · · Score: 2, Interesting

      FBI, Schmeff-Bee-Aii. I hope they get Woz on their series, doing his thing: phone hacking or whatever. The stuff he used to do, back in the day, applied to today's phone technology. VoIP spoofing? (Somebody help me out here: what was the hack that Woz is known for -- the phone hack, that is?)

      --
      Harold
    3. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by negRo_slim · · Score: 2, Insightful

      And, finally, does FBI understand it?

      To the issues of 2600 at the book store in the mall, to the anarchist's cookbook and to the old text file archives of yore this information has been around for as long as we've wanted to learn it. Sure the FBI (or some other organization) might puff up with hubris but I doubt it and in fact I think it's high time we start seeing more things like this. And I think this place is a good start...

      --
      On the Oregon Cost born and raised, On the beach is where I spent most of my days
    4. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by Manip · · Score: 4, Informative

      The video contains no holes in SIMs, Payphones, or the telco billing system.

      Did you even watch it?

      She had to rewire the phone in order to get a red box to work because modern phones keep the microphone unpowered before you pay.

      A SIM reader isn't illegal or even really a black hat thing to do.

    5. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by 0100010001010011 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I know RTFA is a bit hard, but did you even see what they were doing?

      "Modify a retired payphone so it can be used as a home telephone and for VoIP (Skype). Then learn how to modify the hacked payphone so it accepts quarters - and lastly, use a Redbox to make "free" phone calls from the modified coin-accepting payphone."

      So they first show you how to use a retired home phone for personal use. Then how to set it up to accept coins (you own the phone). Then how to redbox the phone you own.

      At the bottom they show you how to hook the Pay phone up to VoiP.

    6. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by Mike+McTernan · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Well they did brute force the secret key (Ki) from their SIM using the reader they build, but as they said, newer SIMs will detect the high number of requests and self-destruct. Additionally this was a 5V SIM reader, and many modern SIMs are 3V in anycase.

      The only thing that worried me in the video was the quality of the soldering!

      Mike

      --
      -- Mike
    7. Re:How long will it take for the FBI to ride? by ladyada · · Score: 5, Informative

      From all the documentation I have read on smart cards, 3V (and 1.8V) cards are an extension of the 5V SIM spec. That is, they work at 5V as well (but with higher power usage, of course). If you have specific documentation otherwise, please post it. Secondly, I assure you the quality of my soldering is excellent (ie http://farm1.static.flickr.com/149/332269259_21900c5a01_b.jpg), but the lighting and video makes perfboard-soldering (ie http://itp.nyu.edu/physcomp/images/tutorials/perfboard/solderaperf26.jpg) look bad

  2. SMI reader kit is for sale by echucker · · Score: 4, Informative

    On their sister site - http://www.adafruit.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=27
    $17 seems pretty reasonable to me.

  3. Payphones? Redboxes? by strelitsa · · Score: 5, Funny

    1981 called - it wants its meme back.

    --
    No mod points, no meta-moderating/Firehose/all the other free work Slashdot wants me to do.
  4. Hole what hole? by TheLink · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Why would it be wrong for me to backup my own SIM?

    --
  5. Re:Payphones? Redboxes? by jeiler · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hacking in its purest form is not necessarily about being "useful," but about being interesting--an interesting hack may have no intrinsic utility whatsoever, but allows a person who is curious to do something that is new ... to them, at least.

    --

    If you haven't been down-modded lately, you aren't trying.

    Sacred cows make the best hamburger.

  6. Why video? by heptapod · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Online video is a waste of time and bandwidth unless it's porn.
    I can easily skim an article and review a diagram much quicker than watching a video. Text also provides an easier point of reference than fast forwarding and rewinding a video to find a pertinent bit of information.
    When it comes to online media the best innovation is no innovation at all.

    1. Re:Why video? by ZeroExistenZ · · Score: 5, Funny

      Online video is a waste of time and bandwidth unless it's porn.

      It's geekporn. A geeky girl, soldering, throwing together electronics and showing you her enthousiasm for hacking and electronics? This *IS* porn.

      Why do you think there aren't as much reactions?

      --
      I think we can keep recursing like this until someone returns 1
    2. Re:Why video? by syousef · · Score: 4, Funny

      It's geekporn. A geeky girl, soldering, throwing together electronics and showing you her enthousiasm for hacking and electronics? This *IS* porn.

      Dude! That was terrible porn. I mean she used Windows! Windows for crying out loud!!! And did you see her solder joints? They were messy and horrible! No way that reader's going to go the distance!

      --
      These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
  7. Re:Bad hair day? by taniwha · · Score: 2, Informative
    sigh - you don't understand geek street cred - they're not applying for a job, nor VC money - if they were they'd drop on the suit.

    Ada runs her own business, selling stuff to geeks, she understands her market - it isn't guys in suits

  8. Re:Payphones? Redboxes? by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Funny, back when I was redboxing fortress fones, we did it for one reason: because we had to. We would have mercilessly ridiculed any dilettante who said he was building a redbox just for the knowledge. What knowledge is there to be had by following instructions off some text phile you d/l'd off some pirate BBS, anyway?

    --
    Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
  9. Re:Payphones? Redboxes? by ibbie · · Score: 2, Insightful

    What knowledge is there to be had by following instructions off some text phile you d/l'd off some pirate BBS, anyway?

    ... Uhm. Plenty.

    TLDR: Documentation is a Good Thing.

    I have to agree. If you didn't already know how to do it, then those instructions taught you how to do it. In fact, correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought that was the point of a tutorial: Teaching you how to do something.

    The Linux Documentation Project, at least, seems to think so.

    Normally I'm in favor of elitism, but when one goes to the extent of saying, "There's no point in this documentation because anyone worth anything already knows it." they're going a tad too far.

    --
    The wise follow a damned path, for to know is to be forsaken.
  10. Re:Lost all respect for Make by Free+the+Cowards · · Score: 2

    I suppose you make your own RAM, know exactly how every one of the 500 million transistors on your CPU is wired, and bake your own bread?

    It's perfectly acceptable to simply accept that an IC does what it's specced to do without knowing why. Comparing it to a Wal-Mart shopper is asinine.

    --
    If you mod me Overrated, you are admitting that you have no penis.
  11. Re:Open Source? Not exactly. by ladyada · · Score: 5, Informative

    "They released all the projects as open source" means that the project information - code, schematics and layout - are open source. See: http://ladyada.net/make/simreader/download.html (The payphone schematics will be up soon, also CC 2.5 BY-SA)

  12. Re:"Geek girl" that doesn't know how to screw righ by ptorrone · · Score: 2, Informative

    the screw needed to be loosened before it could hold the clips for the phone (i edited this and cut it short). limor isn't an actor, she's an engineer - follow the links and you'll see all of her projects and work.

  13. Re:"Geek girl" that doesn't know how to screw righ by ptorrone · · Score: 4, Insightful

    @DarKlajid - when women give examples of why they're not so interested in being part of a community like this, or even go in to the technical fields your comment about a "geek girl that doesn't know how to screw" pretty much symbolizes why. i realize it's a joke, it's just not that funny. to joke like that and then say it's fake to discount her ability as an engineer would make any person steer away from putting themselves out there to be made fun of. yes, it's a joke. i don't take it seriously, it's easier that way. something to think about, each one of us can be the change we want to see in the world...

  14. Re:"Geek girl" that doesn't know how to screw righ by ladyada · · Score: 4, Informative

    yes i'm reading the comments here and i dont think its very funny either. the only reason girls seem to be 'resistant' to these sorts of comments is because those that dont like it leave or are shunned.

  15. Re:Open Source? Not exactly. by ladyada · · Score: 2, Informative

    Oddly enough, its TTL serial (9600 baud) with a shared RX and TX line. The TX half is open collector so you need a pullup.

  16. Re:"Geek girl" that doesn't know how to screw righ by John+Whitley · · Score: 3, Informative

    In fact, most girls that are into nerdstuff are quite resistant to all those jokes.

    You are Legend..-arily clueless. Are you so blind that you don't realize this belief is self-fulfilling? I've known quite a number of women that really just don't want to put up with this disrespectful boys' locker-room crap... and they find other things to do. Spelling it out: insensitive bozos like you keep repelling bright creative minds from all manner of disciplines. STOP IT!

  17. Re:And those who are lazy by KGIII · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Oh man but the beautiful thing about having done it yourself is that you've done it yourself and learned a lot in the process. What you made might not be perfect but it is your creation.

    I have made many things from wood and they exist in houses around the area, some even across the country. (Some stuff went to Germany but I don't think I had much to do with that project.)

    I had a 2000 Ford Explorer Sport that turned the lights on automatically. That got totalled (no I wasn't driving it). I got a 2001 model of the same vehicle but the mirror didn't have the sensor. Dash drilling and several weeks later (figuring on a failed attempt too and wondering how I'd cover the hole I'd drilled prematurely) and the sensor is embedded in the dash *with a timer even* so that it works properly and doesn't just randomly turn the lights on when the vehicle goes under a shadow. (It was tougher than I had anticipated and my mishaps were plentiful.)

    Either way, it is something you did. Something only you did. Even if you go the directions from a site (I probably should have but didn't find one) the result is still your work and you will have learned so much from just having done so and (I think) will appreciate it so much more.

    --
    "So long and thanks for all the fish."