Skip to main content

Your phone number is all a hacker needs to read texts, listen to calls and track you

Hack by tracking a brand new phone

Weaknesses within mobile phone network interconnection system allows criminals or governments to remotely snoop on anyone with a phone. Hackers have again demonstrated that no matter how many security precautions someone takes, all a hacker needs to track their location and snoop on their phone calls and texts is their phone number.

The hack, first demonstrated by German security researcher Karsten Nohl in 2014 at a hacker convention in Hamburg, has been shown to still be active by Nohl over a year later for CBS’s 60 Minutes.

The hack uses the network interchange service called Signalling System No. 7 (SS7), also known as C7 in the UK or CCSS7 in the US, which acts as a broker between mobile phone networks. When calls or text messages are made across networks SS7 handles details such as number translation, SMS transfer, billing and other back-end duties that connect one network or caller to another.



Comments

Popular posts from this blog

US unions plan attack on Donald Trump in attempt to derail presidential bid

Concerned labor group leaders are organizing ad campaigns and phone banks as Trump’s populist message on trade and jobs draws in union voters The prospect of a Donald Trump nomination has labor leaders scrambling to hold the line as the Republican frontrunner’s appeal to disaffected working-class voters threatens to upset the traditional political calculus. The majority of America’s almost 15 million unionized workers can be usually be relied upon to back the Democratic candidate in a presidential year, but leaders are concerned by Trump’s populist message on trade and jobs – and his insistence that union workers are just one of many groups on a long list of those he claims “love” him. Published By - Theguardian.com - Sports New, LifeStyle News, Politics news, UK and world political comment and analysis: Tuesday 26 April 2016 12.00 BST

North Carolina's 'bathroom bill' battle embarrasses residents on both sides | TheNews Linzer

The escalating fight over LGBT rights has turned the historically sophisticated, inclusive southern state into a battleground of intolerance In the family of southern states, North Carolina has long been the cousin who made it. It enjoyed excellent universities, world-class industries, smooth roads and political stability. A whole class of people arose called “halfbacks”: people who retired from the north-east states to Florida, only to realize North Carolina was better and moved halfway back. Now, with the state squaring off against the federal government about who can use which bathrooms, the state finds itself at the pointy end of jokes, and lumped in with more strident southern states like Mississippi and – most bitterly – South Carolina. It’s unfamiliar for North Carolinians. It’s uncomfortable. And many are asking: how did we get here? How did the high-achieving, well-educated cousin end up with a black eye and busted knuckles, reeling over a public toilet? Continue reading....

Sally Faulkner's former husband claims he took children to Lebanon due to her 'relationships'

Ali al-Amin’s claim comes as Channel Nine defends involvement in ‘story profoundly in public interest’ The estranged husband of Brisbane woman Sally Faulkner says he took their two children to  Lebanon  because he “just wasn’t OK” with her new partner being prominent in their lives. Ali al-Amin has been speaking to  Australian media  as Channel Nine explicitly defended its involvement in “a story that not only is profoundly in the public interest but also one the public is interested in”. Nine also announced it would fully investigate how four of its staff came to be arrested in Beirut, charged with kidnapping and finally released on Wednesday,  apparently in exchange for compensation . Amin claimed on the Kyle and Jackie O Kiis radio show on Thursday that he decided to take the former couple’s two children, 5-year-old Lahela and Noah, 3, after he “saw a few things happening in regards to Sal’s parenting or relationships”. Published By -Theguardian.com - LifeSty...