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Samsung TVs Can Be Hacked Into Endless Restart Loop
Gunkerty Jeb writes "Italian security researcher Luigi Auriemma was trying to play a trick on his brother when he accidentally discovered two vulnerabilities in all current versions of Samsung TVs and Blu-Ray systems that could allow an attacker to gain remote access to those devices. Auriemma claims that the vulnerabilities will affect all Samsung devices with support for remote controllers, and that the vulnerable protocol is on both TVs and Blu-Ray enabled devices. One of the bugs leads to a loop of endless restarts while the other could cause a potential buffer overflow."
My parents recently got a 52" Internet connected Samsung TV. Any way I could use this to replace the crap Samsung apps with something better?
On the up side you can't be inundated with endless commercials if your TV is in an endless restart loop ;-)
The buffer overflow is worrisome . A lot of the newer BluRay Players have additional features like netflix over wifi/homenetwork. The basic consumer may put in their credit card (or ____ forbid their debit card) info to start their netflix account.
Beware of those who profit off the docile and persecute the unbelievers.
Where we had dumped carburetors for computer-controlled engines, but they didn't need to get updates, and those updates weren't wirelessly and remotely pushed?
Where we had dumped cathode ray tubes for flat, liquid crystal displays, but hadn't put the tubes back into TV by stuffing the Internet (and viruses) into them?
Where we had dumped both rotary and touch tone land line phones for cellular phones that could do most anything you'd want them to, and you carry it whereever you went, but you didn't have to have an antivirus running on the phone and didn't have to worry about your contact details being sent to Nigeria?
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
So now that TVs restart, I'm guessing malware isn't far behind?
After all, if you expect to turn every household device into a typical computer, you're also gonna drag the bad things computers have.
Can we 'regedit' tvs so we can use our own splash logos?
All glory to Arstotzka!
TV's will eventually have cameras in the front, could be a good method of surveillance.
The vulnerability is originally disclosed here, not in the posted link.
This vulnerability only works from the same broadcast domain where the TV is, since the remote control protocol relies on broadcast messages to announce the service. This means that your TV cannot be cracked from the Internet. Let's hope that Samsung apply a fix soon, in any case.
I own two Samsung Blu-Ray players. I'm not surprised by this in the slightest. You can usually judge the security of an app by how reliably it does its intended function, and their Blu-Ray players are anything but reliable. (Their older TVs work well, but I've never used one of their newer, networked TVs, which I'm assuming are as buggy as their Blu-Ray players.)
For example:
And so on. In short, Samsung's software quality control appears to be utterly awful. So hearing that they have security holes is almost as surprising as hearing that Flash has security holes....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
This does eliminate the age old IT question, "Did you try turning it off and on again?"
Why is this such big news? Did you know you can replace the entire firmware inside your TV too? There's already a group working on getting something usable onto Samsung TVs like these: http://www.samygo.tv/
What? Relevance to this story?
Init level 6 is "Reboot", so the system was configured to boot up ... and then reboot ... and reboot ... and reboot... This is relevant to the story because the story is also about an "endless restart loop"!
Runlevel 5 is the typical X level. You switch to runlevel 6 to reboot the system.
So you set inittab to default to level 6 when you want to incur general rage and butthurt with a restart loop. :D
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
Hey! Deja Vu,
I think I've seen this movie before...
Hey! Deja Vu,
I think I've seen this movie before...
Hey! Deja Vu,
I think I've seen this movie before...
Hey!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Groundhog Day marathon.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
(or ____ forbid their debit card)
And?
Unless you have a very terrible bank and/or don't bother checking your account ever, this isn't exactly a big deal. I just went through this a few weeks ago, when yonder random payment processor got owned hardcore.
Checked my account - like I do regularly, and found a weird charge. Called up my bank, said, "What is this I don't even?" Bam. Charge killed, money returned, new card in the mail, before I could even say, "Wow, you guys aren't nearly as evil as the Internet led me to believe."
Of course, I suppose the fact that I actually bother checking my account activity regularly makes me some sort of Fiscal Wizard compared to your average person. :p
Consider:
Similarly, a computer monitor should not have a built in computer (or vice versa), unless the computer is a replaceable module. The TV or Monitor still have a lot of lifetime (and economic value) long after the computer is hopelessly obsolete. (Yes, I'm looking at you, iMac integrated computer and monitor. But then Apple products seem to be for people with more money then sense.)
- - - - - - -
All that is necessary for Apple to triumph is for Google men to do nothing.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
That depends on how they implement it. For my bluray player netflix setup, they put a unique ID on the screen and told me to authenticate it on my account using my computer. So the bluray player never accessed any information about my account. My bluray doesn't have a web browser built-in only Internet access.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Some banks have very good fraud detection systems and it is in their interest to have them. The sooner they detect it, the less headache they have to deal with. One of my banks froze my card after I made several unexpected large purchases in one day. Another one called me when they noticed suspicious charges to confirm that I did make them. Someone got my card number, but I still had my card so I would not have reported it stolen or lost.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
This or this or this or this or this?
It's deja vu all over again.
What the GP is saying is that many banks will issue refunds immediately for fraudulent purchases, and will remove any overdrafts fees if any occurred. In my experience that is how banks work, legally they are not obligated to do so but do so to keep their customers happy. I don't use my debt card for purchases due to the risks but have not heard of any body getting told by the bank that it's not the banks responsibility. Further any overdrafts that occurred from the fraudulent charges will not be assessed because of how they occurred.
Knowledge = Power
P= W/t
t=Money
Money = Work/Knowledge so the less you know the more you make
Unless you have a very terrible bank and/or don't bother checking your account ever, this isn't exactly a big deal. I just went through this a few weeks ago, when yonder random payment processor got owned hardcore.
Problem is they don't have to. The behavior will vary bank to bank, and running into such issue is how you learn. A bank might also say "sorry, the money is gone - transfer credentials were legitimate". And there will be nothing you can do.
Credit cards, on the other hand, provide chargeback as one of the services (often by screwing the vendor always assuming their fault, but that's another story and doesn't typically concern the buyer).
Some banks are so good at fraud detection, they shut down your bank account when you make a purchase overseas even after telling them a week in advance exactly where you were going, leaving you in a foreign country with no money.
To be fair, any large organization is going to make clerical errors, and it's better that they err on that side, since it happens a lot less frequently.