rigorousintuition.ca

[Penguin]

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/1440402,mayor-daley-emergency-surveillance-cameras.article

"Chicago Mayor Daley has stated that if his Olympic dreams come true, by 2016 there will be a surveillance camera on 'every street corner in Chicago.' Just like in London, elected officials all over America appear to be happily advancing a 'surveillance society' without regard for civil rights or privacy concerns. Ray Orozco, executive director of Chicago's Office of Emergency Management and Communications is quoted as saying, 'We're going to grow the system until we eventually cover one end of the city to the other.'"

Chicago has been developing its surveillance network for some time, but it seems they plan to continue increasing the scale.

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/09/09/2217232&tid=158
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/09/27/1536219&tid=136
(two older stories about Chicagos surveillance network on Slashdot)
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

http://zedomax.com/blog/2008/03/31/diy-google-hack-how-to-get-access-to-random-surveillance-cameras/

I just noticed this and checked out one of WonderHowTo.com’s videos, it’s really cool.

Just go to Google and type, “inurl:ViewerFrame?Mode=Refresh” and you can find all sorts of unsecured surveillance cameras. The one above is from Japan, and who knows, you might find one near your home.

http://www.ccc.de/?language=en
Chaos Computer Club, Germany

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_Computer_Club

The Chaos Computer Club (CCC) is one of the biggest and most influential hacker organizations. The CCC is based in Germany and other German-speaking countries and currently has over 4,000 members.

The CCC describes itself as "a galactic community of life's beings, independent of age, sex, race or societal orientation, which strives across borders for freedom of information…." In general, the CCC stands up for more transparency in governments, freedom of information and a human right to communication. Supporting the principles of the hacker ethic, the club also fights for free access to computers and technological infrastructure for everybody.

History

The CCC was founded in Berlin on September 12, 1981 at the Kommune 1's table in the rooms of the newspaper Die Tageszeitung by Wau Holland and others in anticipation of the prominent role that information technology would play in the way people live and communicate.

The CCC became world famous when they drew public attention to the insecurity of the German Bildschirmtext computer network by causing it to debit a bank in Hamburg DM 134,000 in favor of the club. The money was returned the next day in front of the press. Prior to the incident, the system provider had publicly failed to react to proof of the insecurity provided by the CCC, claiming to the public that their system was safe. Bildschirmtext was the biggest commercially available online system targeted at the general public in its region at that time, run and heavily advertised by the German telecommunications agency (Deutsche Bundespost) which also strived to keep up-to-date alternatives out of the market.

In 1989, the CCC was peripherally involved in the first cyberespionage case to make international headlines. A group of German hackers led by Karl Koch (who was loosely affiliated with the CCC) was arrested for breaking into US government and corporate computers and selling operating-system source code to the Soviet KGB.

Several of the CCC's early exploits are also documented in a paper[1], written by Digital Equipment Corporation's lead European Investigator of the CCC's activities in the 1980s and 1990s. These include the CCC protests against French nuclear tests and members of the CCC involved with the German Green Party.

The CCC is more widely known for its public demonstrations of security risks. In 1996, CCC members demonstrated an attack against Microsoft's ActiveX technology, changing personal data in a Quicken database from the outside. In April 1998, the CCC successfully demonstrated the cloning of a GSM customer card, breaking the COMP128 encryption algorithm, at that time used by many GSM SIMs.[2]

In 2001, the CCC celebrated its twentieth birthday with an interactive light installation dubbed Project Blinkenlights that turned the building Haus des Lehrers in Berlin into a giant computer screen. A follow up installation (dubbed "Arcade") at the Bibliothèque nationale de France was the world's biggest light installation ever.

In March 2008, the CCC acquired and published the fingerprints of German Minister of the Interior Wolfgang Schäuble. The magazine also included the fingerprint on a film that readers could use to fool fingerprint readers.[3] This was done to protest the use of biometric data in German identity devices such as e-passports. [4]

Later in October 2008, CCC's Project Blinkenlights went to Toronto, Canada with project Stereoscope. [5]
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

THE FOLLOWING IS STRICTLY FOR EDUCATIONAL PURPOSES: WE DO NOT TAKE ANY RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR STUPID ACTIONS. DO NOT DO THIS AGAINST ANYONE ELSES PROPERTY.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn8530-activists-hijack-public-cctv-signal.html

A team of Austrian computer activists have demonstrated a method of hijacking police CCTV cameras, in protest over increased surveillance of public areas in their country's capital.

A group called Quintessenz used an off-the-shelf satellite receiver to intercept the video signal transmitted by a surveillance camera overlooking a busy square in the capital Vienna. The feed had been crudely scrambled by modifying the analogue video signal but the activists were able to unscramble it using commercial video processing software.

This enabled them to view everything recorded by the camera, and revealed both its capabilities and shortcomings. "The funny thing was, the camera wasn't able to see right below itself," says Christian Moch, a spokesman for Quintessenz, "so people could carry out drug deals underneath it without being seen".

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2005/12/69942
(same, a bit different data..)

http://www.c-h-a-o-s.com/2007/08/11/sniping-the-security/

The project:
How to remotely disable security cameras nondestructively from quite a distance…

Oh God oh God oh why:
It’s no secret. A lot of my inspiration comes from movies and for quite some time I have become more and more annoyed by Hollywoods sometimes rather silly solutions for an agent to shut down security cameras in order to remain undetected: E.g. blowing up the nearby power-plant or rigging up gadgets in sewers, where they can be detected by renovation workers and the sorts. If you blow something up or otherwise break it, your counterpart will immediately know it is sabotage and rule out a simple technical malfunction.
Another thing that got me to write this article is the abundant usage of surveillance cameras everywhere which makes me want to burst the bubble about security of surveillance cameras by exposing their weakness. Switching point of view will also often lead to improvement…



The basics:
The laser sniper project can basically be split in to three minor projects: The laser and scope with mount, The remote and The switch


Part one: The laser and scope with mount
For the actual disabling of the camera, I decided to use a standard laser for simply blinding the camera. The simplicity of this construction makes me wanna weep (I think I read somewhere that the best spy gadgets are the simplest). In theory I’ll shoot it through a window using a suction camera mount as base, which also makes my contraption quite small and easy to put up almost everywhere.
Mount an ordinary sports rifle scope with the laser mounted directly on the scope and then calibrate the two so that the laser dot hits the center of the crosshair.





Part two: The remote
In the search for a transmitter/receiver solution that had both range and some sort of signal encoding (so others wouldn’t accidently trigger my laser) it hit me: cellphones… they both have potential worldwide coverage, are hardcore encrypted and since they are sold by the billions, they are quite affordable - especially second hand cellphones. So I dug out my Nokia 6280 from my “Cellphone with SLR-lens” project.
I cracked it open once again…


Flipped the top over, removed a warranty sticker and opened up, removed the built-in speaker and solded a sound output cable to speaker connectors.


The next step is done so that the relay on the switch doesn’t sound like Fred Astaire on speed when the phone receives an SMS…
Set up the phone to play a sound only once when receiving an SMS


I found a single click sound off the internet, uploaded it to the phone and set the phone to use it when receiving an SMS…




Part three: The switch
What I then needed was a way for the cellphone to communicate with the laser. Since I’m no wizz at making circuits from scratch, I started scavenging the internet for a building kit that would do the job for me and found a Sound switch from Smartkit. This little gizmo reacts to sounds like claps and flips a switch
I found a small acryllic case and built in the electronics, added a grafite core to filter out electrical noise and two resistors (together 125KΩ) to weaken the signal a bit. Finally, I gave it an on/off switch.





Putting the pieces together:
Finally we just need to set up the laser on target, plug it into the switch, plug in the cellphone and you’re all set.





Materials and price tag::
Hunting scope - 25$
BB gun Laser - 20$
Mountings - 15$


Cellphone - Anywhere form 50$ and up depending on the model and age

Switch circuit - 25$
Box - 3$
Wires, plugs, grafitecore, resistors and other - 15$





Putting it to real use:
Let’s just pretend for a moment that we were actually going to use this setup to enter a building without being seen…
Usually the guys that put up the cameras are clever enough to not just put one camera up to guard an entrance. But they put up several for two reasons; Mainly to get more than one angle on the perps trying to get in, and to make the cameras cover each other so the perps can’t just yank out the power-plug on the cameras…
To get in we’ll need a laser for every camera… (se the drawings below) and a cable-splitter for multiple lasers connected to one switch and cellphone.

And if we’re going to be smart about this… which I’d like to think… then maybe we should take out all the cameras covering the perimeter of the building to make it look like a system failure rather than us trying to get in unseen… just a thought.

Troubled thoughts during the projeckt:
I had some serious thoughts about how to trigger the laser on and off. First, I thought I’d use an old wrist watch as a timer, but ended up discarding that idea… It just didn’t feel right and if the “agent” had to shut down several security cameras, he would not only have to synchronize all the watches and set them up to turn the lasers on at the exact right time at once, but also turn them off after the job. My second idea was to remotely trigger the laser by radio or walkie-talkie. This would give the “agent” the possibility of e.g. pressing the call button on the walkie which would send out a beep to activate the lasers needed.
The problem with this solution is that by using a standard walkie, everybody else could activate the lasers accidently if they where using the same channel (keep in mind that almost all baby-alarms use the standard walkie-talkie frequency). So unless I were to use pro walkie with encryption, I’d have to modify my plans a bit.
In the search for a transmitter/receiver solution that both had range and some sort of signal coding, it hit me: cellphones. But how well will this actually work? Well, after I build this, I had to try it out on an old security camera… Then I had some friends sending it a test-SMS and finally I had someone I knew across the Atlantic do it as well… No problem there, either. It worked like a charm.

The fine print at the bottom…
In case you’ve missed the huge warning sign I’ve put up or choose to disregard it and are thinking about using the knowledge you’ve just gained to be messing with something you shouldn’t… Think about this: Maybe I left some minor, but crucial details out so assholes won’t be messing with something they shouldn’t be messing with… without getting their asses busted
So don’t !!!

(PICS at link for DIY)
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

http://www.t0.or.at/msguide/surveillance.htm

SURVEILLANCE

GENERAL INTEREST
INTELLIGENCE
RELATED TEXTS
APPLICATIONS AND ACTION
SPEAKING @ PUBLIC NETBASE

http://www.ontherecord.org/blog/archives/2005/12/hackers_rebel_a.html

December 29, 2005
Hackers Rebel Against Spy Cams

This is my story on the Chaos Communication Congress computer hacking conference that I filed for Wired News fom Berlin yesterday. Great talks here and lots of interesting people.

BERLIN -- When the Austrian government passed a law this year allowing police to install closed-circuit surveillance cameras in public spaces without a court order, the Austrian civil liberties group Quintessenz vowed to watch the watchers.

Members of the organization worked out a way to intercept the camera images with an inexpensive, 1-GHz satellite receiver. The signal could then be descrambled using hardware designed to enhance copy-protected video as it's transferred from DVD to VHS tape.

The Quintessenz activists then began figuring out how to blind the cameras with balloons, lasers and infrared devices.

And, just for fun, the group created an anonymous surveillance system that uses face-recognition software to place a black stripe over the eyes of people whose images are recorded.

Quintessenz members Adrian Dabrowski and Martin Slunksy presented their video-surveillance research at the 22nd annual Chaos Communication Congress here this week. Five hundred hackers jammed into a meeting room for a presentation that fit nicely into CCC's 2005 theme of "private investigations."

Slunksy pointed out that searching for special strings in Google, such as axis-cgi/, will return links that access internet-connected cameras around the world. Quintessenz developers entered these Google results into a database, analyzed the IP addresses and set up a website that gives users the ability to search by country or topic -- and then rate the cameras.

"You can use this to see if you are being watched in your daily life," said Dabrowski.

The conference, hosted by Germany's Chaos Computer Club, featured many discussions on data interception and pushing back the unprecedented onslaught of surveillance technologies.

Even the Dutch, once known as hacker-friendly, politically progressive Europeans, are now fearful and demanding more cameras on their streets, said Rop Gonggrijp, founder of Dutch ISP Xs4All.
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"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

http://globalguerrillas.typepad.com/globalguerrillas/2006/01/weapons_the_rfi.html
Wednesday, 04 January 2006
WEAPONS: The RFID zapper

Radio frequency IDs (RFIDs), small electronic chips that share information when scanned, are rapidly becoming an essential part of global supply management. In order to correctly route and track items from inception to purchase, these chips are attached to packaging and increasingly the products themselves.
The intentional disabling of these chips can cause supply chain disruption. The best method is to HERF (high energy radio frequency, usually microwaves) the chips using a small transmitter (read about high power home made microwave weapons for herfing). The German branch (privacy activists) of the global guerrilla innovation network has developed a simple solution that converts a standard film camera into a short range RFID zapper. This system: 180px-22c3_mahajivana_img_0419_213x320.jpg

"...copies the microwave-oven-method, but in a much smaller scale. It generates a strong electromagnetic field with a coil, which should be placed as near to the target-RFID-Tag as possible. The RFID-Tag then will recive a strong shock of energy comparable with an EMP and some part of it will blow, most likely the capacitator, thus deactivating the chip forever.

To keep the costs of the RFID-Zapper as low as possible, we decided to modify the electric component of a singe-use-camera with flashlight, as can be found almost everywhere. The coil is made from varnished wire and placed inside the camera exactly where the film has been.

180px-22c3_mahajivana_img_0443_360x447.jpg

Then the coil is soldered between the cameras electronic and its flashlight. Last but not least most single-use-cameras will require some kind of switch to be build into them, since their activating-mechanism usually is to small and primitive. Once the switch is connected and tested, the camera can be closed again and henceforth will serve as a RFID-Zapper, destroying RFID-Tags with the power of ordinary batteries."

http://www.dhbolton.com/articles/diy-emp-generator.html

Build Your Own EMP Generator(2006)

Back to Article Index
This is a thought experiment

I have built toy cannons (and survived). I have also read about military tactical EMP weapons so here is a bit of speculation on how you might create one...No guarantees that it will work of course! It should generate some kind of EMP pulse but how strong depends on many factors. A tranny radio nearby may just go click, or it may fuse out! Certainly no one with a pace maker should try this or be anywhere near when it is attempted!
First Build a Toy Cannon

As a kid I made toy cannons using tobacco tins full of plasticine as a base, a car aerial as the cannon and (safety) match powder as the propellant. It's very easy. Cut 6" of aerial, crimp one end shut and embed that end (do not get the ends wrong!) in the plasticine. Remove the match powder from half a dozen safety matches (if you use non safety they might detonate when compacted- this is generally considered to be a very bad thing). A razor or sharp knife will do. You just want the powder so remove the wood. Insert enough powder to fill maybe an inch in the aerial and gently push it down. A knitting needle makes a good plunger. I suggest you mark the the aerial where the powder is located so you can position the candle correctly.

The picture below shows the match powder in red. The yellow is shrapnel- bits of stone, grit anything that would fit in. Now light a birthday candle stuck in the plasticine under the aerial below where the match powder is and make sure the business end of the cannon (the bit you do NOT want to be in front of) it's pointing out to sea, or at a wall, bank of earth or pile of sand, and not at you or anybody else.

Back off quick, and stand behind something. If the aerial is weak it might shatter and shrapnel is not conducive to good health. It's probably a good idea to do this away from property, people or animals. 6-12 Matches provides enough energy to be deadly or at least make unpleasant holes in humans. After 30 or so secs it should go bang. Do video it (if you can safely) and put it on youtube.

Cannon
Ok, You're probably wondering what a toy cannon has to do with an EMP Generator. Well same principle. Really! It is rumoured (according to New Scientist in 2000) that you can make a portable EMP with just a stick of dynamite, a metal tube, a ferrous rod and a coil of wire. The dynamite detonates in the tube sending the ferrous rod at great velocity through the coil of wire which generates a massive pulse. Now you can see where the toy cannon fits in.
EMP Coil Winding

The EMP coil is the crucial part of the generator. It has to be a closely wound coil, as small in diameter as possible. The diameter depends upon having an available former which is what you wind the coil on. A plastic straw is ideal so long as you have a (ferrous) nail or screw that fits in the tube comfortably (with the flat head sawn or filed off). It should not rattle in the straw, if it does then much of the force of the propellant is going to be wasted. An easy way to test this is to blow it. If you feel the air escaping from the tube without moving the nail then you need a wider nail/screw. get it right and you should be able to blow the nail/screw along the tube. Alternatively you could wrap duck tape round the nail/screw to increase it's diameter.

Take a thin gauge wire and tightly wind this along a 4" section along the straw. Do not overtighten, as this could deform the straw and cause a blow out. Getting the winding tight but not overtight will increase the straw's strength. You can add multiple windings if you have plenty of wire, but ensure that they all run in the same direction- ie when one layer is finished, run it back to the other end and wind from there. The more layers the better. Connect both ends. Sure it will probably fuse or melt but...

Insert the nail/screw in one end of the tube and put in a small stop- a blob of blu tack will do. You just want to hold the nail in place in the tube. This end of the tube will be attached to the propellent tube so that when the cannon is fired, the nail will shoot very rapidly though the coil and generate the pulse.
Propellent Tube

Just like the toy cannon, this is a bit more powerful and will probably need all the power from a box of safety matches. Remember do not use non safety matches as they ignite too easily. An old cigar tube will make a suitable cannon and you will need enough match powder to make at least 1" deep propellant. You might consider however using an electrical firing mechanism as it will take a while for the metal to heat up than the car aerial. Take a long length of thin insulated wire. Fold it in two and remove about 1/4" of insulation from one end. Insert this into the cigar tube so it is at the bottom. The other ends can be attached to a 9v or 12v battery once it's all setup. That should heat the uninsulated wire to ignition temperature.

If you want to be really slick, put the match powder into rice paper or tissue paper and shape it into a cylinder. Insert the bare end of the wire into the powder, checking that the other ends are nowhere near a battery.
Joining the Propellent Tube and Coil

This is the tricky bit. The coil assembly must be firmly attached to the open end of the cigar tube so that it is effectively air tight. All the blast must go up the straw. If the open end of the cigar tube is crushed with pincers then this will be a one off. The straw must only go a short distance into the tube (and none of the coil). If this is not done, then the danger is that when it is fired the entire coil assembly will go flying off into the blue younder, not just the nail/screw.

Let's assume you've built it and joined the two bits correctly. It's almost ready to fire. I suggest you mount it horizontally, facing an earth bank or pile of sand, anything that will absorb and not reflect the nail. If you've done it right, the nail will be a very dangerous high velocity projectile so you need to deal with it. The idea is not to create a BFG. Of course if you lined up a column of balloons, it would make a very videoable spectacle, assuming you didn't fuse the video camera of course! A convenient Faraday cage like a car parked 50' away might make a suitably safe recording platform.
That's It- Light the blue fuse and retire!

The author accepts that this is a gloriously daft and stupid experiment, as was Ben Franklin's "Kite flying in a storm" experiment. Have fun!
Coming Soon- Black Hole generator

Don't hold your breath waiting for this one... <g>

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread65154/pg1

Thread on Portable EMP generators

http://www.amazing1.com/emp.htm SOLD here, up to very high powered ones, wirh reflectors available for manipulating the beam.

EMP/HERF/Shock Pulse Generators
Shock wave generators are capable of producing focused acoustic or electromagnetic energy that can break up objects such as kidney stones and other similar materials. EMP generators can produce pulses of electromagnetic energy that can destroy the sensitive electronics in computers and microprocessors. Destabilized LCR circuits can produce multi megawatt pulses by using an explosive wire disruptive switch. These high power pulses can be coupled into antennas, conic sections, horns etc for very directional effects. Research is currently being undertaken to disable vehicles thus avoiding dangerous high speed chases. The trick is to generate a high enough power pulse to fry the electronic control processor modules. This could be a lot simpler if the vehicle was covered in plastic or fiber glass rather than metal. The shielding of the metal body offers a challenge to the researcher to develop a practical system. A system could be built that could do this but would be costly, large and produce collateral damage to friendly targets.

Devices described are intended for
experienced researchers and qualified
personnel who are aware of all hazards
and liabilities in use of this equipment



(like frying all electronics you own and accidentally passed the beam over )
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

"The Met Police got a short sharp rap over the knuckles yesterday, as the Office of the Information Commissioner questioned what looks very much like a blanket policy to force CCTV onto public houses in certain parts of London. The story begins with a letter to the Guardian last week, from Nick Gibson. He is currently renovating Islington pub The Drapers Arms, after its previous owners allowed it to go insolvent and then disappeared. In his letter, he argues that if he had merely taken over an existing licence, the police could not have imposed any additional conditions. However, because this was now a new licence, the police were able to make specific requests, including one particular request in respect of installing CCTV."

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/17/met_cctv/

The Met Police got a short sharp rap over the knuckles yesterday, as the Office of the Information Commissioner questioned what looks very much like a blanket policy to force CCTV onto public houses in certain parts of London.

The story begins with a letter to the Guardian last week, from Nick Gibson. He is currently renovating Islington pub The Drapers Arms, after its previous owners allowed it to go insolvent and then disappeared.

In his letter, he argues that if he had merely taken over an existing licence, the police could not have imposed any additional conditions. However, because this was now a new licence, the police were able to make specific requests, including one particular request in respect of installing CCTV.

Mr Gibson wrote: "I was stunned to find the police were prepared to approve, ie not fight, our licence on condition that we installed CCTV capturing the head and shoulders of everyone coming into the pub, to be made available to them upon request. There was no way that they could have imposed this on the previous licence holder."
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"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[OP ED]

wish they'd do that here.

some people worry about entirely the wrong things.

[Penguin]

what, me worry?


Im more worried about pubs and bars selling alcohol. That never ends well in the wee hours.
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"

[Penguin]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/4790389/Remote-controlled-planes-could-spy-on-British-homes.html

Police could soon use unmanned spyplanes like those used to track enemy troops in Iraq and Afghanistan for surveillance operations on British homes.

The Home Office has suggested that the remote-controlled drones could be used to help police gather evidence and track criminals without putting officers at risk.

The miniature aircraft could be fitted with cameras and heat-seeking equipment, allowing police to carry out aerial reconnaissance from a control room.

They also have the benefit of being quieter than conventional helicopters or spotter planes and are much cheaper to run due to their fuel economy.

However, their use is likely to provoke opposition from people sceptical of Britain’s increasing use of surveillance equipment, who fear they represent yet another example of the expansion of a Big Brother state.
_________________
"Brother Gatling Gun of Patience"