Stolen iPhone, Broken Glass – SIM Card is Vulnerable
Last week was one of the worst weeks I had in current history. Monday, someone broke into my car and stole my iPhone. Over the previous weekend my Google Glass stopped working. My Desktop also broke down (thankfully only a reload issue) and I even had a Notebook explode in my lap! I did have some fun last week as we went up north and relaxed on the boat for the day. Here’s to future weeks being less stressful. Thanks to Jennifer who made my crawling work a lot easier.
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Geek Smack! episode 268 Tech News:
Larger iPads, iPhones
A 13″ iPad and 4.7 and 5.7″ iPhones are being tested. Would you buy a larger iPhone?
Ring to Rule
This NFC ring could unlock your doors and transfer information
Ford Emergency Notification
Ford is trying a new system where your car will alert you when an emergency vehicle is approaching and in hot pursuit.
Leap Controller
Did you get a Leap? What is it? Engadget reviews Leap.
1 Billion Subscribers
Apple noticed over a billion subscriptions to 250,000 podcasts. That is 4,000 subscribers per podcast!
Flipboard Desktop
Flipboard will be turning on Desktop mode shortly, allowing you to view news via PC or Mac
Tracking Camera
This camera can track an object at high speeds. Images can even be projected
Geekedia of the Week
Real Genius – Want to know how to get license plates on your Underwear? Need to know how to build a laser tracking system? This week’s geekedia is the movie Real Genius. Starring Val Kilmer and Gabriel Jarret.
Geek Smack! Geek News
Tumblr Adult Rules
Tumblr changes rules on adult pages so they are not searchable anymore
Outdated Internet Laws
Is it time to update DMCA, Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and ECPA?
LG Curved TVs
Great for theater lovers, the LG curved TV could give us a mini IMAX experience in our living rooms for $15k
Apple Breached
Developer website was hacked but no personal data was compromised
Bluetooth Ring
Orb is a ring that flips into a Bluetooth headset.
Netflix Grows
See, we can forget what they tried to do and enjoy their service once again. It’s almost back to where it was.
This Table Floats
The Rock Paper Robot Float table is a series of magnetized cubes that work together to float the cubes.
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Geek Smack: SIM Card Security – Vulnerable to Hackers
It’s been an interesting week for me on security and stolen phones, but there is another issue we need to address in security – your SIM card. According to SRLabs, the SIM card – that card your phone carrier puts in your phone to activate on a network – is using 56 bit DEC encryption. This technology was developed in the 1970s.
Hackers can get into a SIM card using an errant SMS message and Java technology to pull whatever is on your SIM card. This can be contacts, passwords and other information you may have on this card.
Over 750 million phones are open to this attack. That is 1 in 8 phones!
SRLabs is going to show their findings at the BlackHat conference on July 31st. They are going to recommend SMS Firewall and a better encrypted SIM in future phones.
Updated encryption means phone carriers will have to update their SIM identification programs. Most likely that would be a software upgrade. If they were to upgrade this today, we would see a 4-year process to clear out all old phones. End result might be any phone older than 2013 might not work on a carrier
Although phones such as iPhones and Android don’t rely on SIM cards to hold data, this could be a gateway into the phone itself. We at Geekazine wholeheartedly back SRLabs plan to update SIM card technology and get into 128-bit encryption.
Geek Smack! is a weekly video show and podcast that comes out every Tuesday evening. Your host: Jeffrey Powers – talks tech news, IT news and geek news for the week. Geek Smack! is ©2013 under a Creative Commons no-deriv license. What’s the frequency, Kenneth? If you would like more information about what is technology, recent news, Geekazine, and Jeffrey Powers, feel free to contact him. Jeffrey Powers does interviews, just ask!