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High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

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Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#61

Post by Arch-TK »

Twirrim wrote: post #56
teaearlgraycold wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do this in the wrong school district and they'll put you in prison. Absolutely ridiculous.

Do this around people with type 1 diabetes, and there's a chance you're wiping out their glucose monitor (a sizeable number of the continuous glucose monitor systems rely on a cellphone app, smartphones are becoming ubiquitous hardware/software.) It might be a funny stunt, but there could be some serious consequences.

>a sizeable number of the continuous glucose monitor systems rely on a cellphone app

I thought medical hardware had to go through stringent approval processes with health authorities?

This is just an awful design in general. An auxiliary control system for your body should be much more resistant against electronic interference and self contained to prevent this kind of vulnerability.

Yeah, interfering with people's medical equipment is bad but whoever put such trash on the market should also get a prison sentence if it lead to harm.

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#62

Post by happyraul »

dmoy wrote: post #58
pennomi wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was around a decade ago, but I remember having a use case where sending too much data to the Bluetooth stack on iPhone would crash the Bluetooth stack so hard that only a factory reset would fix it. I have no doubt that lingering vulnerabilities exist in that stack.

To be fair to apple, Bluetooth is a hot mess

I don't think we need to be particularly fair, given Apple's courageous decision to remove wired headphone ports from their devices.

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#64

Post by jojobas »

EMIRELADERO wrote: post #59
whythre wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds like your school sucked and a phone was the band-aid. I doubt you are alone in this kind of ‘education’ (using the word very lightly) induced misery, but escapism via device is not much good when the real problem is the systemic misuse of time and resources in our schools.

My school was actually very academically good, and psychopedagogycally too. The teachers were often kind and so was the rest of the staff. Hell, even the classmates were cool most of the time. I consider myself quite lucky when reading Americans' complaints about their schools and recesses, with sentences such as "bring back recess!". I shudder to think of what goes on in some districts compared to what I had, which…

With all respect saving an odd one out from boredom of solitude has to give way to saving the vast majority from being stuck to their phones all the time.

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#65

Post by EMIRELADERO »

jojobas wrote: post #64
EMIRELADERO wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My school was actually very academically good, and psychopedagogycally too. The teachers were often kind and so was the rest of the staff. Hell, even the classmates were cool most of the time. I consider myself quite lucky when reading Americans' complaints about their schools and recesses, with sentences such as "bring back recess!". I shudder to think of what goes on in some districts compared to what I had, which…

With all respect saving an odd one out from boredom of solitude has to give way to saving the vast majority from being stuck to their phones all the time.

Is it common for most students to be on their phone all the time during recess (to not even socialize between themselves, even to show each other stuff on them), and in class? Is there a reason why the no-phone policy can't be scoped to the classroom only?

And about me, it wasn't just solitude. It was also nothingness. There was a computer room but it was just used for IT class and locked when not in use for that purpose. There was no library, no board games. (Not that I would have played any if they were, as I had no one to play with)

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#66

Post by deadbabe »

seanhunter wrote: post #35

Before any gets inspired by this and tries to use an F0 for assorted hijinks like this, just make sure you understand the legal framework in your country. In the UK where I am for example, this is almost certainly “deliberate interference with wireless telegraphy” which can carry a 2 year prison sentence. Not saying that the law isn’t an ass, just that you might want to know what you’re getting yourself into before y…

So what you’re saying is plant a device that can’t be traced to you then leave the area and set it to fire on some timer.

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#67

Post by skygazer »

seanhunter wrote: post #35

Before any gets inspired by this and tries to use an F0 for assorted hijinks like this, just make sure you understand the legal framework in your country. In the UK where I am for example, this is almost certainly “deliberate interference with wireless telegraphy” which can carry a 2 year prison sentence. Not saying that the law isn’t an ass, just that you might want to know what you’re getting yourself into before y…

“Unlimited fines” sound mind-bendingly excessive — risk of financial singularity. I’d opt for the merciful two years.

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#68

Post by _nalply »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #8

If that kid (and their parents consent) is on HN I’d like to buy them a soda and see about hiring them as an intern. we’re both in the DC area and I have a few interesting robotics projects for aspiring hackers

As long you give scripts they can execute this might work out

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#69

Post by javawizard »

gipp wrote: post #24
ryukoposting wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, what a funky little device! Thanks for the lead, I might have to pick up one of these things. It looks good for hack ing but is it hack able itself? An exposed JTAG port would have this thing shipping to my home right now.

Picked one up for Christmas and have already been having a blast with it today. Yes, it is supremely hackable, try awesome-flipperzero [1] as a starting point. The iOS exploit discussed here is already patched as of a week or two ago, fwiw. [1] https://github.com/djsime1/awesome-flipperzero

Ok this is the silliest nitpick but like... The personality/emotionality of the flipper zero has been the biggest thing stopping me from using mine more.

Like, I classify myself as an empath, and it's physically painful to think about using it and having to face the dolphin's sad face if it's been a while.

Looks like I need to hack mine to not get sad when I don't use it. Digital antidepressants, as it were...

Re: High school student allegedly uses device to turn off nearby iPhones

#70

Post by Freak_NL »

127361 wrote: post #60
Twirrim wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do this around people with type 1 diabetes, and there's a chance you're wiping out their glucose monitor (a sizeable number of the continuous glucose monitor systems rely on a cellphone app, smartphones are becoming ubiquitous hardware/software.) It might be a funny stunt, but there could be some serious consequences.

This is ridiculous. Critical safety functions should not be dependent on a unreliable medium that can be easily disrupted. There must always be a fallback mechanism.

People who use such a feature would surely have a backup strategy in case their phone dies, the battery dies, is stolen, is lost, or is unavailable for any number of reasons (fucked up OTA update? hacked? some dumb app crashing their device?), right? If they don't and just rely on that single consumer-grade device working all the time, I feel sorry for them.

This glucose monitor excuse gets trotted out for these topics every time, but someone wielding a Flipper is probably the least of your concerns if device and connectivity reliability is so critical.

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