[p2p-research] Drone hacking

[Eugen Leitl]

On Sun, Dec 20, 2009 at 05:13:14AM +0000, Andy Robinson wrote:
> Probably as well that the nuke idea is a no-go... *shudders*

It is definitely heartening that this has not happened yet.
The Curve of Binding Energy is from 1973. If anything, it is
much easier now, some 40 years hence. How our cities and
society would look like in times of high-frequency asymmetric
nuclear warfare is probably none of us is particularly keen
to experience. 
 
> Actually, since 911 (which itself was not exactly planned on the scale it
> happened), insurgents seem to have been avoiding 'mass destruction' attacks
> and instead concentrating on doing things which are extremely cheap but
> cause a lot of fear and disruption.  Including feeding fake "plots" to US

I don't know who is doing what and why, but you'll have to agree
that in terms of ROI a few kT in a major high-density location
are extremely well invested.

> interrogators so the US itself causes immense disruption and fear by locking
> down key sites at important times, or by media stories that some venue is
> about to be blown up.
> 
> The whole insurgent model in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere is based on
> imposing costs with minimum expense.  At present, air warfare is the last
> real advantage of high-cost, high-tech warfare, so major powers can't yet be
> defeated, just fought to a standstill and demoralised.  I expect

If you cannot increase the rate of body bag shipments (or, better
alive but maimed bodies) only way to demoralize left is to carry mayhem 
back to soft heartland of the agressor.

> countermeasures are already being designed, some of them ironically enough
> by the US military.  In particular, it may only be time before EMP weapons
> are easily available and portable, after which technological advantages
> disappear - anything relying on hi-tech can be EMP zapped and scrambled (cf

Doesn't describe any reality I live in.

> Battlestar Galactica).  I also just saw a story about a kid who got a
> phone-camera into space and photographed the earth's axis in an $80 science
> project - who knows what else might eventually be put up in high orbit in a
> similar way.  Then there's the lower-tech version of drones, namely
> remote-control.  This has already been used in a DMKP(C) plot reputedly.

The current generation is not really autonomous either.
 
> Supposedly the reason the drones don't have encryption is the quantity and
> speed of visual data needed.  Time will tell if they can be hacked as well.

Encryption is incredibly cheap in terms of logic real estate or CPU cycles. 

> There's a passage in Timothy Zahn's "Outbound Flight" where Grand Admiral
> Thrawn manages to misdirect a fleet of drone droids by recording and copying
> the command signals.  In any case, I don't think drones are a big

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replay_attack

> advancement in warfare.  Their functionality is basically the same as a
> bomber, and the reason they're used is distinctly "full spectrum" - namely,
> they avoid the risk of a pilot being shot down and captured in countries

There is a distinct kill rate threshold at which US forces are recalled.

> America isn't meant to be in to begin with.  They are also doubtless
> generating the pork-barrelling of a big section of the military-industrial
> complex.

That, too. Money has nearly run out now, though.

-- 
Eugen* Leitl <a href="http://leitl.org">leitl</a> http://leitl.org
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