Hacking parking meters

Our pals released a very interesting presentation about smart parking meters at the Black Hat Briefings USA, Las Vegas, Nevada, yesterday… Good presentation to review on how they figured out the security (or lack of) on parking meters…

Throughout the United States, cities are deploying “smart” electronic fare collection infrastructures. In 2003, San Francisco launched a $35 million pilot program to replace approximately 23,000 mechanical parking meters with electronic units that boasted tamper resistance, payment via smart card, auditing capabilities, and an estimated $30 million annually in fare collection revenue. Other major cities, including Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, Philadelphia, Portland, and San Diego, have made similar moves. This presentation details our evaluation of electronic parking meters, including hardware disassembly, smart card protocol emulation, and silicon die analysis.