The 3rd annual lock picking contest went on at DEFCON. It’s pretty amazing to see the wide variety of tools, locks and lock pickers all in one spot and all handily dispensing of most locks in record time. Here are some photos of the lock picking in action (I was able to liberate a couple locks, but there was this young kid who schooled me and did it with his eyes closed, the show off)… Link.
I was going to write up the IR hacking talk, but Wired news online got to it before I had access so here ya go. A vulnerability in many hotel television infrared systems can allow a hacker to obtain guests’ names and their room numbers from the billing system. It can also let someone read the e-mail of guests who use web mail through the TV, putting business travelers at risk of corporate espionage. Link.
BoingBoing has the latest list of the “many, many mirrors for Mike Lynn’s controversial Black Hat presentation in which he quit his job, described critical vulnerabilities in Cisco equipment and got sued by his employer“…I’m getting slammed with emails and IMs about this, so here ya go…Link.
“Security researcher Michael Lynn has settled a dispute with Cisco over his presentation on hacking the company’s routers, which was given at the Black Hat security conference in Las Vegas this week. The two parties and Black Hat organisers have agreed not to further discuss the presentation, which contained techniques Lynn said could bring the Internet to its knees.” [via] [BoingBoing round up] Link.
So far I’ve learned one important thing: laptops need power. I secured a new power adaptor, but it’s a drag when this happens. Turns out you can indeed get anything in Vegas. The coverage will now resume.
Brian Krebs has a good round up of today’s events. I didn’t get a chance to check out the lock picking area yet, but that will be my first stop now that I can get online and have power again! Link.
