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Gaining Root Access On Linux-Based Femtocells
viralMeme writes "According to the Register, 'Security researchers have turned their attention to femtocells, and have discovered that gaining root on the tiny mobile base stations isn't as hard as one might hope.' One of the researchers said, 'After hours of sniffing traffic, changing IP address ranges, guessing passwords and investigating hardware pinouts, we had obtained root access on these Linux-based cellular-based devices, which piqued our curiosity [about] the security implications.' Whoever designed these devices should be sent back to computer school. An authentication device that can be bypassed is a contradiction in terms. Or, as some pen-pusher would put it in a report: an unantipicated security excursion.
An authentication device that can be bypassed is a contradiction in terms.
You don't need to see his identification.
The summary mentions "investigating hardware pinouts". This makes me think that the attack is, in part, on the hardware. If one has access to hardware, they've pwned the system. Period. So this is a non-issue.
Second; cell phones trusting the base station has always been a security issue. And "exploits" based upon this weakness are already in use by law enforcement as well as criminals. The whole inmates sneaking cell phones into prisons has been made a non-issue based upon this very approach. Prisons are beginning to cover their facilities with femtocells which give them the ability to monitor all illicit cell traffic on their property. Any truly secure system will assume that the network carrying its traffic is insecure.
Have gnu, will travel.
Too many companies are still shipping products that have no intended user access to the command shell with passwords like "Admin", "12345", and the ever-popular "password". It's not like it costs more to have a longer, more complex password.
You think longer, complex setup doesn't cost the company money? I gather that you haven't considered support costs?
The best solution I've seen so far is to have a strong password printed on a sticker on the outside of the box. That's a pretty good compromise because if the attacker has physical access to the box, he/she could hit the "Reset" button on the device anyway. Thus, putting the password on the bottom of the device on a sticker really isn't any less secure than other solutions, and this can be done fairly cheaply.
But it still costs - each router has to be given its own unique password, and a process has to be set up to match up the passwords given with the stickers, and there are still more support costs from the clueless dolts who have to be told to look on the bottom of the device for the default password.
If you assume any intelligence on the part of the end user, your support costs will quickly challenge that assumption!
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
I had no idea linux proponents were all Jedi. That explains everything.
"You don't NEED the extra features in Photoshop."
"You don't NEED integrated audio processing software."
"You don't NEED anything OpenOffice doesn't have."
"You don't NEED..."
Now those Jedi need to start using their powers for good.
"You NEED to write documentation for non-technical users..."