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SS7 is vulnerable to attack. However, the types off attacks on the video don’t affect Signal as it requires a pin. (Make sure you set your pin to something strong and secure)
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PSA: if your financial institution/government/<other website> is using SMS codes (aka PSTN MFA) for multi-factor authentication they are practically worthless against a determined attacker who can use SIM swap or an SS7 attack to obtain the code. Basically you are secured by a single factor, your password. If your password is compromised it may be sold via black hat marketplaces and purchased by an attacker who would then likely attempt to break that second factor.
The best way to protect yourself is to use a unique password; a password manager especially helps with this. Sometimes institutions will offer “Authenticator” (TOTP) as a second factor, or PassKey authentication, both secure alternatives to SMS codes.
Here in Aus I’m working with Electronic Frontiers Australia to try and force some change within government and financial institutions (via the financial regulator). Most banks here use SMS codes and occasionally offer a proprietary app. One of the well-known international banks, ING Bank, even uses a 4 pin code to login to their online banking portal. 😖
Unfortunately SMS codes are a legacy left from old technology and a lack of understanding or resourcing by organisations that implement it. Authenticator/TOTP tokens have been around for 16 years (and standardised for 13 years), and PassKeys are relatively newer. There is a learning curve but at the very least every organisation should at least provide either TOTP or PassKeys as an option for security-minded users.
He says nothing about the PIN, so I don’t think that is what protects Signal as OP writes. It simply doesn’t rely on SS7.
You only type your PIN into Signal about once a month.
I found it confusing. Did he explain how the IMSI number is obtained?
Towards the end he said there was a special “interrogation” command that would reveal the IMSI but that loophole is now closed.
Can everyone please stop linking to Linus? He’s a YouTube huckster.
For one this isn’t a video by LTT.
Secondly not everyone hates LTT like you do
Would GrapheneOS with default settings be immune since 2G is disabled and networks don’t have 3G anymore?
No as ss7 is still widely used for compatibility
Super Saiyan 7 is actually invincible.
The hack is Super Saiyan God
It’s 30 minutes. Anyone have a quick summary?
when I read comments like these it makes me realize that maybe all the money flowing to OpenAI isn’t folly and there really are people out there trying to tl;dr their own lives
Can’t do text skimming in a video.
If that guy is like me i prefer to digest text rather than video.
What feels alien to me is the idea that experiencing a creative work is itself a means to an end.
I prefer to digest text too, but still would choose to taste a meal than read a typed up printout of the flavors it contains.
unfortunately, sometimes the chef likes to ascend from a golden staircase first to tell you about who they are and what the meal means to them, whilst passionately discussing their good friend’s VPN company, before finally, dramatically, letting you actually sit down and eat.
It wasn’t always like that. I remember when dishes were thrown fresh out of the kitchen without even a “heads up” call. Those were good meals.
Exactly! Why go to the first restaurant (video) at all if you don’t like the experience? You’re really going to wait outside the door of the first one asking the people leaving what the food tastes like? How is that better than the restaurant (videos) you do like?
Because when I told the taxi driver that I was “a bit peckish”, rather than take me to a nice greasy spoon where I can swallow a nice meal in 5 minutes, pay $5 and leave… he took me to the Ritz where I had to wait for a waiter to talk my ear off about the pastrami whilst being presented a wine menu.
I ain’t got time for that, I just wanted to satiate my hunger!
We seem to agree that actually eating real food at a greasy spoon is preferable to reading a description of the dining experience offered at the Ritz. But your replies give me the impression we disagree?
If I showed up at a restaurant and was presented with a menu that didn’t describe anything about the dishes on offer, I’d be pretty disappointed.
Point being that we have limited time and a nearly limitless amount of options for how to spend it. Text summaries are a tool we can use to decide whether something is worth our time (and money) investment if we’re on the fence about it.
A menu is not a creative work it’s a means to convey information. Veritasium is not reading wikipedia articles on screen, he’s creating an original work.
Listen I am not criticizing how you choose to enjoy your time I just find the entire concept of finding the experience of reading a text summary to be more to be more rewarding than experiencing the thing itself to be alien.
You make it sound like an arthouse movie yet it is the extreme geeky opposite.
Or were you talking about AI summaries in general rather than this one?
Im with this guy. Its a video about hacking a phone.
It’s a creative work, you are talking about Veritasium as if it he’s reading out a written a security bulletin on camera.
I don’t trust LLMs to do tldrs for me and it certainly doesn’t provide a rich nuance or spark discussions like asking a human would do.
(I say that with 7 comments in the thread lol but you get my point I’m sure)
SS7 protocol for 2G and 3G is vulnerable to man in the middle attack, easy to spy on people with. They use a walled garden approach al the primary defence mechanism and you can gain access through in for the low low price of couple of thousands of USD.
Couple of exploits are intercepting or monitoring calls and texts and triangulating position by checking what cell towers are in range.
My rule of thumb that grimaces in the thumbnail mean the video is playing on emotions instead of facts (i.e. is crap) has another match.
I remember the analog days where a few keystrokes on an Ericson phone were all you needed to start listening to private conversations on the cell tower you were connected to.
Mobile networks are awful and are very easy to spy on.
But the video is worth every minute.
I did watch it in the end after your recommendation, and it was interesting. Thanks!
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I don’t particularly like Linus, but he was bearable in this video. As someone who assumed this was a SIM swap, I was genuinely as confused as he was playing it up when he was able to place calls but not receive them. That was really interesting.
I have seen Linus straight up lie about things and distort benchmarks to make it seem like companies they get money from make better products than they do. Fuck that guy.
Linus is great. Sure he has his flaws but of all the flawed people he doesnt have horrible ones.
Birds of a shit-feather flock together.
I’ve never had a cellular provider for this reason among others. Here is NBTV’s video with some alternatives to directly having a SIM card, which I combine with MySudo to get phone numbers as well.
What’s your experience with using mysudo/voip numbers in terms of services accepting them (e.g. Google)? And socially, can you do regular calls with these numbers? Any audio delays?
Silent.link is also worth considering. I think it also works for people in the EU.
What’s your experience with using mysudo/voip numbers in terms of services accepting them (e.g. Google)? And socially, can you do regular calls with these numbers? Any audio delays?
(copied my comment for the top context comment but the other person hasn’t answered yet, wanted to get some info on these kinds of services first hand)
Haven’t used it [silent.link] myself. All I know is that all (or some) plans they offer include only incomming-calls, not outgoing. But good point you make about delays. That’s important. Haven’t thought about that myself.
I’m not too versed in it myself yet. You were asking about these services in general, right? Since you wrote “voip numbers”. I’ll keep tabs on your other comment then
Right. I’m considering trying out voip numbers but concerned about these disadvantages. Not that I call much anyways, just don’t want to make a frustrating calling experience more frustrating lol