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MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

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Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#71

Post by saganus »

eggy wrote: post #51
saganus wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh wow... shit... it's the same guy for all of these indeed. I think I would've been super proud of myself just for accomplishing even one of these things... I guess these are the type of guys that would start to approach the definition of a modern polymath maybe? Not saying he is one necessarily (or that he isn't), but what would examples of modern polymaths are there? considering a lot of the fields to be mastered…

Yes, he has quite a resume there. However, maybe I'm just older, but my ideal polymath is not just coding/hacking electronics. I personally think it should be those plus knowing more diverse fields and skills such as: applied mathematics, celestial navigation, biohacking, chemistry, milling/lathe work, building machinery from scratch by smelting and casting [1], animatronics, boatbuilding, horology, mechatronics, mus…

Do you have any examples of someone that would fit this description?

I think a modern polymath could look a bit different than the ones in the classical sense. To be able to make contributions to the fields you mentioned, I guess you would need more years of study than anyone could dedicate to, just because those fields seem to be very hard, especially considering the degree at which nowadays we would consider someone proficient in any of these.

Well, I'm not sure, I'm actually wondering. For your particular definition, or something close to it, who would you say it gets close?

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#72

Post by brbsix »

eggy wrote: post #51
saganus wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh wow... shit... it's the same guy for all of these indeed. I think I would've been super proud of myself just for accomplishing even one of these things... I guess these are the type of guys that would start to approach the definition of a modern polymath maybe? Not saying he is one necessarily (or that he isn't), but what would examples of modern polymaths are there? considering a lot of the fields to be mastered…

Yes, he has quite a resume there. However, maybe I'm just older, but my ideal polymath is not just coding/hacking electronics. I personally think it should be those plus knowing more diverse fields and skills such as: applied mathematics, celestial navigation, biohacking, chemistry, milling/lathe work, building machinery from scratch by smelting and casting [1], animatronics, boatbuilding, horology, mechatronics, mus…

Wow, surprised to see Gingery books are still around! They got me started melting down aluminum cans with a coffee can charcoal furnace as a kid. I always wanted to build the lathe but never got around to it.

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#73

Post by dfox »

Animats wrote: post #46

It should be possible to detect this with a reader firmware upgrade, if the reader reads more than one track on the card. If both read heads are showing similar signals, the signal isn't coming from a normal card.

That depends on whether the terminal has physical capability to read more than one track of card data. I have Ingenico Alphira terminal in my junk box and from casual inspection it looks like the magnetic head has two coils, but while there are footprints for two sense amplifiers, only one is populated.

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#74

Post by steve19 »

saganus wrote: post #71
eggy wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, he has quite a resume there. However, maybe I'm just older, but my ideal polymath is not just coding/hacking electronics. I personally think it should be those plus knowing more diverse fields and skills such as: applied mathematics, celestial navigation, biohacking, chemistry, milling/lathe work, building machinery from scratch by smelting and casting [1], animatronics, boatbuilding, horology, mechatronics, mus…

Do you have any examples of someone that would fit this description? I think a modern polymath could look a bit different than the ones in the classical sense. To be able to make contributions to the fields you mentioned, I guess you would need more years of study than anyone could dedicate to, just because those fields seem to be very hard, especially considering the degree at which nowadays we would consider someon…

Ben Krasnow is easily one. The amount that guys knows about everything (electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, material science, chemistry and some programming) is staggering. His Youtube channel is great.

https://www.youtube.com/user/bkraz333 http://benkrasnow.blogspot.com/

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#75

Post by namocat »

peteretep wrote: post #42

One day in the future, Samy (the creator of this) will stop being the coolest person on the internet, but today isn't that day. Previous projects include: The Samy MySpace worm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samy_%28computer_worm%29 EverCookies: http://samy.pl/evercookie/ SkyJack: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SkyJack And so much more... http://samy.pl/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samy_Kamkar

So what you're basically saying is: "samy is my hero"?

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#76

Post by i336_ »

artursapek wrote: post #65
peteretep wrote: post #42

One day in the future, Samy (the creator of this) will stop being the coolest person on the internet, but today isn't that day. Previous projects include: The Samy MySpace worm: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samy_%28computer_worm%29 EverCookies: http://samy.pl/evercookie/ SkyJack: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SkyJack And so much more... http://samy.pl/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samy_Kamkar

He was banned from using computers for 3 years as a result of the MySpace worm? That's ridiculous.

The number of times I've seen what seems like the Hackers script got borrowed and applied to real life - people being banned from using computers for an arbitrary length of time - is just silly.

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#77

Post by leni536 »

anonova wrote: post #21
[deleted] wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

It's pretty much the same as what's being described in the article. Samsung calls it Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST): http://www.samsung.com/us/support/answer/ANS00043865/9974103...

> Magnetic Secure Transmission They dare to call this secure...

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#78

Post by leni536 »

chrisfosterelli wrote: post #15
JaggedJax wrote: post #3

I was very surprised to learn there's no check for Chip and Pin requirements beyond what the magstripe requests. I naively assumed if the card had that feature the terminal could force it to be used. What would happen with the other fields he mentions, like whether or not you can withdraw cash with the card?

The terminal has no method to determine if the card is Chip and Pin enabled aside from the magstripe. Sure it could check for the actual chip, but credit card fraudsters aren't creating fake cards that include the chip so that wouldn't help either. I would argue the way they should implement it is such that the bank itself rejects the transaction if it knows the card is chip enabled and the terminal is as well.

It's easy. Make card number ranges that must have chip and pin.

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#79

Post by rconti »

halviti wrote: post #50
JaggedJax wrote: post #3

I was very surprised to learn there's no check for Chip and Pin requirements beyond what the magstripe requests. I naively assumed if the card had that feature the terminal could force it to be used. What would happen with the other fields he mentions, like whether or not you can withdraw cash with the card?

The problem of tricking the reader will be solved in the US the same way the rest of the world solved the problem. You stop using magnetic stripes. For the longest time, chip-and-pin readers in most european countries would let you just swipe the magnetic card if you didn't have a chip.. this allowed americans (and whoever else still uses this technology) to be able to shop when they travel. Unfortunately a dispropor…

I can't claim to spend a ton of time in a huge variety of countries, but in the past year I've been to Iceland, England, Wales, Scotland, Italy, France, and New Zealand, and I can't remember anywhere I had to use the EMV chip in my credit cards except places like parking garages that didn't have the physical facility for a mag stripe swipe. Every retailer terminal could read a magstripe.

More annoyingly, whether I swiped or dipped, a signature was required. Except, again, where there was no way to sign (parking garages). Then, magically, my PIN was "good enough".

I went out of my way to get EMV cards last year due to upcoming trips, because I had only been overseas sporadically over the past decade and assumed that the magstripe was gone. It was not. If anything, merchants seemed more able to deal with them than 10 years ago, where I occasionally had a clerk who couldn't figure out whether to swipe extremely slowly, or quickly enough to set fire to the equipment.

Re: MagSpoof – wireless credit card/magstripe spoofer

#80

Post by rplnt »

oxplot wrote: post #40

Hmm, I'm very surprised that magstripe readers don't have sensors that detect physical presence of a card, even to this date. But regardless, the main point for me was how trivially one could downgrade the security by setting the bit about Chip/PIN capability off.

I'm surprised magstripe readers still exist. I don't think I've used one in years. They are often there.. but I don't see their purpose. Last non-chip card I've seen was maybe 12 years ago.
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