Hacker / Fricker 1903: breaking the "secure" wireless link

«Another my hobby is also detected at an early age, was a practical magic (tricks). Learn how to act or that trick, I practiced it over and over again until it reaches perfection. To some extent, it is through the tricks I discovered the pleasure of obtaining secret knowledge. » I> Kevin Mitnick blockquote>

« manage the adversary's sensory perception »in order to« confuse, delay, inhibit, or misdirect [his] actions » i> DARPA`s project « Battlefield Illusion ». < / blockquote>

Within training young authors Habra in category "Sauron» got a second nominee. Let me introduce - Trephs (Alex), who did most of the work on translation from English (so that the issues of translation to it) .
This time we decided to highlight the theme, in my opinion quite decent Habra, namely the story of the first break of the information system, about which I have already mentioned in passing in a post "History of hacker hacking information systems (1903-1971)» .
Worth mentioning is the fact that hacking had only "trolling" character.

Maskelyne - she still little family. Grandfather astronomer studied Venus and perpetuated the race Meskelinov fact that it was named in honor of the crater on the Moon , daddy hero text below, John Maskelyne , invented a paid tulet cabins and other tricks, and his sonny, Jasper Maskelyne led Hitler's nose (and maybe Churchill), and was a true battle mage, illusionist, "hide" the Alexandria harbor, conjured German cruiser « Admiral Graf Spee » and a bunch of" inflatable "tanks, as well as helping prisoners with shoots.

On how well Nivelles Maskelyne hacked Marconi with his "superzaschischennym" radio read under the cut.


More than a century ago, one of the first in the world of hackers used Morse code hacking to disrupt public demonstration of Marconi's wireless telegraph.

June evening of 1903 in a famous lecture theater of the Royal Institute of London silence. Before a crowd of physicist John Fleming Embrous set up a mysterious device, intending to demonstrate the new miracle of technology: a wireless communication system to transmit messages over long distances. The system was designed by the Italian pioneer of Radio Engineering - Guglielmo Marconi. The goal was the first time publicly to show that the message of the Morse code can be sent wirelessly over long distances. In removing 300 miles, Marconi was preparing to send a signal to London from the station on a mountaintop in Poldhu, Cornwall, UK.

But before the demonstration could begin, the apparatus in the audience began to print the message. First he gave the same word over and over again. Then it turned into a facetious poem accusing Marconi inflated public. Their demonstration hacked and that for a hundred years before the current troubles in the net. Who makes a hack at the Royal Institute? How cheeky messages get here and why?

It all started in 1887 when Heinrich Hertz proved the existence of electromagnetic waves predicted by James Clerk Maxwell in 1865.
Unloading two separate capacitor electrode Hertz ionized air between them, creating a spark. Surprisingly, another spark flashed between two electrodes by a few meters, the electromagnetic wave from the first spark creates an electric current between the second pair of electrodes. They were long and short bursts of energy - "Hertzian waves" - they could be broadcast to replace the dots and dashes of Morse code. So a wireless telegraphy, and Marconi and his company became the vanguard. Marconi claimed that his wireless messages can be sent privately over great distances. "I can set up my tools so that no other instrument than similarly-configured, can not intercept my messages" - boasted Marconi in London's St James Gazette in February 1903.



It soon became apparent that this June day, the case at the Royal Institute for Marconi and Fleming did not go smoothly. In minutes before Fleming was to receive messages in Morse code from Marconi from Cornwall, the silence was broken rhythmic ticking noise, popping out of the copper with the torch, which is used to display slides narrator. To the untrained listeners, it was like a shimmering sound projector. But Arthur Blok, Fleming's assistant, quickly recognized the sound of typing a message in Morse code. Someone decided Block, filed a powerful wireless pulses into the theater and they were strong enough to prevent the electric arc discharge lamp of the projector.

Deciphering the message in mind, Block realized that it reports one playful word, again and again, - "Nonsense." Looking at the output of the printer located close communications Morse, he confirmed this conjecture. Then, at the receiver Morse received over private message, ridicules Marconi * literally * "One Italian guy strongly bamboozle the public" (original: «There was a young fellow of Italy, who diddled the public quite prettily»). Then followed the coarse epithets and relevant line from Shakespeare.

The flow of battle ended for the time before the signals from Poldhu Marconi arrived. The demonstration continued, but she has suffered irreparable harm if someone was able to intervene on the frequency of the wireless so the system obviously was not nearly as safe as it said Marconi. And apparently it was possible to eavesdrop and private messages.

To Marconi it was, at least, very sad, but he did not respond directly to the insults in the audience. He did not want to deal with skeptics and distrustful people and it was a convenient "excuse": "I will not show the system to those who do not trust her work." Whatever it was, Fleming sent a letter with indignation at the London "Times". He called the hack "hooliganism in science" and "a crime against the traditions of the Royal Institute." He asked readers to help him find the culprit.

He did not have long to wait. Four days later, joyful letter regarding the hack, was published in the "Times". Write it to justify their actions in terms of demonstrating security hole, which he opened for the common good. The author was Nevil Maskelyne, a mustachioed 39-year-old British illusionist-antispiritist and inventor. Maskelyne came from an inventive family - his father came up with locks that open, if you omit them a coin and used these locks for paid toilets, and his ancestor was famous astronomer (named in honor of him crater on the Moon ). Maskelyne was self-taught and was passionate about wireless technology. He used Morse code in focus with "mind reading" to secretly talk with the assistant. He developed a method of using a spark transmitter to remotely ignite gunpowder. In 1900, Maskelyne sent wireless messages between a ground station and a balloon at a distance of 10 miles. But, as correctly noted by the author of the book Wireless, Sanguk Hong, his ambitions were spoiled Marconi patents, and Maskelyne harbored a grudge against the Italian. Soon, however, provide case Maskelyne revenge.

Most of the technology industry has suffered Marconi wireless telegraphy. Telegraph company owned expensive cable stations at sea and on land and operated fleets with teams of experts for installation and maintenance of submarine cables. Marconi and his wireless technology is a threat to their hegemony cable.



Eastern Telegrafistskaya company serves communications hub of the British Empire from seaside villages Porfkurno (Porthcurno), from the west of Cornwall, where the submarine cables stretched in Indonesia, India, Africa, South America and Australia. After an exquisite demonstration of transmission translatlanticheskoy December 12th 1,901th, VTK ordered Maskelyne take advanced spy operations.

Maskelyne built a 50-meter radio beacon (the remnants of which still exist) on the rocks west Porfkurno to see if he could overhear the message that the company Marconi broadcast on ships, as part of its highly successful business by sending messages from ship to shore . By publishing my letter in the journal "Electricians» / «The Electrician» 7th November 1902, Maskelyne gladly reported that no security system. "I received a message from Marconi 25-foot chain accumulating [air] set at the front of scaffolding. When the lighthouse was finally turned on, the only problem was not intercepted, and how to cope with the unusually high amount of energy. »

Not that everything is supposed to be so easy. Marconi patented technology setup a wireless transmitter to broadcast within a certain wave. This setting, said Marconi, guarantee the confidentiality of communication channels. Anyone who has ever logged onto the station knows that it is not, but at that time it was not so obvious. Maskelyne proved it using a broadband receiver, through which he could eavesdrop ether.

Intercepted data possible, Maskelyne wanted to draw more attention to the flaws of technology, as well as to show that the interference in the transmission possible. So he organized a hack at the Royal Institute, set up a simple transmitter Morse code from his father, not far from the Western Music Hall.

Humorous messages that he sent, to easily mix with those Marconi himself sent from Cornwall, or it could destroy both messages if they are sent simultaneously. Instead, they drew attention to a legitimate flaw in the technology - and the only damage was inflicted ego Marconi and Fleming.

Fleming continued to resent weeks in the newspapers that the hacking, who spent Maskelyne - an insult to science. Maskelyne replied that Fleming should focus on the facts. "I recall Prof. Fleming that abuse - not an argument," he said.

In modern times, many hackers are completing that show technological flaws and lapses in security systems like Maskelyne. In small tricks always has its benefits.

Source: Статья in NewScientist.

P.S. Who knows interesting stories of earlier "hacking" of technical systems (pigeon do not touch), for example, a wired connection - share, will be very grateful.

Source: habrahabr.ru/post/236287/