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Stealing Laptops For Class Credit
First time accepted submitter core_tripper writes "Students at the University of Twente have stolen thirty laptops from various members of the university's staff. They were not prosecuted for this, so they could just get on with their studies. Indeed, these students even received ECTS credits for these thefts. UT researcher Trajce Dimkov asked the students to steal the machines as part of a scientific experiment. Stealing these laptops turned out to be a pretty simple matter."
This sounds like Pwn2Own taken to the next (and otherwise illegal) level. In this case, it looks like they were auditing physical security amongst other things.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Even if the submitter speaks another language, couldn't Timmy at least READ the summary before posting it??
In the other news, 30 new government positions have been allocated as part of a "job program" to 30 soon to be graduates out of University of Twente. Seems like all of them will be IRS related jobs.
You can't handle the truth.
It doesn't mention whether the cleaners or caretakers knew the people they were letting in or not.
Does it matter? A lot of thefts are inside jobs.
outsourced cleaners with poor English don't know any better and a good story is all it takes to get past them.
"The university’s security staff were informed in advance, to make sure that the students involved did not end up in jail."
Physical security is a lot harder to enforce when you tell the physical security not to do their job...
Seems there are still scientists out there that know how to do something both spectacular and scientifically valuable. Impressive! I wish there were a lot more that can do things like this.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
At the UofMN people walk out with entire desktops; while the people are still in their office. We had one person who was at her desk talking on the phone, with her back to the door, looking behind her out the window. Someone walked in, unplugged her iMac, and walked out with it.
Suppose one of the students followed his friend around to see how he stole a laptop, and then later copied the method? Would he get credit, or be marked down for plagiarism?
Just specify some boundaries. Where was the imagination that birthed the idea in that decision?
And what do you mean casing the house, like attempting to break in or simply gathering information like the names of his children, their birthdays, he wife's name, etc.
Shoot, all anyone would need to get into my dad's laptop is his current dog's name. (Useful for my mom, but not exactly top notch security.)
The members of staff who had loaned the laptops were asked to make sure that these machines were always chained to their desks.
So the fault was with the people who loaned the laptops for not keeping them chained up. It's hard to loan someone something if you've chained it to your desk, but that's the best security if you don't trust the people you loan things to, I guess.
Did they find the person who did it or are you confessing?
If they had permission..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
outsourced cleaners with poor English don't know any better and a good story is all it takes to get past them.
Being a janitor does not mean you can use social engineering to get past them. Even with a good story. It depends on the janitors.
I have used social engineering to get past people that can speak the English real good, get paid many times more than a janitor, and have college degrees.
Social engineering works on people that are not always considering security around them, and to a large extent, those that are not cynical and suspicious of others by nature. It's much harder to get past assholes with the best stories and a lot easier to get past a cute secretary that is outgoing and bubbly.
You get a 60 year old janitor who has seen it all and heard it all, and believes there are aliens at Area 51, and you have somebody with a finely tuned bullshit detector. Those are the equivalent of landmines in social engineering.
I have used social engineering to get past people that can speak the English real good,
Have you used it on anyone who could speak English really well?
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Seems like a douche move rather than a fair one. A university is a place of somewhat more trust in others than the outside, because in academia you share knowledge with others, the spirit is a bit different, you don't take others' tools.
Taking advantage of that to run a test of whether it's easy to steal laptops is not entirely ethical.
Not to say that people shouldn't be careful, but exploiting them isn't cool either.
When I was in school, someone hacked my student account and framed me for downloading and piracy. I didn't have to go to court, but if I ever found out who did it, I'd gladly have caused them serious injury.
It's woooshhh in the English right?
Interestingly enough, many of these students may never have attempted to steal a laptop because of the legal consequences. Now that they were given permission to become comfortable with the idea, it is more possible that one of them would be inclined to steal a laptop at a later point. After all, they now know how to get past security (assuming nothing is beefed up after the experiment).
From Amarillo Globe News.
... he impersonated an army officer to take command of the launch site for nearly two days after 14 people were killed when an Interstate 40 bridge fell in eastern Oklahoma...
And blackjack!
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Love that sig - is that of your mind?
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It doesn't mention whether the cleaners or caretakers knew the people they were letting in or not.
Given that the University has 9,000 students and 3,300 faculty/staff, and that they were 60 attempts of thefts (only 30 of which succeeded). And given that this experiment was conducted in the context of a security audit, I doubt that the successful cases were all due the cleaners actually knowing the student (may be some of them knew some of the students, but surely not all of them did, and in at least one case, the student got to the laptop just because the door was found unlocked when the door was supposed to be locked).
Besides, "knowing" someone and building rapport can be faked in an extremely short amount of time. For instance, when Steven Spielberg was still a teenager, he got into the Universal Studios through a guided tour, but when he left the Studio that night, he escaped from the guided tour, he dressed himself up in a suit, and he made a point to address the guard on his way out by his first name. After that night, he was able to go back and forth through that security checkpoint as long as that same guard was there, no questions asked. He was wearing the right uniform, a suit, plus the guard "knew" him from the previous day.
Yeah that's an original.
Having 3 kids who love Dr. Suess in his many and varied forms, I've always appreciated your sig when I've spotted one of your comments.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
"We only looted, raped, and plundered for science." - Vikings
Table-ized A.I.
First time through I actually didn't notice the word 'the' in front of English.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Reminds me of the early days of computing, where often a student that was found able to break school system security was often given tasks by the IT admin.
comment first, facts later. http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/RelativityofWrong.htm
Hard to see how a university ethics IRB (Institutional review board) could approve something like this.
"You can justify anything by putting it in quotes, adding a famous name and making it a sig" - Albert Einstein
You get a 60 year old janitor who has seen it all and heard it all, and believes there are aliens at Area 51, and you have somebody with a finely tuned bullshit detector.
A guy that believes there are aliens in a hangar in Nevada has a finely-tuned bullshit detector?
Hell, all you'd have to do is tell him the G-men are coming to destroy the evidence of aliens on the laptop ("You always thought Dr. Smith was a bit off, didn't you?"), and he'll help you get it out of the building.
Actually, I'm pretty sure that happened in The X-Files.
My sister opened a computer store in Hawaii. She sells C shells by the seashore.
Like Someone picks up the wrong item?
Other laws are broken in the course of doing the test.
Some harass cop busts some one and let's say try to hit them with raising arrest or other charges like braking and entering or some other law.
Let's say you miss a test or class sitting in lock up waiting for it to be cleared up?
some chains the laptop to a weak point and the person trying to take it end ups makes a big mess by pulling on it.
What if some posing a technicians give fake advice ends and that turns in to a big mess or end's giving a fake name that ends' up with some taking the heat just as some named there name.
I once gave my undergrad students a similar assignment where they had to each score an ounce of weed for me.
It was also a great success and provided them with an important life lesson about society and individual liberty. Or something.
The Dean of my department at the time was not amused, though he did think the sticky red bud was the bomb.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Can't claim any originality, though!
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It's geek porn and you love it.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Political science majors would get extra credit for theft.
who prays for Satan? Who in 18 centuries has had the humanity to pray for the 1 sinner that needed it most? ~Mark Twain
heard of laptops being stolen from large businesses by people dressed and acting like UPS/delivery/IT personel. These types of people are generally ignored. Act as if you belong there and people will think you do, even though they have never seen you before.
The most sucessful ones that I had heard of had dressed themselves as delivery people and walked in with a 2 wheel cart with empty boxes on it. The boxes were not empty when the walked out again.
I'm really curious, but is there a citation or place you read this? I want to find out more :)
Thankfully the cleaners spoke perfect Dutch, which was a good thing, as the University of Twente is in the Netherlands.
Dumbass.
Hehe, but it's pronounced twent-eh in Dutch, sounds nothing like twenty ;)
http://www.forvo.com/word/twente/#nl
We don't pay for grass and hookers, as your posting just confirmed those sort of things are for foreign visitors and tourists.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
there were no controls and everyone was in on it.
Who told you?
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Yes. [sarcasm]
But more to the point - who cares if janitorial employees in the Netherlands speak English?
I assume you mean a citation for the Spielburg anecdote. Unfortunately, it is exaggerated. Read more here: http://www.snopes.com/movies/other/spielberg.asp
Boom chicky boom boom
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Lojack for Laptops.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Actually on second thought, I wonder if the offices of the targets were far enough away from each other and if the same cleaners didn't get far many more requests for opening doors that they usually did on a given night -- thus raising their suspicions a little bit.