A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC • Hacker News Board

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#11

Post by jared314 » Sun, May 05, 2013, 1:02 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #2

Man, her blog is full of awesomeness. All kinds of cool little projects on there.

I wonder what her lead time on each post is. Is she really productive, or does she have a lot of projects in a pipeline and we see the built up list of results? Either way, I feel unproductive just reading it.

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#12

Post by joyeuse6701 » Sun, May 05, 2013, 1:11 AM UTC

No doubt about it, that is awesome. I wish I had the time... correction I probably always have the time, but none of the patience to do something like this alone on the side. I'll definitely bookmark her blog.

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#13

Post by mikeash » Sun, May 05, 2013, 1:21 AM UTC

cachvico wrote: post #8

jrockway wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't an attack, it's just using the cheap FM radio and a sound card like a software-defined radio.

It's an attack on the 'system' (i.e. the money making system) ;)

Not this part. The system doesn't attempt to make it difficult to obtain that data. The monetization part is done with an unrelated encryption scheme.

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#14

Post by rwg » Sun, May 05, 2013, 1:25 AM UTC

waterlesscloud wrote: post #2

Man, her blog is full of awesomeness. All kinds of cool little projects on there.

I get a seriously bittersweet feeling reading her blog since some of the things she's doing are eerily similar to little "just for the hell of it" projects I did in college many, many moons ago. (Transmitting data with IR LEDs driven by my sound card, using audio tapes to store data, playing with signal processing using audio from FM radio stations captured with my WinTV card, writing everything in Perl [5.005], ...)

I wish I still had the desire to just play around with such things again... :-\

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#15

Post by cantankerous » Sun, May 05, 2013, 1:44 AM UTC

Super cool post. I'm glad there are people in the world working on these things, at least in a hobby capacity and sharing with the rest of us. I worry that doing something like this might get one in all kinds of stupid trouble with somebody in a hot minute (especially in the US). Can't say my fears are well-founded, if only so through the various hyped up horror stories you hear about hackers getting in legal trouble for unforeseen reasons.

Regardless, I wish her all the best!

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#16

Post by kbuck » Sun, May 05, 2013, 2:14 AM UTC

andrewcooke wrote: post #3

the coolest bit by far is RDS was decoded from intermodulation distortion in the radio's Line Out audio caused by the stereo demuxer circuitry. :o)

There's more about the discovery of the RDS data here: http://windytan.blogspot.fi/2013/04/how-i-discovered-rds.htm...

(there's also a couple links at the end of this article discussing how she modified her radio to provide a digital interface for the data)

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#17

Post by eksith » Sun, May 05, 2013, 2:24 AM UTC

rwg wrote: post #14

waterlesscloud wrote: post #2

Man, her blog is full of awesomeness. All kinds of cool little projects on there.

I get a seriously bittersweet feeling reading her blog since some of the things she's doing are eerily similar to little "just for the hell of it" projects I did in college many, many moons ago. (Transmitting data with IR LEDs driven by my sound card, using audio tapes to store data, playing with signal processing using audio from FM radio stations captured with my WinTV card, writing everything in Perl [5.005], ...)…

Getting back into a hobby to get away from another frustration doesn't always work, cause then your heart's not in it. That's just escapism.

Sometimes the desire is just a matter of achieving momentum. I've let my hobby desk collect dust (figuratively speaking; my OCD wouldn't allow it) until I come across something that piques my interest and I plug in Ye Olde soldering iron and fiddle around. Might do that a few days, fall into a lull and then suddenly pick up and follow through.

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#18

Post by [deleted] » Sun, May 05, 2013, 2:26 AM UTC

rwg wrote: post #14

waterlesscloud wrote: post #2

Man, her blog is full of awesomeness. All kinds of cool little projects on there.

I get a seriously bittersweet feeling reading her blog since some of the things she's doing are eerily similar to little "just for the hell of it" projects I did in college many, many moons ago. (Transmitting data with IR LEDs driven by my sound card, using audio tapes to store data, playing with signal processing using audio from FM radio stations captured with my WinTV card, writing everything in Perl [5.005], ...)…

[deleted]

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#19

Post by jimktrains2 » Sun, May 05, 2013, 2:59 AM UTC

http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=64&id=5 is another hacker going at it as well, from 2007. It includes a little more information about the protocol, but doesn't touch on listening to encrypted versions.

Re: A determined 'hacker' decrypts RDS-TMC

#20

Post by simcop2387 » Sun, May 05, 2013, 4:16 AM UTC

As simple of an operation as this is, I wonder how hard it would be to brute force this without knowing the location. If you assume that the location values must all be within some distance of each other, I suspect you could iterate though all 65k keys fairly quickly and find the tightest group of them and it would likely be the right one. This makes me want to get some kind of thing going to decode them and try it myself.