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Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

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Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#51

Post by eternityforest »

imroot wrote: post #8
solardev wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just got my GPRS radio license and this was a really strange phenomenon to encounter. Apparently the FCC doesn't allow actual encrypted comms in this part of the spectrum, so the "privacy" codes, like you said, are really more just convenience codes, more noise cancelation than anything for privacy or security. It was weird trying to explain this to my family, too. Basically just had to tell them "Nothing you say i…

Get an itinerant frequency -- $300, requires no coordination, and you can encrypt your comms. One of the (ham) radio clubs that I'm a member of does this as a benefit for the group, and it's something that's nice to have: I can give my wife a radio and not worry about what she may or may not say if we have to take two separate cars when we road trip. I've been meaning to do the process myself, but, I haven't had the…

What about Meshtastic and CB? CB is kind of awful but it's cheap, and Meshtastic is text only but has amazing range.

I still can't believe any of this is even an issue though.

There's no technical reason we couldn't have cheap all digital bubble pack radios with miles of range and mesh support, running deep learning codecs on an ASIC or something....

Every time I'm on a project that needs radios it's an expensive hassle that seems like it should have been solved by now.

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#52

Post by solardev »

imroot wrote: post #8
solardev wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just got my GPRS radio license and this was a really strange phenomenon to encounter. Apparently the FCC doesn't allow actual encrypted comms in this part of the spectrum, so the "privacy" codes, like you said, are really more just convenience codes, more noise cancelation than anything for privacy or security. It was weird trying to explain this to my family, too. Basically just had to tell them "Nothing you say i…

Get an itinerant frequency -- $300, requires no coordination, and you can encrypt your comms. One of the (ham) radio clubs that I'm a member of does this as a benefit for the group, and it's something that's nice to have: I can give my wife a radio and not worry about what she may or may not say if we have to take two separate cars when we road trip. I've been meaning to do the process myself, but, I haven't had the…

Is there no license available for private (doesn't have to be encrypted per se, just don't want to spam the whole channel) comms for general individual/family use?

I'm not discussing anything secret, just making breakfast plans etc, but having to try to find a quiet channel every time is such a pain...

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#53

Post by solardev »

eternityforest wrote: post #51
imroot wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Get an itinerant frequency -- $300, requires no coordination, and you can encrypt your comms. One of the (ham) radio clubs that I'm a member of does this as a benefit for the group, and it's something that's nice to have: I can give my wife a radio and not worry about what she may or may not say if we have to take two separate cars when we road trip. I've been meaning to do the process myself, but, I haven't had the…

What about Meshtastic and CB? CB is kind of awful but it's cheap, and Meshtastic is text only but has amazing range. I still can't believe any of this is even an issue though. There's no technical reason we couldn't have cheap all digital bubble pack radios with miles of range and mesh support, running deep learning codecs on an ASIC or something.... Every time I'm on a project that needs radios it's an expensive has…

CB doesn't seem to solve anything that FRS (walkie talkies) or GMRS (nicer walkie talkies with call signs) doesn't already do better. Meshtastic is interesting but not for the use case of general use between family members (no way I want to build and support DIY hardware like that just to use as walkie talkies... GMRS radios are complicated enough already for the average non techie user).

It's so bizarre coming into the radio world from the tech/web/network protocols world. On one hand everything is so nicely defined and regulated and licensed and shared. On the other hand all the UX seems 20 years in the past.

I'm excited about things like DMR and handheld to handheld texting, but that's a harder license to get and there's only one expensive handheld that actually supports the texting, I think...

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#54

Post by MarkusWandel »

vueko wrote: post #3
lupusreal wrote: post #2

Walkie-talkies can "eavesdrop" on walkie-talkies...

Seriously. People really need to understand that CTCSS and DCS aren't actually privacy features, but convenience features for filtering out _other_ people's transmissions a user isn't interested in. It's the exact opposite of privacy. I guess the marketing as "privacy codes" worsens the situation.

Indeed the opposite. For example, a party of us was on a mountaintop going through the FRS/GMRS channels with CTSS off and heard another party. We were curious to ask them where they were, but they couldn't hear us until, manually stepping through the CTSS options, we found the one that enabled their receiver to hear us. It's not a privacy filter, it's a "don't bother me" filter.

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#55

Post by philsnow »

ac29 wrote: post #45
vueko wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting! I was under the impression that the FCC was actually somewhat strict about part 90.35 eligibility, in that you have to provide fairly detailed specifics of your business use case or how you fall under the various educational/nonprofit exemptions, and that if you told them you wanted it for personal use or supplied a thinly veiled excuse they'd tell you to get lost. Maybe that understanding is outdated. I…

You dont have to provide detailed specifics of your business use case, usually just a sentence is fine. But 90.35 does not allow for individuals to be licensed for personal communications. My guess is that if a ham club is offering this to members, it is doing so as an educational institution, or a public safety organization. If the license is granted that way, using it for personal communications would be impermissi…

I doubt that there are requirements on the number of members of a ham club, you could probably have a 1- or 2-member "club" for the adults in your household, right?

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#56

Post by shadowpho »

runjake wrote: post #27
shadowpho wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very interesting! Where did you get them?

Apologies if this has some sort of referral in it. I copied straight from the Amazon app. https://a.co/d/gEGW5gr

wow, that's dirt cheap! Definitely a impulse purchase territory lol. Is this the best cheap one to plug into PC?

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#57

Post by retrochameleon »

zactato wrote: post #35

Is the Flipper Zero still legit? I know it’s only quasi legal in some places. I see a lot of ads for it to the point where I kind of suspect it’s some sort of FBI entrapment program. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.

The device is worthwhile if you are exploring this kind of hardware security and also want to poke at other things while you're on the go to enhance your learning. The fact they added a Javascript engine so you don't have to program in C/C++ when you want to run something custom, I think will be a huge boon.

Don't undervalue getting all these features in a purpose-built device with a purpose-built OS.

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#58

Post by big-green-man »

SV_BubbleTime wrote: post #33
big-green-man wrote: post #32

Anybody can eavesdrop on walkie talkies. I can do it with my baofeng. It's not that interesting. What is interesting is everything else that that device can do.

>What is interesting is everything else that that device can do. Leaving me hanging.

You were hanging when I got here.

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#59

Post by eternityforest »

solardev wrote: post #53
eternityforest wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about Meshtastic and CB? CB is kind of awful but it's cheap, and Meshtastic is text only but has amazing range. I still can't believe any of this is even an issue though. There's no technical reason we couldn't have cheap all digital bubble pack radios with miles of range and mesh support, running deep learning codecs on an ASIC or something.... Every time I'm on a project that needs radios it's an expensive has…

CB doesn't seem to solve anything that FRS (walkie talkies) or GMRS (nicer walkie talkies with call signs) doesn't already do better. Meshtastic is interesting but not for the use case of general use between family members (no way I want to build and support DIY hardware like that just to use as walkie talkies... GMRS radios are complicated enough already for the average non techie user). It's so bizarre coming into…

There's starting to be off the shelf Meshtastic hardware, otherwise I'd agree.

Actually using custom hardware or soft is not something I consider a reasonable choice, basically ever, unless there's no off the shelf alternative, or I'm specifically being paid to create said off the shelf alternative.

CB has a bit better range but otherwise I'd mostly agree.

In practice FRS is the only thing I ever actually use besides checking in at the weekly net with a Baofeng, it's just the standard everywhere, even for small scale commerical stuff, and it's what everyone I know already has.

Re: Flipper Zero Gets Major Firmware Update, Can Eavesdrop on Walkie-Talkies

#60

Post by Aloha »

vueko wrote: post #25
Aloha wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm using EFJ 5100's and have a full KVL, and software that can make Christmas Tree radios. P25 Encryption is pretty good, in terms of quality.

While definitely better than the non-encryption of CTCSS etc, P25 encryption has some relatively concerning implementation problems. It's possible none of these actually matter for your usecase as many are related to UX around configuring and using encryption in an institutional setting, but the unauthenticated traffic injection, induced transmission and jamming issues are, well, not great no matter how you look at i…

A lot of these issues if not all are specific P1 P25, which if you're on conventional you're using. I find it interesting they treat P1 as if it's different from normal FM, it is not, its C4FM - so all the normal capture effect stuff works fine.

In the end, the goal of P25 was to make it almost, but not completely possible to listen in - I'd also note the way they did their testing is not how these radios are typically deployed, which is not direct subscriber to subscriber on simplex, its either via a conventional repeated system or via a trunked system.

I do agree that frequent key changes are bad - but for entirely different reason, they're an operation nightmare. Most agencies who deploy it either use very long lived keys deployed by KVL, or deploy a UKEK and then change keys via OTAR on some cycle, which is not infrequently, never.

My belief is the theoretical risks on P25 are not well proven in reality, you're more likely to have some interference issue over say, intentional jamming.

Either way a radio for ~75 bucks plus supporting hardware that will do AES256 isnt bad - and DES-OFB/DES-XL is good enough to keep the casual listener out, which is more or less the point of the crypto here. Also I know they make a big deal about unit ID's, but they carry no meaningful info, its just a hex ID.

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