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French Gas Stations Robbed After Forgetting To Change Gas Pump PINs (zdnet.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from ZDNet: French authorities have arrested five men who stole over 120,000 liters (26,400 gallons) of fuel from gas stations around Paris by unlocking gas pumps using a special remote. The five-man team operated with the help of a special remote they bought online and which could unlock a particular brand of gas pumps installed at Total gas stations. The hack was possible because some gas station managers didn't change the gas pump's default lock code from the standard 0000. Hackers would use this simple PIN code to reset fuel prices and remove any fill-up limits.
Crooks would operate in small teams of two to three individuals who visited gas stations at night using two vehicles. A man in a first car would use the remote to unlock the gas station, and then a second car, usually a van, would come along seconds later to fill a giant tanker installed in the back of the vehicle with as much as 2,000 or 3,000 liters in one go. The group advertised the fuel they stole on social media, providing a time and place where customers could come and refuel their vehicles or pick up orders for gasoline and diesel at smaller prices. Police uncovered the scheme in April 2018, when they arrested a suspect in possession of a remote used in the hack. "Five men, part of the same gang, were arrested on Monday, according to Le Parisien, who first reported the scheme last November," the report adds.
Crooks would operate in small teams of two to three individuals who visited gas stations at night using two vehicles. A man in a first car would use the remote to unlock the gas station, and then a second car, usually a van, would come along seconds later to fill a giant tanker installed in the back of the vehicle with as much as 2,000 or 3,000 liters in one go. The group advertised the fuel they stole on social media, providing a time and place where customers could come and refuel their vehicles or pick up orders for gasoline and diesel at smaller prices. Police uncovered the scheme in April 2018, when they arrested a suspect in possession of a remote used in the hack. "Five men, part of the same gang, were arrested on Monday, according to Le Parisien, who first reported the scheme last November," the report adds.
There is nothing clever about this. This is just security failing because of the incompetency of the gas station managers. Nothing about this could be called a hack.
you don't set them from inside the store? But an RF or IR remote? that some can easily clone
1. Have human staff on duty when the gas station is operational.
2. Have human staff look at the "van" and the amount of fuel and the price of that fuel.
3. Make people walk from the gas pumps to a cashier with a computer display showing pump used, price and amount of fuel.
4. Pay for the fuel.
5. Human staff on duty will see huge numbers never seen before from any average "van" on the computer display? Thats not normal.
Have the computer alert to totally unexpected numbers.
6. Lots of quality CCTV for face, passengers face and gait.
7. Remove anything automated that can allow your gas station to pump fuel for free at any time.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
its France so its called a fucking petrol station.
https://www.total.fr/pro/carburants/essences-sans-plomb
With a 4 digit pincode as only 'security' it barely matters if they changed the default - in all likelihood they could try all pin options in a matter of minutes anyway
1.Don't be a WindBourne.
The gang solves the gas crisis
Well, ok, it's not exactly IoT, but IoT is in smack-center exact the same position.
Point in case:
Just the other day I saw an elaborate public-space add for a bluetooth operated brother strip-.label printer. Totally bizar. Expensive, complicated, error prone and obsolete in 5 years. Mine is 15 years old and has a keyboard built in and doesn't need a smartphone with a certain type of bluetooth connection and accompaning software to operate. It will last longer, is cheaper, easyer to operate (I only use it once a year or so) and works wether I have my smartphone or not.
IoT and this gas-pump thing and every other new fad that comes along and thinks that everything should be connected wirelessly and the net if applicable in any way, shape or form is prone to exactly this problem.
IoT is a fad and will come with tons of problems all very simliar to what cased this hilarious joke of a gasoline-heist.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
...an idiot would have on his luggage!
Idiot "editors", that is. So it's hackers! Hacking! With hacks! Even if this is patently false. Because hackers! Hacking! With hacks! The clicks are the reward.
That is not even script kiddie territory!
We bougt remote control watches to change people's TV channels as literal actual kids in the 90s!
This is in the same category of baby insanity wolf actions as prank buzzing!
Aka EU.
Yeah, Brexit was favored by Nazis. Too. Just like th Autobahn. Or dogs. Or bread. Nice try with that poisoning, fascists.
Nobody has anything against working together where everyone involved agreed to it. It ss basic common sense that that is advantageous, except to nationalist, racists, sexists etc.
What we have a problem with, is when one *didn't* agee to it, and was *forced*! Especially when it expands until is logical conclusion is reached: Totalitarianism.
And that is what we factually see from the EU. More and more idiotic lumping togeter rules that harm us and that we never agreed to.
If it wasn't for that, the EU would be great!
Wait, there's another thing too:
The EU was created for "free markets". The same as TTIP/CETA/TPP/.... Where "freedom" is not the freedom from the harm of others, as you and I would expect, but the freedom TO harm others, as those corporations see it, that would prefer a world without worker/human/environmental rights, no social safety whatsoever, and everything being owned by them. (Represented by the massive Mont Perelin Society lobby think tank organization.)
So as a means for corporations to overrule the sovereignity of the people over their own home/city/region/country/continent.
If it wasn't for those two things, the EU would be great! Duh.
But it isn't!
Tyranny is a well armed sheep deciding instead.
I'd say something about "hamberders" and Trump here, but I think I won't.
Engaging "Captain Obvious" mode, ruiner of quick jokes since birth of forums:
yeah, because then stealing electricity might be more of a concern :-)
Charging an e-vehicle requires at least some voltage and amps.
More than what's available on, e.g.: street lights. (Europe, that would usually be 250V with quickly is hard requirement for a heist )
The household connector (Europe, that would be 250V, between 10A and 16A depending on regions and type of connector) would be a rather slow trickle.
It's okay if you leave a vehicle *over-night* or even a couple of days. It's okay-ish if your battery is near dead and you want to get just a little bit more so you can manage to reach a better charging option (you must not be in a hurry. be ready to be patient)
US household connector are basically junk (If memory serves me well, 120V with 10A to 15A depending on connector). You should leave your car plugged in for probably a week to steal any meaning full amount of electricity. And such a slow "theft" is going to be painfully obvious.
So either you need to stay for impractically long time connected to your stealing spot.
Or you need to steal from a specific rare spot with better voltage/amps, most of which arent easily accessible:
- in houses, they would be located in kitchen/cellar
- out door they would be only available at special industrial spots: e.g. where construction workers or market's food tucks needs to connect. They are either better guarded (if nothing else, because they would be a safety liability if something goes wrong), or are freely accessible to begin with for the specific purpose to attract customers to the venue (some public car chargers).
Also electricity is incredibly cheap compared to gas (hence the whole idea of business trying to attract you with cheap or free charging).
So the whole procedure would help make as much money as stealing candy.
---
*: i.e. 250V on each phase, but 400 between phases.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
If some thief steals donuts and coffee it is a simple theft. But here the gas station lost control of a hazardous substance and there were rickety vans with leaky tanks with 3000 liters of gasoline sloshing about. These crooks most likely do not understand the effects of fluid being transported in un-baffled tanks. It was a disater waiting to happen. Safety of hundreds of people has been endangered.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
of how I used to "hack" coke machines by getting into the menu via the default (changeable) combo of buttons and then some of them would set everything to sold out if you chose "error"
how those fuel exchanges on the side of the road went. "So, where'd you get the cheap fuel?" "It, uh, fell off the back of a truck?"
I guess we have the Plot for the next Fast and Furious Movie!
Quick, change my pin to "1234"!
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Did the perps spend the week stealing gasoline, the spend weekends protesting gas taxes? That would be ballsy.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
OMG, really? But I went thru the procedure and changed the it *TO* 0000, my favorite number. Let's force the manufacturer to change the default to something else so that *I* can use *MY* number without fear.
If the universe is someone's simulation -- does that mean the stars are just stuck pixels?
Idocy cannot be hidden like that!
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.