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USBKill Transforms a Thumb Drive Into an "Anti-Forensic" Device
Orome1 writes with a snippet from a report at net-security.org; a hacker going by Hephaestos has shared with the world a Python script that, when put on an USB thumb drive, turns the device in an effective kill switch for the computer to which it's plugged in. USBkill, as the programmer dubbed it, "waits for a change on your USB ports, then immediately kills your computer." The device would be useful "in case the police comes busting in, or steals your laptop from you when you are at a public library," Hephaestos explained.
So it's a deadman's switch basically.
This is to be used in conjunction with TrueCrypt. The summary is alluding to the arrest of the alleged founder of Silk Road at a public library. He was using a computer with full disk encryption, but they physically separated him from the laptop before he could power it off. Attach this to your wrist, and the machine will be powered off when the USB drive is removed from its port.
"In case the police come busting in" is a condition typically followed by a hailstorm of bullets here in the United States. Afterwards, assuming you have a winning complexion, charges are fabricated and officers exhonorated.
Our prosecution also works similar to a firehose. Typically if youre arrested for loitering or driving while black, youll be charged with resisting arrest and a large slew of other charges that may not even apply to your specific encounter. Once in jail a member of the prosecution team will approach you with a laundry list of offenses and the threat of decades of years in jail. Mercifully they will offer a plea bargain that, should you choose to simply plead guilty, youll only spend a fraction of that time in prison. If you cant afford a lawyer, and dont have a firm grasp of legal proceedings yourself, this option is generally chosen.
Wiping the contents of your laptop, or refusing to give a password in the US, is generally met with unfavourable consequences. Indefinite forcible detention at border checkpoints without charges, for example, befell moxy marlinspike. computing chicanery in general that goes beyond the relm of 'good consumer' will find you hounded to the end of your days, as was the case of the late Aaron Schwartz. Given my options, id rather feign ignorance than quietly activate a duress payload.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Reminds me of something I wrote back around 1981. Working with the early IBM PC at the machine code level several flaws surfaced and for fun I packaged them all together in the boot sector of a 5 1/4" floppy which we put in a "break glass" box and put on the wall (There were no hard drives yet, the XT wasn't out yet). If you placed the floppy in the boot drive it would destroy the hardware in a few seconds. First, there was a bit on the original IBM display adapter (mono text only) which would lock the horizontal sweep on the standard IBM monitor forcing the horizontal output power transistor to overheat and burn out. You would see the display image collapse while the monitor would squeal while smoke (literally!) would come out the sides and back, and die with a $200 repair to fix it. Second, there were no stops on the head movement on those original floppy drives - with the right loop they would step out until the heads fell off inside the case with a pair of clunks if you had a 2 drive system. (Not a difficult repair, but you had to know what your were doing and get into the floppy drives themselves to fix it.) Finally, the speaker ran off of a shift register which could be loaded with a really nasty PWM sound and set to free run. With interrupts disabled and the CPU halted, the machine sat there smoking with a very loud nerve-rattling siren, completely dead and unable to boot. It would require major physical repairs to get it working again. The monitor would stink for weeks afterwards.
That is probably a tactic to be used by the authorities. If they get a hold of the laptop and sneak in some piece of hardware to make the USB drop every now and then, the suspect will pretty soon disable it.
Way back when I worked for a 3 letter acronym this was a pretty low tech solution often employed to circumvent alarms of all sorts. Just randomly trigger the alarm a every few hours at night and within a few days it will be turned off out of disgust or at the orders of any cops that have been dispatched the last half dozen times. Now you can waltz in and do your dirty work.