Wardriving made easy with Eye-Fi
December 15th, 2007
I was reading some time ago about the Eye-Fi wireless SD card. It allows you to upload your digital photos straight from your digital camera to your favourite online photo hosting site. Well, according to the marketing speak anyway. In reality, from the reviews I’ve read, you have to set it up to talk to your home Wi-Fi access point (not ad-hoc) as it can’t use public hotspots. In other words, it allows you to upload photos from your camera to your PC in your own home without the use of cables.
The reviews and technical specs I was reading started me thinking about the security implications of this card. Eye-Fi supports WEP (oh dear) and WPA/2 PSK, which means having to configure the card with your wireless network encryption key.
Think about it, how many people leave their digital cameras unattended at parties and social events? All a hacker needs is the Eye-Fi SD card reader and a laptop and he can get your wireless network encryption key in under a minute. There would no longer be any need for a hacker to sit in a car outside your home trying to crack your network encryption. They could just follow you to a bar and wait for you to leave your Eye-Fi enabled digital camera unattended.
January 4th, 2008 at 11:06 am
It does seem like a lot of trouble to go to to get access to someone’s wireless network. I suggest that it would be far easier to break into their house and install a key logger than it would be to follow them around with a concealed laptop, waiting for them to leave their camera alone in a public area (Something I’ve never done)
You only tend to do it at weddings because you don’t expect your family and friends to steal your camera, let alone your broadband!