GPRS Can Be Hacked Easily, Claims German Researcher

hypnosec writes "A German technology researcher on Wednesday showed global mobile makers and technology firms how General Packet Radio Service can easily be tapped, intercepted, and decrypted with an average mobile phone and a few applications. According to the New York Times, Karsten Nohl, a computer engineer and mobile security researcher, demonstrated to fellow researchers gathered to attend Chaos Communication Camp, a Berlin-based hackers event, how to intercept the voice or data messages sent between mobile devices over GPRS easily, owing to weak protection provided by mobile network carriers for data information. Nohl, in collaboration with his colleague Luca Melette, tapped the information within a radius of five kilometers using a seven-year-old inexpensive mobile phone from Motorola." Computerworld also has an informative, link-laden account. If you are attending this year's CCC (only every four years, sadly), feel free to drop a line (with the submissions form) about cool projects you encounter there.

Comments

Aha!

[drobety]

That's why I got lost despite my GPS last time. Some people in my house tried to make me feel as if I was stupid.

Re:The Germans also found out

[wsxyz]

You're confusing bad Germans with good Germans. They're not the same, you know.

Re:I'd just like to interject...

[ArhcAngel]

But are they Whole wheat, saltine, or low sodium crackers?

1995 called...

[Anubis_Ascended]

They want their outdated mobile data standard back (preferably with no shipping charges)

Re:1995 called...

[X0563511]

GPRS != GSM.

Re:1995 called...

[TheRaven64]

1995 called and asked for a standard from 1997 to be returned to them? I'd like to comply, but there are rules about giving future technology to the past.

Very interesting

[ArhcAngel]

using a seven-year-old inexpensive mobile phone from Motorola

Yet another reason why I still use my RAZR. MUHAHAHAHA!

Re:Very interesting

[elsJake]

They probably used the C123 from Motorola/

Re:Very interesting

[antdude]

Which model do you have?

Yep, they (v3t GSM) still work for my queen ant and me for basic phone calls. :)

Re:Very interesting

[HTH NE1]

Meanwhile my e815 is turning itself off rather than charge its battery. Three different chargers, two different batteries. Thankfully I was able to set up call forwarding before the first battery got too low to boot the phone.

Not a problem for me!

[toadlife]

I recently switched to Sprint which runs the much more secure CDMA net..............[NO CARRIER]

Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[jandrese]

Isn't GPRS effectively obsolete at this point? The only time I see it in use is way out in the boonies where they're clearly near the bottom of the list for tower upgrades. Often the service is broken anyway (get GPRS connection with strong signal, but no packets make it through). 10 or 15 years ago this would have been a big issue, but these days I just can't see it.

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[imjustmatthew]

10 or 15 years ago this would have been a big issue, but these days I just can't see it.

Given the near-total disregard for security I feel in most mobile network operators, I think anything that draws attention to how laughably easy it is to intercept cell data is worth talking about. Most people just assume that their cell data is secure, when every year at DEFCON we see more exploits .. and they never seem to get patched. With how ridiculously easy it is to encrypt internet traffic you'd think they could at least deploy some patches to fix some of these attacks... rogue towers anyone? They still don't use signed certificates for towers?

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[Jimbookis]

There are craploads of M2M terminals in Australia at least which rely on GPRS or SMS to convey data. These terminals are the portable credit and bank payment terminals used in every taxi and by mobile merchants and heaps and heaps of embedded telemetry systems. The carriers here are loathe to shut down the GSM/GPRS network because of the probably millions of embedded systems that rely on the GSM/GPRS network - the cost or replacement or redesign of these terminals is insanely expensive and will only be phased out by natural attrition over the next 5-10 years.

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[bemymonkey]

GPRS is fine for e-mail, IM and such. Better than nothing when you're out in the wilderness (i.e. 30km beyond city limits :p)...

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[TheRaven64]

IM, maybe. GPRS, when I last used it, had a round trip time of about 2 seconds and a maximum throughput of aroudn 5KB/s. Basically, worse than a modem. Email is fine, unless someone sends you any attachments. IM is probably fine, although the latency may mean that you're asking questions after they're answered.

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[bemymonkey]

Can't say I've noticed much latency. Even tethered surfing (with Flashblock, NoScript and AdBlock Plus, of course) isn't really worse than flaky 3G (like on the train)... sure, Slashdot takes 20 times longer to load than at home, but when you're out in the boonies with nothing to do, 10 seconds to load the page of comments that you're going to spend 10 minutes reading isn't too bad ;)

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[TheRaven64]

Try running ping sometime. I found UMTS gave around 200ms average ping times, GPRS gave about 2000ms, to the same host. Wired connection gave about 70ms to the same host. 200ms is usable, 2000ms limits you to things that don't require interactivity. SSH over GPRS is painful.

Re:Bad news for people out in the boondocks

[zippthorne]

You're talking about an industry which, until something like 2002, was still using unencrypted, 800 MHz AM transceivers and relying on laws passed by congress to force radio shack to cripple it's scanners...

Re:The Germans also found out

[aristotle-dude]

You're confusing bad Germans with good Germans. They're not the same, you know.

Neither have a sense of humour.

sensational?

[recharged95]

Now that's it's fairly inexpensive ($50) and abundant that you can get GPRS transceivers, and the wire protocol is widely known today.... it's not surprising that folks can hack into it.

I mean current technology R/C transceivers are more secure nowadays.

Re:sensational?

[Errol backfiring]

The SSH way of connecting to another computer is also widely known. But that is not the point.

Secure cellular communications?

[wall0645]

Are there any cellular protocols that are secure? That a criminal, corporation, or government couldn't hack? GPRS and CDMA are out from what I remember recently. Anything else been hacked? What hasn't been hacked yet?

Also, are cellular communications inherently less secure than wired communications like a land line? Or are those even easier for say your phone company or government to listen in on?

Re:Secure cellular communications?

[X0563511]

Here's a tip: you don't have secure communications over the phone, period.

Unless you have something like a fritz chip (that isn't retarded) it isn't secure.

Re:Secure cellular communications?

[GameboyRMH]

Exactly. If you're relying on any protocol or device you don't control, it's not secure. You want secure? Use a VPN with keyfiles where you control the devices on both ends. That's a secure connection, but if you run Skype through it, that Skype call is not secure.

I always considered phone calls, texts, and (at the very least) non-SSL cellular data traffic to be unsecure, so this news doesn't bother me.

Re:Secure cellular communications?

[X0563511]

At which time it's not really a phone conversation... but yes, that would be a way to manage it. Though you do have to trust the phone itself.

Re:Secure cellular communications?

[X0563511]

Didn't I just say that? It's implicit in "Though you do have to trust the phone itself."

Re:Secure cellular communications?

[Pinky's Brain]

I assume you mean the specs are unreadable?

(The fact they are only available under NDA means nothing given the number of companies and people with access to it.)

Re:I'd just like to interject...

[X0563511]

Yea, you go ahead and explain that to the NYT. We'll wait here for ya.

Re:I'd just like to interject...

[GameboyRMH]

Good hackers are called anti-hackers according to CNN.

Re:The Germans also found out

[Anne Thwacks]

Au contraire mon frere, the (good?) Germans had the Monty Python team do an episode in German, despite not understanding what they were saying (Pythons and Germans).... because there was not enough silliness in Bavaria!

Re:The Germans also found out

[wsxyz]

Oh come on... While speaking of Germans, you use French?
Wir sind die Guten!

Incorrect information

[Anonymous Coward]

Karsten Nohl states - “One reason operators keep giving me for switching off encryption is, operators want to be able to monitor traffic, to detect and suppress Skype, or to filter viruses, in a decentralized fashion,” Mr. Nohl said. “With encryption switched on, the operator cannot ‘look into’ the traffic anymore while in transit to the central GPRS system.”

This is rubbish. Deep Packet Inspection for the detection of layer 7 applications such as Skype being used by mobile broadband subscribers is generally done on the Gi interface, on or after the GGSN towards the ISP network. At this point in the network, there is no encryption (except for VPNs towards corporate networks for example).

DPI is not achieved by sniffing the radio interface, so Karsten Nohl's comment here is misguided and not accurate.

Re:The Germans also found out

[TheRaven64]

They also don't like kissing.

Re:The Germans also found out

[RockDoctor]

I think you'll find out that it was the Poles who found out that the Enigma code system could be easily broken (for many values of "easy"). They gave the recipe to the British, via IIRC the French during the "Phony War" (which wasn't very phony, for the Poles).