Wi-Fi finder hacking

Technology
Wi-Fi finder hacking

Wifi Finder
The latest Phrack Magazine has a good article on Wi-Fi finder hacking…

Christmas has passed, and in the cold weeks since we have already become bored with the shiny new toys Santa left us under the tree. Our only choice is to hack them! This article describes our successful attack on a popular wifi finder, and will provide you with the ability to use the device in new and interesting ways. You are limited only by your own creativity!

48 thoughts on “Wi-Fi finder hacking

  1. james says:

    Big deal. All they did was analyze the IC with a scanning electron microscope, erase the EEPROM and create and upload new firmware (after remapping the bootloader). Let’s have more REAL Makin’, like hotgluing a thumbdrive inside a scooby-doo lunchbox or touching the circuit board in a Speak and Spell to make amazing ‘music’!

  2. Anonymous says:

    Indeed. I’m surprised Phil posted such a silly little thing when he could be looking for more sites with people scribbling on money or taping magnets to LEDs.

    Makers don’t want to read such basic stuff as this, how about some more stickers to deface ads?

  3. Phillip Torrone says:

    i’ve posted tons of advanced projects involving wi-fi / wi-fi device hacking. not everyone is an expert and knows the process of how to get there (read the article, it’s all about the process)… most people wouldn’t know where to start with “analyzing an IC with a scanning electron microscope, erase the EEPROM and create and upload new firmware (after remapping the bootloader)”

    i’ll try and find more money scribbling and LED magnet posts now, check back in an hour.

  4. figgalicous.myopenid.com says:

    I do not thank the previous (Anonymous? Really?) arm-chair pundits for their sarcastic opinions. They seem to labor under incorrect views of this website & it’s publications.

    As a reader from issue 1 and a daily user of information found on Make, I continue to be annoyed by useless noise-making and elitists with their just-plain-wrong disdain for the the beginner/intermediate-skilled projects. Have they seen the websites linked to and hosted on this site? Is the quality of Make in general decline?

    I would think that given their concerns over the direction of Make, they would be more than able to find a better site to fawn over.

    Sadly, there is none. So in the stead of that alternative, I offer a challenge. When you find a post unappealing, offer silent protest or post a better site in the comments – or better yet: Email the URL to PT so that he can improve upon a site that you really do seem to care about.

    Additionally, you can create your own über-content that could be posted here for all the makers of the world to behold.

    -Mike, Las Vegas, NV

  5. Phillip Torrone says:

    @mike, thanks – you’re one of the reasons it’s easy for us to keep doing what we do, make is inclusive not exclusive and despite the 1-2 trolls on the site i think the site gets better each month and more new people are reading. out of the millions of people who read make online, there are only a couple of people who poop on posts for beginners, that’s ok – i do wish they would send in links as you suggested, but they never do.

  6. Phillip Torrone says:

    @james – there’s now a post with a usb drive.

  7. james says:

    I really didn’t mean to sound like a jerk or a troll. I’ve also been a paying subscriber since the beginning, and I know Make has never wanted be a clone of Nuts and Volts or Popular Mechanics.

    But good grief Phillip, you’ve got to admit the signal to noise ratio in this blog is falling, due largely to the proliferation of artsy hipster junk. And this blog is a huge chunk of the fresh content on this site.

    My daughter and I love the ‘beginner’ Makes (believe me, reprogramming a WiFi detector is way over my head), it’s just that a bowling ball covered with lizards or scribbling on money doesn’t sound like ‘technology on my time’. What happened to Craft?

    Anyway, sorry to be one of the two Make detractors in the world. If your site’s getting more hits from folks looking for the latest Che stencil, so be it. I’ll stick to the digital edition. And for all my belly-achin’, I’ll definitely keep subscribing :)

  8. federal-land says:

    I was actually hoping it would be an article about hacking the lower-end wifi detectors as pictured in the photo, instead it was about hacking the high-end ($50-range) detectors that have LCD panels.

    Right now I’m trying to figure out how to get an arduino to grab data from one of the low-end ones so I can display it on an analog meter.

    and unless I’m doing something horribly wrong, the Makezine blog doesn’t recognize my flickr openID :(

  9. The Oracle says:

    I also was a subscriber from the beginning, but I stopped after the second year. I just felt it went way downhill for the sort of reasons we’re talking about here.

    My opinion of this block has dropped so much, I almost skipped this article expecting it to be yet-another-change-the-led-colour type thing.

    It’s at the point now where I read this as something to skim when waiting for other sites to update. That’s kind of sad, since back in the day, this was my favorite site, and now I just seem to read it out of habit.

  10. Phillip Torrone says:

    @james – we’ve never posted a che stencil.

  11. Phillip Torrone says:

    @federal-land – i’ll see what i can dig up and/or do that project, shouldn’t be that hard…

    as far as the OpenID thing goes, email me directly and we’ll see what we can do.

  12. Phillip Torrone says:

    @The Oracle – that’s an interesting comment, until recently i was the only author on MAKE, but most of the posts you don’t like are from me – i haven’t changed, although i’d say i do post things from more people.

    if folks want to see other things on the site, send them in – Oracle, what links or projects would you like to see here?

  13. Anonymous says:

    Personally I’d like to see more steampunk posts and more posts with stuff built inside of altoids tins. I would also like to see more leatherman multi-tools being advertised with the Make name printed on the side. Could you put more Arduino projects up? I think the site is in desperate need of more of those. Make sure you put the link to the Make store in all of the posts for the multi-tools and the Arduinos.

  14. Phillip Torrone says:

    @Anonymous – i’m sorry you don’t like arduino projects, they’re very popular and -makers- are sending in what they’re doing, how about -you- send in something you’re doing or interested in.

    out of the tens of thousands of posts on make, there are less than .01% that have the make tools.

  15. The Oracle says:

    I do think you’ve changed your posting style. I do want to be clear that when this was my favorite site you were the main poster.

    It seems like over the past year or so you’ve been focusing your posting mainly on counter-culture type stuff. I don’t want you to misunderstand me or think I’m insulting what you’re posting, just that it is not Make, on this blog it’s nothing but noise.

    For examples, things like scribbling on money. How do you justify that being on here? It’s not a novel idea; I’ve seen doodled money as long as I’ve seen money. It’s not an interesting process; take pen, scribble on paper. It’s not “technology on my time”. It has nothing to do with the maker manifesto or any of the open philosophy this magazine and blog stand for. I believe that 2 years ago, you’d never have considered posting that.

    My personal taste is electronics projects of enough complexity to be educational to me. I could give you a long laundry list of the sorts of posts I’ve liked and disliked, but this site is not about me. There’s tons of posts I don’t like that are 100% pure Make. And there’s tons more that I wouldn’t expect to like but do.

    My criticism is the rapidly increasing number of posts like scribbling on money that very clearly don’t fit here in any way. As well as the same brain-dead projects over and over (to borrow from James, how many different things do we need to see thumbdrives glued into, or electronic devices screwed up to make weird sounds.) We get the concept must you post every single implementation? At least the frayed USB cable is more interesting then most, but it does look like garbage.

  16. Phillip Torrone says:

    @The Oracle – first, i want to make sure you know i read all the cheers and jeers on MAKE, and i don’t mind hearing about the issues you have with MAKE, in fact, it’s fine – it makes me work harder to make the site better.

    now on to your comments…

    1. if you think the blog is “noise” don’t read it, if you think the posts have “counter-culture” i’d suggest you’re not reading all the posts. 99% of the posts here are counter-culture. maybe a couple a week at the most, out of hundreds.

    2. money scribbling, look at the related links – there is a trend of people doing things with money. from rings, to origami, to laser cutting. more people are doing more things with money – i suspect this project won’t be the first or last. 2 years ago i would have posted this to *if* i saw the same trend. as far as it being a novel idea, i’ve seen it on a dozen or so web sites, other people seem to think it’s interesting to write about now, it’s certainly not the best example we’ll ultimately see of art on money, but i’m positive we’ll see a lot more of this.

    3. your list of projects, you won’t say anything you want on this site at all? that’s not helpful, i suspect we have a little of everything for everyone, including you – but that wouldn’t help prove my point so if you’re not interested in suggesting new things, there really are other sites out there to consider.

    the editors and authors here reflect what “belongs” here, the makers who send things in reflect what “belongs here” – if you don’t like what’s going, it might be because what’s going on at this time doesn’t fit with what you consider making, and that’s ok – things change. graffiti-type projects are something you don’t like from your previous comments, but it’s hard to say it’s not a serious art form with GRL at the MoMa and Banksy being one of the most “successful” artists now. a year from now there will be something else, and as it happens we’ll likely write about it.

    4. lots of people like the thumbdrive projects, maybe you don’t see the same things i do – but i’ve had hundreds, yes, hundreds of parents tell me that their kids are now “makers” because they got started modding something simple and it led to so much more. maybe you’ve seen every project on MAKE but most of the people reading MAKE now haven’t been reading MAKE since we started, so for them a thumbdrive mod is new, try and be inclusive and not exclusive, we were all newbies once. the projects here go from simple to complicated each day, it’s a blog – it’s fast pace and it goes with the magazine, but it’s not stand alone, we have kits, print, video and events…

  17. james says:

    The tagline on the magazine, right under the title, is ‘Technology on your time’.

    This is from your main page:
    The first magazine devoted entirely to DIY technology projects, MAKE Magazine unites, inspires and informs a growing community of resourceful people who undertake amazing projects in their backyards, basements, and garages.

    It seems that Make has gone from featuring amazing technology projects to, well… pretty much anything that lands in your inbox. You’ll post fake, f-word filled instructables off YouTube! When I had the audacity to point that out, you literally posted a USB drive with a fake frayed cable as an ‘in your face, this is how Make rolls now sucker’. Did I just get culture jammed?

    Make went from being a magazine about inspiring with projects from elite makers, to being ‘inclusive’? How is that different from going downhill, given your original mission statement? It seems the only thing you’re working hard on Phillip is a higher click count, and your original audience knows it.

  18. Phillip Torrone says:

    @oracle

    >>>>None of what you said here in any way justifies that this is make related for all the reasons I listed above. Any idiot can scribble on money (and a lot have since before we were born). It doesn’t make them makers.

    i think there’s “something” going on with the art community and doing things with money, there are more projects each month – it’s part of my job to keep an eye on these things. i’m willing to bet that we’re going to see more and more “money art” works and this example, while you might consider it idiotic might inspire someone to do something more interesting.

    >>>>Okay, I love Arduino, I’ve contributed quite a bit to that community, and I like to see those projects here. And yes, I know I’m giving the exact opposite opinion of Anonymous here. I’d love to see some more PIC projects though. Anything electronic is usually interesting to me, as long as it’s not the same trivial thing that’s
    been covered 10 times.

    we cover PIC as PIC projects are sent in, for whatever reason it’s practically zero lately while arduino is completely taking over the microcontroller world (it seems) — send in PIC projects you see, or tell PIC project makers to send in their projects to use, we’d love to have them!

    >>>How about this project idea. You’ve covered 3D photography quite well over a number of posts. I’ve seen like 3D webcams, but I’ve never seen a posting here about how to do it (obviously connect 2 webcams to your computer, but what software to use?).

    3D webcams, good one – i’ll send something to the team here and see what we can find or perhaps make as a project.

    >>>We will always disagree on this, but GRL is not art it’s a bunch of idiots who want to do anything to get a reaction (I will accept your opinion that that would count as art), but are too stupid and incompetent to even accomplish that. I saw the post on the laser cut money, it’s was almost painful to watch how desperately they wanted people to cry out against them for it. You in your post were practically begging people to flame you too.

    GRL, this week is in the MoMa and in Time magazine with a long docu-style video about them. it’s really not up to me to decide what is art, but the people who usually do – consider them not only artists, but some of the best in the world.

    >>>The MoMa hung a urinal in their gallery and called it art. I don’t think any serious member of the artistic community considers them as anything other than a bad joke on themselves.

    art is art, it’s hard to say who’s right or wrong.

    >>>You should try being a bit inclusive too. You mention events. Well, there’s a lot of Makers outside the US. Why not schedule a maker faire somewhere else for a change?

    we cover every event we can, if makers outside the USA don’t send us event it’s nearly impossible to write about them. if you know of ones we should cover *please send them*

    >>>Most people start on something simple and it leads to more, that’s why I’ve been careful not to complain about overly simplistic projects. It still doesn’t explain why you want to keep posting almost identical dupes of simplistic projects because someone may not have been there from the beginning. You have a very navigable archive here.

    again, not everyone searches the site or pages through *thousands* or archives, we do our best to have projects here everyone can do, we’ll continue to try harder to get more on the site.

  19. Phillip Torrone says:

    @james –

    >>>>”It seems that Make has gone from featuring amazing technology projects
    to, well… pretty much anything that lands in your inbox. You’ll post
    fake, f-word filled instructables off YouTube! When I had the audacity
    to point that out, you literally posted a USB drive with a fake frayed
    cable as an ‘in your face, this is how Make rolls now sucker’. Did I
    just get culture jammed?”

    what “fake f-filed instructable” are you referring to?

    as far as the USB drive goes, people seem to really like that and it’s from one of the most prolific makers out there, evil mad scientists– it’s a great project. it’s ok that you don’t like it, -not every- single – post is for everyone.

    and to be clear, i didn’t post that project, gareth did – i doubt he even knows we’re talking about any of this in this thread.

    >>>Make went from being a magazine about inspiring with projects from
    elite makers, to being ‘inclusive’? How is that different from going
    downhill, given your original mission statement? It seems the only
    thing you’re working hard on Phillip is a higher click count, and your
    original audience knows it.

    as far as “original audience” goes, we never had an “audience”, that would mean there’s “us” and “them” – MAKE is a community, we’re showcasing what’s going on in the world of making, perhaps there is more culture jamming going on now, maybe it’s a response to the troubling times in the world, we could spend days on speculation, but the world of making is not immune to the world around it. i assure you, if we wanted high click counts we wouldn’t be doing a magazine, site and videos about making things.

  20. The Oracle says:

    @phil,

    >>>>>i think there’s “something” going on with the art community and doing things with money, there are more projects each month – it’s part of my job to keep an eye on these things. i’m willing to bet that we’re going to see more and more “money art” works and this example, while you might consider it idiotic might inspire someone to do something more interesting.

    And this is “Technology on your time” or “The first magazine devoted entirely to DIY technology projects, MAKE Magazine unites, inspires and informs a growing community of resourceful people who undertake amazing projects in their backyards, basements, and garages.” in what way.

    There’s no reason to argue the merits of this activity. It has absolutely nothing to do with Make from your own self-description.

    >>>>> art is art, it’s hard to say who’s right or wrong.

    Even if I concede that. Why should it be an issue in any way, shape, or form on this blog? This is “Technology on your time”, remember? Why are you posting this crap that may or may not be art but is certainly not within the scope of Make?

    >>>>> we cover every event we can, if makers outside the USA don’t send us event it’s nearly impossible to write about them. if you know of ones we should cover *please send them*

    I was talking about Maker Faire. They’ve all been in the US as far as I’ve seen.

    >>>>> MAKE is a community, we’re showcasing what’s going on in the world of making, perhaps there is more culture jamming going on now, maybe it’s a response to the troubling times in the world, we could spend days on speculation

    MAKE is a community, and none of this speculation or culture jamming fits in with the scope of this community. If I want to join a community on culture jamming as a response to the troubling times, I’m sure it’s out there. But it’s not Make. Unless you are trying to reinvent yourself, in which case, please correct your tagline and description.

  21. Phillip Torrone says:

    >>There’s no reason to argue the merits of this activity. It has absolutely nothing to do with Make from your own self-description.

    MAKE is defined by the makers out there, not just 2 sentences – if you look at all the projects that do things with money they’re 100% MAKE projects, context is important. there will be more and more “money – related” projects, something interesting is happening, people are making things, making art and they’re sending it to us. coin rings, origami, laser cuts… we will write about them as makers make.

    >>>Even if I concede that. Why should it be an issue in any way, shape, or form on this blog? This is “Technology on your time”, remember? Why are you posting this crap that may or may not be art but is certainly not within the scope of Make?

    unless you send in links and participate positively you can’t really say belongs here – more so if you can’t be constructive, you can call what people do “crap” but on MAKE we cover art, which is likely one of the most popular types of making things and we always will. art is polarizing for some, skip it.

    >>>I was talking about Maker Faire. They’ve all been in the US as far as I’ve seen.

    again, suggest some places, some venues, work with us to bring a maker faire to your area. or ask what our plans are… we’ve had mini-maker faires outside the USA so far, did you attend those? we’ve had 3 maker faire total – why would we stop with just 2 locations? why punish us in the comments for building a sturdy business plan to keep doing these?

    >>>MAKE is a community, and none of this speculation or culture jamming fits in with the scope of this community. If I want to join a community on culture jamming as a response to the troubling times, I’m sure it’s out there. But it’s not Make. Unless you are trying to reinvent yourself, in which case, please correct your tagline and description.

    i would say culture jamming -does- fit in the scope of the community because it’s the community who is creating these things, documenting them and sending them to us. we’ve always been the same, celebrating the world of making, however “making” changes over time – it sounds like there are a handful of art and culture jamming posts you don’t like, just skip them – we have tons and tons of other posts – and as always, send in your projects and things you want to see on the site.

  22. The Oracle says:

    @phil,
    I have submitted posts which have been accepted, mainly in the 3D Photography and Electronics areas. Some were even my own projects.

    >>>>> MAKE is defined by the makers out there, not just 2 sentences – if you look at all the projects that do things with money they’re 100% MAKE projects, context is important. there will be more and more “money – related” projects, something interesting is happening, people are making things, making art and they’re sending it to us. coin rings, origami, laser cuts… we will write about them as makers make.

    Make, as a community, is to a large degree defined by what you choose to post. Yes, it is a community, but you are, to a large extent, the gatekeeper. That’s your job and your role in the community.

    I find it hard to beleive you’re trying to justify scribbling on money as “Make”. As your collegues for their opinion. As some of your friends who aren’t the GRL attention-whore types.

    >>>>> would say culture jamming -does- fit in the scope of the community because it’s the community who is creating these things, documenting them and sending them to us.

    No, it is *A* community who is doing that. And you’re being a victim of their culture jamming efforts by falling for it. Either you, personally, are a culture jammer, and make is the community that you are jamming, or these culture jammers have been very sucessful jamming you into being confused between Make and Jam.

  23. Phillip Torrone says:

    @oracle —

    >>I have submitted posts which have been accepted, mainly in the 3D Photography and Electronics areas. Some were even my own projects.

    which projects, links? i’d like to check them out.

    >>Make, as a community, is to a large degree defined by what you choose to post. Yes, it is a community, but you are, to a large extent, the gatekeeper. That’s your job and your role in the community.

    gatekeeper? besides spam, there’s not a lot of gatekeeping, anyone can post photos of their projects on flickr and they will appear here, instructables, our web form – we’re editors, a lot different than gatekeepers. there are 5+ people here, it’s not just one person.

    >>I find it hard to beleive you’re trying to justify scribbling on money as “Make”. As your collegues for their opinion. As some of your friends who aren’t the GRL attention-whore types.

    i’d say it’s more than scribbles, TRON, KISS, etc are different than what most people would define as “scribbles”.

    besides, i’ve asked, no one seems to have an issue with it – and calling someone “GRL attention-whore types” isn’t a constructive criticism. you’re free to comment here, but i will eventually edit out remarks that are just straight up name calling.

    >>No, it is *A* community who is doing that. And you’re being a victim of their culture jamming efforts by falling for it. Either you, personally, are a culture jammer, and make is the community that you are jamming, or these culture jammers have been very sucessful jamming you into being confused between Make and Jam.

    a handful of posts about art and culture jamming doesn’t mean anything more than we’re very observant. for whatever reason artists, makers, crafters are doing more projects that fit in the “culture jamming” arena – we write about them. try and look at the other posts, there are other trends we cover that might be more interesting, low cost 3D printing for example.

    keep in mind the origins of MAKE were a lot of people telling us “you shouldn’t do that” – putting cameras on kites, modding VCRs to become cat feeders, making scarves that look like police tape, making rings from old coins… from the start the things we’ve had here and in MAKE have been called “counter-culture” perhaps at the start it was because we’d rather MAKE than buy, and once an awhile it’s something else – an opportunity to question or raise awareness about something.

  24. Matt says:

    I think this post, like most others on this blog are just freakin’ awesome! Make rules!

    For those readers who just walked through the firestorm of posts – don’t get discouraged. I enjoy seeing all different types of topics here on make, and BTW – I HAVE one of these wifi finders and used the instructions as described to get into it’s brains. Thanks for the link!

    All your small electronic devices are belong to us!

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