Security

[keithr0]

Like most people, I don't have a high opinion of the security people at
airports etc. My opinion went down even further when boarding a boat at
Southampton in the UK. I put all the usual stuff in a box to go through
the X-ray machine but then the security person told me to take my fit
bit off and put it through. When I asked why as the thing is almost all
plastic and would not set the metal detector off, she replied "It has a
radio in it and it could be hacked".

Its true that it has a Bluetooth transceiver but what evil could you
possibly do with a hacked fit bit, and how could you tell whether it had
been hacked by X-raying it?

My flabber was ghasted, going through more than a dozen more security
checks nobody else seemed interested in it.

 

[Computer Nerd Kev]

keithr0 <user@account.invalid> wrote:

Like most people, I don't have a high opinion of the security people at
airports etc. My opinion went down even further when boarding a boat at
Southampton in the UK. I put all the usual stuff in a box to go through
the X-ray machine but then the security person told me to take my fit
bit off and put it through. When I asked why as the thing is almost all
plastic and would not set the metal detector off, she replied "It has a
radio in it and it could be hacked".

Its true that it has a Bluetooth transceiver but what evil could you
possibly do with a hacked fit bit,

Maybe hide it somewhere so that it snooped on data, stole WiFi data,
took the helm(?) while you were safely ashore?

I was once thinking about using one of those WiFi SD cards to
download large files at free WiFi "hotspots" unattended - hacking
them is well documented and they run Linux (need to hook up a
battery though). But as much fun as the project would have been,
it wouldn't really have been practical given that I don't download
all that much data and infrequently visit areas near such hotspots.
Plus the performance of such hotspots later became terrible as
(presumably) more started using them with their new smart phones.

> and how could you tell whether it had been hacked by X-raying it?

Of course you couldn't, so as a test it's completely pointless.
Well I guess if there's a common method that requires destroying
some of the case material and/or soldering wires to the circuit
board, there might be a trace visible to a well trained eye
looking at a high resolution X-ray image. The availability of
that eye seems highly unlikely though.

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