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Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

samcurry.net

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Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#221

Post by hollander »

hanniabu wrote: post #165
vlan0 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Cox's support organization was presented with a compromised device being handed to them by an infosec professional, and they couldn't handle it effectively at all. I can't really blame them. The number of customers able to qualify that a device has actually been hacked is nearly zero. But do you know how many naive users out there that will call/visit because they think they've been hacked? It's unfortunately larger…

How many of those show up in person though?

That is the problem. He should have contacted them like he did the second time. When he went into their shop, it all depended on that particular employee, and you can't blame that person for not recognizing the issue.

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#222

Post by Biganon »

mrguyorama wrote: post #201
ryukoposting wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why I'm not an AT&T customer. Spectrum lets me bring my own hardware, and they're the only other option in my area, so Spectrum gets my business. Plain and simple. Unfortunately, not everyone has the palatable solution that I have.

Spectrum remote manages your hardware even if you bring your own modem. This nearly entirely consists of deploying firmware updates once a decade, but they can also command other things like modem reboots.

If it's your own hardware, what's stopping you from closing the port they connect to?

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#223

Post by Biganon »

globular-toast wrote: post #214
sammy2255 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its HTTP not HTTPS, anyone or anything on the wire could see the request

That's the part I didn't get. The author said there was no other possibility except the modem, but why? It seems like quite a leap. I would have first suspected a compromised router on the internet. Is it possible that changing the modem caused new routes to be used which appeared to fix the problem?

Of all the routers along the route, the one most likely to be compromised is obviously the piece of plastic guano your ISP forces you to use

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#224

Post by Biganon »

underlogic wrote: post #194

Did they * pay* him? He kind of saved them, tipped them off to a complete compromise of their security infrastructure which was not trivial to discover. Looks like he got nothing in return for "doing the right thing". How insulting is that? What is their perception of someone walking in to their offices with this essential information? I guarantee his self image and their perception are very different. They see an ov…

Cox don't pay bounties.

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#226

Post by someguydave »

hanniabu wrote: post #165
vlan0 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Cox's support organization was presented with a compromised device being handed to them by an infosec professional, and they couldn't handle it effectively at all. I can't really blame them. The number of customers able to qualify that a device has actually been hacked is nearly zero. But do you know how many naive users out there that will call/visit because they think they've been hacked? It's unfortunately larger…

How many of those show up in person though?

yeah the false positive problem is huge here. For every legitimate security professional there are probably 10-100 schizos who believe they are “hacked”

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#227

Post by chemmail »

vlan0 wrote: post #149
oasisbob wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cox seem to have acted like the very model of responsible security response in this kind of situation It's hard to imagine, but I wish they would have taken advantage of him walking in with the compromised device in the first place. I once stumbled upon a really bad vulnerability in a traditional telco provider, and the amount of work it took to get them to pay attention when only having the front door available wa…

>Cox's support organization was presented with a compromised device being handed to them by an infosec professional, and they couldn't handle it effectively at all. I can't really blame them. The number of customers able to qualify that a device has actually been hacked is nearly zero. But do you know how many naive users out there that will call/visit because they think they've been hacked? It's unfortunately larger…

They probably get someone in asking to change it because someone on LOL say they just hacked their computer.

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#228

Post by oxide »

vlan0 wrote: post #149
oasisbob wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cox seem to have acted like the very model of responsible security response in this kind of situation It's hard to imagine, but I wish they would have taken advantage of him walking in with the compromised device in the first place. I once stumbled upon a really bad vulnerability in a traditional telco provider, and the amount of work it took to get them to pay attention when only having the front door available wa…

>Cox's support organization was presented with a compromised device being handed to them by an infosec professional, and they couldn't handle it effectively at all. I can't really blame them. The number of customers able to qualify that a device has actually been hacked is nearly zero. But do you know how many naive users out there that will call/visit because they think they've been hacked? It's unfortunately larger…

I work for a support org for a traditional telco. We have "contacts" but they're effectively middlemen.

If you dropped this in my lap, and I'm pretty savvy for a layman, I wouldn't know how to get past my single channel. I think it would require convincing the gatekeeper.

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#229

Post by krallja »

Biganon wrote: post #222
mrguyorama wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spectrum remote manages your hardware even if you bring your own modem. This nearly entirely consists of deploying firmware updates once a decade, but they can also command other things like modem reboots.

If it's your own hardware, what's stopping you from closing the port they connect to?

DOCSIS?

Re: Hacking millions of modems and investigating who hacked my modem

#230

Post by protocolture »

oxide wrote: post #228
vlan0 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Cox's support organization was presented with a compromised device being handed to them by an infosec professional, and they couldn't handle it effectively at all. I can't really blame them. The number of customers able to qualify that a device has actually been hacked is nearly zero. But do you know how many naive users out there that will call/visit because they think they've been hacked? It's unfortunately larger…

I work for a support org for a traditional telco. We have "contacts" but they're effectively middlemen. If you dropped this in my lap, and I'm pretty savvy for a layman, I wouldn't know how to get past my single channel. I think it would require convincing the gatekeeper.

I used to run a small telco noc and if any of my guys sat on something like this rather than reporting it to me I would have turfed them.

Especially because both of the ISPs we supported insisted on using a lot of dodgy CPE.

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