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USB Killer 2.0: a Harmless-Looking USB Stick That Destroys Computers
An anonymous reader writes: Plugging in random USB sticks in your computer has never been more dangerous, as a researcher who goes by the name Dark Purple has demonstrated his new device: USB Killer 2.0. When plugged into a computer, the deadly USB draws power from the device itself. With the help of a voltage converter the device's capacitors are charged to 220V, and it releases a negative electric surge into the USB port. This surge "fries" the USB port and, in the researcher's demonstration, the motherboard — perhaps not always after the first surge, but the malicious USB device repeats the process until no more power can be drawn.
If you have local access to the PC you could just use a sledgehammer. The old 120V into the network port almost always fries the NIC as well. The fact that someone with physical access can damage your PC shouldn't be a big surprise.
"I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." - Mark Twain
Uh, no, it doesn't. You just drop a few of these in the parking lot outside a company, and wait for people to pick them up and stick them in their PC.
>> someone with physical access can damage your PC
This isn't a local access attack, though. Instead, you label your attacking USB stick with your target company's name and leave it in the parking lot or at a restaurant where you know a lot of your target's employees visit. Some foolish altruist will frequently pick it up and shove it into their computer when they get back to the office. This kind of thing works great for infecting someone's computer with command-and-control malware; if anything this "wreck the computer" attack seems less useful.
Bonus points if it has some legitmate function before it's ready to strike: 802.11n adapter, etc.
Hypothetically of course ... Just make lots and lots of these. Get a Sharpie. Label each of them with things like TAX DOCUMENTS, ACCOUNT NUMBERS, and definitely lots of them labelled PORN COLLECTION. Drop them in hotels, restaurants, restrooms, subways, bus stops, just leave them all over town. Hilarity ensues!
For more bonus points, act shocked when you hear about the mysterious computer-killing USB drives. Say you don't believe anyone would do such a thing.
http://i.ebayimg.com/00/$(KGrH...
make lots and lots of these
Label each of them with things like TAX DOCUMENTS, ACCOUNT NUMBERS, and definitely lots of them labelled PORN COLLECTION
Drop them in hotels, restaurants, restrooms, subways, bus stops, just leave them all over town
Open a computer repair shop
Profit!!
If you believe that any unfamiliar USB stick looks "harmless", you clearly haven't been paying attention.
Anti espionage: Just leave one around the office if you suspect the cleaning crew.
Russian roulette: Get 1 killer USB and five legits and a few friends... take turns plugging into your computers.
Search and seizure revenge: "I warned you".
Worked for Stuxnet and most other state sponsored cyber attacks. Just saying. We recently ran a "security awareness" month at the UNI I work for, giving away free flash keys to students who could show us their phone was secured at least with a password or pattern. They seemed surprised that no one bothered and most people told them they are too lazy to have to swype a pattern to unlock their phones. My suggestion was to custom build some pseudo malware, load it on those flash keys, or a set of flash keys, and leave them around campus. Nothing nefarious would happen to the user who did insert it other than an autorun popup informing them that we could have owned them right there if we wanted. The didn't go with my plan, I might still do it on my own. I'm nice like that, when I taught myself to crack into WEP and weak WPA access points that had the management page accessible over wifi and the default admin passwords set, I promptly change their SSID and passwords, letting them know they need to lock that shit down. I'm nice like that
And hub is connected to the ... ankle bone?
My suggestion was to custom build some pseudo malware, load it on those flash keys, or a set of flash keys, and leave them around campus. Nothing nefarious would happen to the user who did insert it other than an autorun popup informing them that we could have owned them right there if we wanted.
Don't do it on your own. Don't do it with serious back up and written guarantee for support from higher ups. What you are doing is very similar to finding homes with unlatched/unlocked back porches, walking in sitting in the living room sofa and shouting boo when the home owners walk in. No matter how sensible and helpful your advice is, the homeowners are going to be jumpy, irritated, made to look like fools and they will hate you intensely.
Try to do it differently. Create these USB warning devices as you planned, but give them to students, tell them what it does and ask them to "educate" their friends and relatives. Watermark each device so that they don't prank unsuspecting people.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
TSA: "We're going to have to take a look through all your laptops, memory devices and phones, sir."
Didn't they just have a big computer outage recently?
Have gnu, will travel.
And hub is connected to the ... ankle bone?
I tried that. The throughput was terrible. [ 0/10 do not recommend ]
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
We had an office thief once. He would take anything and it didnt really matter the value. Shitty old drives, ram, a customers computer we were configuring and other random crap.
I simply connected every line to Vcc on an old IDE hard disk and put it inside of a desk. The person who owned the desk I told them what was going on.
Maybe two days later one of the technicians is complaining that his IDE controller no longer works. He would later admit to some drug problems and a predilection for theft.
Label them in large letters 'BACKUPS', and then in small letters underneath 'always make backups!'.
if anything this "wreck the computer" attack seems less useful.
Imagine that you're a CIO tasked with protecting data worth billions of dollars.
Drop a few of these in the parking lot or cafeteria, and write off a few $800 Dells to find and eliminate the employees who cannot be trained to not do stupid things that will severely damage the company.
I'd do it.
Ya, watch the person you catch to be the CEO.