Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

ProxyHam Debunked and Demoed At DEFCON

Posted by samzenpus on from the here's-the-deal dept.

darthcamaro writes: Last month, the ProxyHam project talk for DEFCON was mysteriously cancelled. In its place as a later edition is a new talk, in which the ProxyHam approach will be detailed and debunked — in a session called '"HamSammich". In a video preview of the talk, Rob Graham and Dave Maynor detail the flaws of ProxyHam and how to do the same thing with off the shelf gear, legally. "Our goal is to show that ProxyHam did not actually enhance security," Maynor said. "It does the exact opposite, causing more trouble than you can fix."

7 of 38 comments (clear)

  1. Transcript Please by rudy_wayne · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I can read. I don't need to watch two retards mumble their way through a poorly shot video.

    1. Re:Transcript Please by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 2

      Agreed...just let me scan the text, I don't need a puppet show for this kind of stuff.

      --
      Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    2. Re:Transcript Please by Darinbob · · Score: 3, Insightful

      But how else are they supposed to make money from their youtube channel? That's the real reason everyone wants a 10 minute long video to relay two sentences of value.

    3. Re:Transcript Please by Sqr(twg) · · Score: 2

      Didn't watch the video either, but according to TFS it tells you how to build your own, and that's not hard to figure out:

      * Go to Google and type in "900 MHz ethernet extender", click on one of the ads an buy one.
      * Connect it to a wireless router, and set the router to "bridge" mode.
      * Congratulations, you now have a ProxyHam
      * ...
      * Profit!

  2. Re:DISINFORMATION by Pikoro · · Score: 3, Informative

    The difference is mainly in legal vs illegal. It's not illegal to hide yourself, but it IS illegal using the previous method. Broadcasting all over a licensed band is a quick way to end up in trouble. HAMs self report, no FCC required. Hell, we'd grab the YAGIs and make a game out of finding the prick.

    --
    "Freedom in the USA is not the ability to do what you want. It is the ability to stop others from doing what THEY want"
  3. IF they eventually answer it by raymorris · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The paragraphs of fluff "introduction" has always bugged me, but lately I've run into a few articles which have all the fluff, then completely forget to address the question, to EVER get to the point. Stuff like:

    HOW TO BOOT DIAGNOSTIC MODE IN ANDROID

    Android is the world's most popular ...
    Cell phones are now more popular than PCs ...

    Diagnostic mode should be used with care ...
    Some carriers disable diagnostic mode ...

    THE END

    Hey asshole! You forgot to say how to boot into diagnostic mode!

  4. Re:DISINFORMATION by Obfuscant · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The difference is mainly in legal vs illegal. It's not illegal to hide yourself, but it IS illegal using the previous method. Broadcasting all over a licensed band ...

    1. It's not "broadcasting", it's point-to-point data.

    2. It's unlicensed for the devices that were being used.

    HAMs self report, no FCC required. Hell, we'd grab the YAGIs and make a game out of finding the prick.

    Yeah, go track down a legal secondary user of a band where you are a secondary user yourself and Part 97 (97.301 and 97.303(e)) tells you that you must accept interference from, and then what? Force them to stop their legal use of the frequencies you want to call your own?

    The "previous method" is no different than the current one. You didn't bother to read any of the discussion about this in the earlier /. dust-up and conspiracy party, did you? It was pointed out by several people, myself included, that the ProxyHam hardware shown in the pictures they released were simple 900 MHz unlicensed data radios and cheap Yagi-Uda antennas. That's not illegal. They weren't shut down by some awful FCC or NSA conspiracy to stop some dangerous hacking activity, because it was both legal and the intended use for the commercial products they were using.