News Article - Now There are 2 articles

Second article added as comment 11.  Article courtesy of another member.  Thought it appropriate to add here.

Got this from a friend; cannot attest to it’s veracity. Came out of a US Dept of State (for the rest of our readers, Dept of State = Foreign Ministry) web site called osac.gov.

Why was this in a Dept of State site? Probably because it was based on a conference taking place in Australia.

http://www.businessinsider.com/highly-contagious-malware-could-cause-mass-murder-by-hacking-pacemakers-to-send-deadly-jolt-2012-10.

URL is the best summary of the article.

Don

19 Comments

EVIL PEOPLE

by donr - 2012-10-18 10:10:25

Alma: "Malware" is computer programming (Software) that makes a computer literally sick (Like in mal de mer - sea sick) Mal also translates loosely as "Bad."

Why would anyone want to do that sort of thing to us? Well, the world is just full of EVIL people who revel in hurting others. Can't make it any simpler than that.

Our immediate past Vice President, Dick Cheney, hosted a PM/ICD. He recently underwent a successful heart transplant. Would you believe that there were actually people hoping he would die? Some people are just that perniciously evil.

I know nothing of the Melbourne conference, but there are all sorts of conferences worldwide all the time that all sorts of Geeks attend & we never hear a peep out of them or even get a glimmer that they exist! F'rinstance - our #1 Son attended a conference here in Atlanta, Georgia this week & we had not an inkling that it was going to take place I asked him what it was all about & he gave me the title. We are both electrical engineers & I swear, Alma, that he was speaking a language from another planet - perhaps Vulcan or Klingon. I had never heard the words before in my life, except on "Star Trek" on TV & that was "Phasor." Being a Geek, himself, I knew he had not gone to a Trekky convention. Believe it or not, there were over 200 people at that conference that knew what he was talking about!

Don

hackers

by Alma Annie - 2012-10-18 10:10:47

Hi Don, I have read the report on the website. I don't really understand what this 'malware, is, being somewhat computer and technology illiterate! Why would anyone want to target people with pacemakers and ICD's and the like. We really are not that important in the scheme of things. I don't know what the conference was in Melbourne, and I am Australian.
Can you explain more? Thanks.
Alma Annie.

Hmmm

by ElectricFrank - 2012-10-19 01:10:12

Just how are they going to pull this thing off.

First you have to access large numbers of pacemakers and reprogram each one. The response distance of the pacer to an external signal is very short. Even if a high powered transmitter were located near a group of people it would activate data activity on all the pacers simultaneously since they aren't tuned to separate frequencies. Then in order to set up two way communication required for handshaking the data transfer the pacer transmitter would need to have a higher transmit power to be picked up by the hacking receiver. Of course there would be mass confusion with a large number responding.

Now assuming you could get around all these obstacles only ICD's have the capability to shock the patient.

There is one hazard to the whole thing though. With the mass fear that is so easy to generate in people I could probably have most of the pacer wearers passed out on the floor by just wearing a "Pacemaker Hacker" tee shirt, and carry a dummy antenna around in the mall.

Now if you really want to know what I worry about, well.......better not. LOL

frank

Good One Frank !!

by Tattoo Man - 2012-10-19 05:10:25

I live near a lot of active Military Airbases here in Lincolnshire.

I need some reassurance regarding the Flying Pigs that I have seen recently....are they targetting me because I have an Aortic porcine valve replacement ??

When will it be safe to come out of the cupboard under the stairs ??..it is very spidery in here and i am gagging to go to the loo.

Please help soon...or send in a pizza

Tattoo Man ....always a sucker for a conspiracy theory

Ah, Frank...

by donr - 2012-10-19 07:10:27

...You left out the salient point - the basic assumption is that the miscreant has your PM's SERIAL NUMBER.

Remember my comment about where it came from - a conference in Australia, via the US Dept of State. The last time that bunch got anything right was when Ben Franklin was the de facto Secretary & that was pre-Revolutionary War!

I'd pass it off as sci-fi, except that there were a couple guys from MIT referenced, & they may be out in left field (Sorry, TM, that's a baseball term - don't know the equivalent from cricket) but they usually have a reasonably sound basis for what they say, even though pretty esoteric. Therefore, I'd stick it in the back of my mind for possibly real, but not necessarily probably real. At least not in 2012.

Have any of you seen the demonstration of the guy that walks around in a mall & steals people's credit card info via the new little chip being put in them for proximity scanning, as opposed to having to be swiped? No one who had it done believed it happened to them.

There is capricious & then there is EVIL. Capricious is Frank w/ his tee & a dummy antenna; EVIL is some political whacko who envisions killing Dick Cheney by hacking his ICD. The EVIL ones exist, & we all read of them.

BTW: Frank, put me down for the first production model of your tee.

Personally, I think it can be done, given enough EVIL thought & some development. It has been postulated as possible; therefore, good men need to think evil thoughts to figure out how to counter it. Otherwise, we will all be vulnerable. If for no other reason than to counter the psychological potential in the masses.

Don

Here's a synopsis...

by donr - 2012-10-19 08:10:23

...of the Melbourne conference report. Thanks to ck108, who sent me the link in a pvt msg. The dateline on this article is today! At first, I thought it was a rehash of the Melbourne report, but it turned out to be a summary w/ more detail on Barnaby Jack the presenter.

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9232477/Pacemaker_hack_can_deliver_deadly_830_volt_jolt

Much more detail of his presentation.

Sounds wild & it is, Son came in from his wooly-haired conference in Atlanta (See comment 3) wearing a tee that said "Dream; Design; Build" the theme of the University of Illinois annual Engineer Field Day this year. This subject is somewhere in between "Dream" & "Design." I've said on many occasions that "Dreams come with neither a business plan nor a design."

Enjoy - or not.

Don

EVIL THOUGHTS

by donr - 2012-10-19 08:10:28

Keith, Frank: Another part of the story was the general vulnerability of medical devices in hospitals/MD's offices because the owners are afraid of legal consequences if they mess w/ the programming.

All evil men (or wimmun) need do is tap into the interrogator/programmers in the system & they could wreak havoc in the community. Face it - that Medtronic portable device gets updated occasionally. Hack into the Medttronic system & it's all over.

I cannot envision this ever getting to the level of virus transfer like Robert Heinlein's "Puppet Masters" via transfer from PM to PM - but why not? Every scientific principle was once a wild hair in some wooly-headed genius' 'do!

Don

OMG!!!!!

by Casper - 2012-10-19 09:10:25

I think someone just hacked into my pacemaker!!!

Yikes!!!!!

I hope I can finish this letter before my pacemaker .................................................................................................................................................................................

Hmmmmmmmm

by Moner - 2012-10-19 12:10:34

Donr,

This almost sounds like science fiction. I know you live in the US and probably are familiar with the TV servies, NCIS.

Last season one of there shows featured a story in which a marine who was hosting a pacemaker at the time, somehow had his pacemaker hacked and dropped dead, the show revolved around finding out who his enemy was.

I remember this show very well, because I had just recently received a pacemaker last January.

Moner

No Fear

by Alma Annie - 2012-10-20 02:10:27

It seems to me that the whole thing is just one big laugh, and seems a little like 'Dr Who!'
If it were to be true and someone wanted to kill me then so be it. I am just so not worried.
Life is to be lived, not to be feared. Our road toll is far too high, but I still go out there and drive.

I hope no one out there is taking this seriously.

Alma Annie

synopsis

by ElectricFrank - 2012-10-20 03:10:39

The affiliation of Barnaby Jack the presenter gives away the real issue. His company sells security equipment to detect hackers.

Do you suppose he has any ponies in the show?

Same as happens on TV periodically. Symantec or McAffee will be interviewed about some new virus. Bet that sells some software.

frank

Ian: Shall we...

by donr - 2012-10-20 04:10:27

...Tell TM he has a spelling problem - other than the name of the main city in the congressional district in southern Kansas represented by Mike Pompeo & inhabited by Pacer Girl?

I mean, after all, if he is going to quote something, he might as well get all the words correct.

You'd a made it into Casper's PM, but you made a wrong turn at Bangor Maine - or was it Wales. I never can get those two straight.

Don

Good One!!!

by Casper - 2012-10-20 04:10:47

Hi Ian,

Lucky for me James Bond was in the states working on a private mission and happened to come bursting though the doors at the last minute and saved the day.

Watch out, James Bond (Daniel Craig) will be coming after you next, you better lay low.

Casper


Dear Don, I am chastened by your attention to detail

by Tattoo Man - 2012-10-20 05:10:44

To Pacer Girl and to all that might find my orthographic forte to be lacking...'Mes Apologies, Chers Amies"..

To Mike Pompeo..'all in all, doing well, given your 59%,..but will the 'Turban Incident' ever quite go away ?

Tartooing Moon........Don ,..you are right my spolling is arfull..shool ..troi to der betar in footcha.

Suspect interference from an outside Farce.. quite possibly , given the proximity of Halloween,.. from Witch-it-All

PS Pacer Girl and I have both own Porsches

But lets not forget....

by Tattoo Man - 2012-10-20 07:10:35

....as the old saying goes.."Just because you are paranoid, doesnt mean that they are not still out to get you"

TM

Alma Annie

by donr - 2012-10-20 09:10:47

You'd best hope that some wooly-haired geek is taking it seriously. Evil is not rational.

There is an old saying "For evil to triumph, all good men need do is remain silent," or words to that effect.

I can think of all sorts of evils that have been perpetrated on mankind because the victims scoffed initially.

Frank is completely correct about Barnaby having a pony in the show - MOF, I'd say that he has an entire ring of the circus under his command. But, I'll guarantee you one thing - he has the pony, not the pile of manure.

If you examine safety regs & building codes, they are, for the most part written in blood. But there are still people like Barnaby who influence them for their own financial benefit.

Don

Casper

by IAN MC - 2012-10-20 10:10:32

Sorry it was me who hacked into your pacemaker. I was trying to hack into the Pentagon and something went wrong !

.... your settings look fine by the way !

Ian

paranoid

by ElectricFrank - 2012-10-21 01:10:31

Maybe its because I had my paranoids taken out along with my tonsils as a child.

frank

TM: I also have a Porsche

by donr - 2012-10-21 08:10:43

Since I live in the south, it runs all the way around my house & is covered w/ a roof to keep the hot Sun from shining in my windows in July.

One day, I hired my neighbor, Bubba, to paint it. He came to the door in about an hour for payment. I looked around at the Porsche & commented it didn't look like he'd done anything & it should have taken him a lot longer to paint it than an hour.

Bubba looked around at me & says "Wahl, now, it didn't take long at all to paint it, & besides, it warn't no Porsche, it war a Mercedes parked out back."

(W/ the greatest respect to Jerry Clower, who I stole it from.)

Don

You know you're wired when...

You can finally prove that you have a heart.

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