Re: another reason to avoid airbus: surveillance

2002-05-11 Thread Steve Schear

At 06:59 PM 5/10/2002 -0700, you wrote:
On Friday, May 10, 2002, at 05:32  PM, Steve Schear wrote:

At 05:06 PM 5/10/2002 -0400, you wrote:

  Black-and-white images captured by the cameras will be fed to screens in
  the cockpit via the cables used to distribute pictures to seat-back
  video screens. Although only some lights will have cameras, potential
  terrorists will not know which ones.

Huh.  Easily defeated.  The images won't be watched,
as the cabin crew have better things to do.  By the
time the plane has been taken, the best they will
know is that it is going on.

Then, out comes the big roll of duck tape and slap
slap slap, all lights are out.  Special points for
opaque tape.

A less observable jamming means is to just bring a key chain penlight 
aboard and aim it at the light.  If the light has a suction cup mount it 
can be mounted to the arm of the chair.  For more clandestine use a two 
position switch on the light could activate an IR laser/led, shining 
through the same lens, for light/dark cabin situations.

Jamming the camera or overloading it is itself a tell.

Depends on the overload failure mode.  Many SS camera will simply appear to 
be full white/black on overload.  Same as a malfunction.


Knowing the exact location and geometry of a camera lens makes it feasible 
to spoof the scene by placing a fixed image below the camera. Unless the 
camera has a zoom, which is unlikely, a simple affine transformation of a 
real lap is enough. Make it of a  lap covered with a blanket and then 
even the lack of movement will not be a tell.

I can the MI music playing in the background already.

steve




Re: another reason to avoid airbus: surveillance

2002-05-11 Thread Neil Johnson

On Friday 10 May 2002 07:32 pm, Steve Schear wrote:
 A less observable jamming means is to just bring a key chain penlight
 aboard and aim it at the light.  If the light has a suction cup mount it
 can be mounted to the arm of the chair.  For more clandestine use a two
 position switch on the light could activate an IR laser/led, shining
 through the same lens, for light/dark cabin situations.

 steve

You mean a couple of these?  http://www.photonlight.com/index2.html 
(They even make an infrared one too!)

Damn! Should have kept my mouth shut. 

Now I guess I'll have to leave them at home with my Leatherman Micra and my 
nail clippers :) 

-- 
Neil Johnson, N0SFH
http://www.iowatelecom.net/~njohnsn
http://www.njohnsn.com/
PGP key available on request.




Re: another reason to avoid airbus: surveillance

2002-05-10 Thread Steve Schear

At 05:06 PM 5/10/2002 -0400, you wrote:

  Black-and-white images captured by the cameras will be fed to screens in
  the cockpit via the cables used to distribute pictures to seat-back
  video screens. Although only some lights will have cameras, potential
  terrorists will not know which ones.

Huh.  Easily defeated.  The images won't be watched,
as the cabin crew have better things to do.  By the
time the plane has been taken, the best they will
know is that it is going on.

Then, out comes the big roll of duck tape and slap
slap slap, all lights are out.  Special points for
opaque tape.

A less observable jamming means is to just bring a key chain penlight 
aboard and aim it at the light.  If the light has a suction cup mount it 
can be mounted to the arm of the chair.  For more clandestine use a two 
position switch on the light could activate an IR laser/led, shining 
through the same lens, for light/dark cabin situations.

steve




Re: another reason to avoid airbus: surveillance

2002-05-10 Thread Tim May

On Friday, May 10, 2002, at 05:32  PM, Steve Schear wrote:

 At 05:06 PM 5/10/2002 -0400, you wrote:

  Black-and-white images captured by the cameras will be fed to 
 screens in
  the cockpit via the cables used to distribute pictures to seat-back
  video screens. Although only some lights will have cameras, potential
  terrorists will not know which ones.

 Huh.  Easily defeated.  The images won't be watched,
 as the cabin crew have better things to do.  By the
 time the plane has been taken, the best they will
 know is that it is going on.

 Then, out comes the big roll of duck tape and slap
 slap slap, all lights are out.  Special points for
 opaque tape.

 A less observable jamming means is to just bring a key chain penlight 
 aboard and aim it at the light.  If the light has a suction cup mount 
 it can be mounted to the arm of the chair.  For more clandestine use a 
 two position switch on the light could activate an IR laser/led, 
 shining through the same lens, for light/dark cabin situations.


Jamming the camera or overloading it is itself a tell.

Knowing the exact location and geometry of a camera lens makes it 
feasible to spoof the scene by placing a fixed image below the camera. 
Unless the camera has a zoom, which is unlikely, a simple affine 
transformation of a real lap is enough. Make it of a  lap covered with 
a blanket and then even the lack of movement will not be a tell.

--Tim May
They played all kinds of games, kept the House in session all night, 
and it was a very complicated bill. Maybe a handful of staffers actually 
read it, but the bill definitely was not available to members before the 
vote. --Rep. Ron Paul, TX, on how few Congresscritters saw the 
USA-PATRIOT Bill before voting overwhelmingly to impose a police state