Most Frightening Presentation at DLD-08

Link: sevenload.com

If you have just received a letter from your credit card company, plus a new RFID enabled credit card, take a look at what Pablo Holman has to say during the first few minutes of this video taken from a session at DLD this year. Yes, the secret credit-card information is encryoted on the card. But Pablo shows that it is all decrypted by a simple RFID reader he got for US$8 on ebay. He recommends putting your credit cards into a stainless-steel holder so0 that it cannot be read by rogue readers. Next year, he quipped, he can put the same reader at the door of the theatre and grab all the credit card numbers and expiration dates of the people entering the lecture theatre. His group, which I term "Hackers for the good side of society" can clone RFID passports already.



Starbucks claims the line moves 3 times as fast if people don't have to get a credit card out of their wallet. I'll stick to mine in the stainless steel carrier if you don't mind. I think there are other ways for Starbucks to solve its transaction problem - like an optical code read by a scanner. Some people already have the solution.