Not mentioned in article: MediaMarkt, the German equivalent of Best Buy, was selling these compromised devices on store shelves in every city in Germany.
Reminds me of that time when state actors wanted to spread the Stuxnet worm into an air gapped nucleair facility in Iran, and basically hijacked the whole USB supply chain and put the worm in there.
When enough resources / money is involved, these things are to be expected.
When there are millions of dollars to be stolen, someone can figure out how to remove the potting.
If need be, just grind and cut till you are back to the one silicon wafer that contains crypto keys, then rebuild the whole lot from scratch, add your evil parts, then re-pot it.
This story is a case of someone tampering with devices in the supply chain, before the user first receives them.
What you’re describing is a different thing. It’s an “evil maid” attack, when you tamper with a wallet that is already set up by the user. Also, it would be ultra difficult and expensive.
What you’re saying is possible. But:
It would probably be cheaper to build a total fake Ledger Wallet, then just replace the new real wallet and deliver a fake with a weak entropy generator. Any case, that’s not what has happened this time.
There are pictures online. And for an unexplainable reason it is the person behind the biggest Bitcoin exchange SNAFU of all times (where hackers stole something like 800 000 Bitcoins), Mark Karpeles of "Mt. Gox" (who did jail time btw), who was the first to post them:
Apparently the hacker did remove the battery and replace it with a smaller one, leaving enough room for the tiny eSIM/LTE modem / OCR chip that did recognition of the secret on screen.
You should have a paper backup of your hardware wallet anyway. The point of the wallet is to perform cryptographic calculations you’ll probably rather not do in your head.
I had a similar idea to bypass DRM for a while. Some kind of board that goes between the display panel driver and whatever sends it the signal, and outputs something you can capture, e.g. DVI or unencrypted HDMI. Not sure how practical it is.
I already commented the other day on this exploit but really it's fascinating.
I don't care about cryptocurrencies but I've always been fascinated by the cryptography behind it. I've also dabbled with hardware wallets for non-cryptocurrencies stuff: like U2F auth.
The idea of a master secret that is behind a secure element which I control and which I can duplicate is amazing to me (as opposed to, say, "your" passkeys which Google/Microsoft/Apple can basically backup and transfer to other devices for you).
But really to me in the cryptocurrencies world people have been sold the lie that a hardware wallet was secure: it's not. It could be tampered with (as happened in this hack, where an additional rogue chip reading the screen and then sending it using an eSIM steals the secret) but it can also contain a bug (like the recent Coldcard exploit where Coldcard hardware wallets fell back on a RNG with only 32 bits of entropy and some dark-hat hacker cracked those and stole Bitcoins) and, most of all, the vendor of the hardware wallet itself can do nasty attacks (like "kleptography").
From the very start everybody in the ecosystem should have pushed of "n-of-n" schemes (say even just 2-of-2), where one secret goes on a hardware wallet from one vendor and the other secret goes on a hardware wallet from another vendor.
For years and years the tune has been: "PCs cannot be trusted, use a hardware wallet" but it mislead people.
PCs indeed cannot be trusted but unsuspecting users should have learned how to use 2-of-2 or 3-of-3 schemes, to become immune from hacks affecting one hardware wallet vendor.
The typical, non-sensical, response to this is the idiotic: "but if you have two secrets, if you lose one of them you lose everything". It's totally idiotic for people basically save a list of 24 words (the "seed", which is the master secret). Well, guess what: instead of saving a list of 24 words, you save a list of 48 words. Exact same thing, just twice longer.
That's my take: the entire "your coins will be safe if you use a hardware wallet" was misguided.
Not mentioned in article: MediaMarkt, the German equivalent of Best Buy, was selling these compromised devices on store shelves in every city in Germany.
Reminds me of that time when state actors wanted to spread the Stuxnet worm into an air gapped nucleair facility in Iran, and basically hijacked the whole USB supply chain and put the worm in there.
When enough resources / money is involved, these things are to be expected.
The link you want:
https://grandideastudio.com/portfolio/security/ledger-hardwa...
They should have posted the weight with and without the device in it.
Also: never leave empty space in a hardware key, pot the whole thing in epoxy.
Is that safe for devices containing a lithium battery?
They could x-ray it, carve out epoxy with nothing inside, put the logger, apply epoxy.
I heard they reduced the battery size to make space for their chip.
Yes, hence the potting. You'd have to figure out a way to open the device without breaking it.
When there are millions of dollars to be stolen, someone can figure out how to remove the potting.
If need be, just grind and cut till you are back to the one silicon wafer that contains crypto keys, then rebuild the whole lot from scratch, add your evil parts, then re-pot it.
This story is a case of someone tampering with devices in the supply chain, before the user first receives them.
What you’re describing is a different thing. It’s an “evil maid” attack, when you tamper with a wallet that is already set up by the user. Also, it would be ultra difficult and expensive.
What you’re saying is possible. But:
It would probably be cheaper to build a total fake Ledger Wallet, then just replace the new real wallet and deliver a fake with a weak entropy generator. Any case, that’s not what has happened this time.
millions out of thousands of wallets. Epoxy potting raises the lottery ticket and odds of getting caught by a great deal.
This one too (pardon the AI slop): https://www.tibane.net/research/ledger-nano-x-implant
Ah good one, more useful info in that one. That kapton circuit might be traceable to whoever ordered it.
And the Vodafone NL SIM could also offer some leads
I have some friends there, I will ping them.
Not your factory, distributor, warehouses, fulfillment centers and entire supply chain, not your coins.
Here’s a new market for $500 Faraday Cages, if any HN readers are interested in selling that
Man, I wish there were some pictures. I didn’t even know that there are LTE modems that small.
There are pictures online. And for an unexplainable reason it is the person behind the biggest Bitcoin exchange SNAFU of all times (where hackers stole something like 800 000 Bitcoins), Mark Karpeles of "Mt. Gox" (who did jail time btw), who was the first to post them:
Apparently the hacker did remove the battery and replace it with a smaller one, leaving enough room for the tiny eSIM/LTE modem / OCR chip that did recognition of the secret on screen.
https://www.tibane.net/research/ledger-nano-x-implant
They're here. It's wild.
What incredible engineering
Back to paper wallets I guess.
You should have a paper backup of your hardware wallet anyway. The point of the wallet is to perform cryptographic calculations you’ll probably rather not do in your head.
The technique is so coool. I mean taping the screen output on the way to the display to get around having to hack the secure element. :)
I had a similar idea to bypass DRM for a while. Some kind of board that goes between the display panel driver and whatever sends it the signal, and outputs something you can capture, e.g. DVI or unencrypted HDMI. Not sure how practical it is.
Garbage website that doesn't allow me to reject tracking cookies without paying.
> Data processing by advertising providers including personalised advertising with profiling
> Consent [required for free use]
Most websites do this, they just don't give you the option.
If you lie down with dogs, you will get up with fleas.
Dogs = cryptocurrencies. Fleas = scammed.
Yep. Crypto is more clever than I am—and there are scammers in the field equally so.
(My hardware wallet is made of pleather and holds paper bills.)
I already commented the other day on this exploit but really it's fascinating.
I don't care about cryptocurrencies but I've always been fascinated by the cryptography behind it. I've also dabbled with hardware wallets for non-cryptocurrencies stuff: like U2F auth.
The idea of a master secret that is behind a secure element which I control and which I can duplicate is amazing to me (as opposed to, say, "your" passkeys which Google/Microsoft/Apple can basically backup and transfer to other devices for you).
But really to me in the cryptocurrencies world people have been sold the lie that a hardware wallet was secure: it's not. It could be tampered with (as happened in this hack, where an additional rogue chip reading the screen and then sending it using an eSIM steals the secret) but it can also contain a bug (like the recent Coldcard exploit where Coldcard hardware wallets fell back on a RNG with only 32 bits of entropy and some dark-hat hacker cracked those and stole Bitcoins) and, most of all, the vendor of the hardware wallet itself can do nasty attacks (like "kleptography").
From the very start everybody in the ecosystem should have pushed of "n-of-n" schemes (say even just 2-of-2), where one secret goes on a hardware wallet from one vendor and the other secret goes on a hardware wallet from another vendor.
For years and years the tune has been: "PCs cannot be trusted, use a hardware wallet" but it mislead people.
PCs indeed cannot be trusted but unsuspecting users should have learned how to use 2-of-2 or 3-of-3 schemes, to become immune from hacks affecting one hardware wallet vendor.
The typical, non-sensical, response to this is the idiotic: "but if you have two secrets, if you lose one of them you lose everything". It's totally idiotic for people basically save a list of 24 words (the "seed", which is the master secret). Well, guess what: instead of saving a list of 24 words, you save a list of 48 words. Exact same thing, just twice longer.
That's my take: the entire "your coins will be safe if you use a hardware wallet" was misguided.
You might be interested by the Tillltis TKey - it's an open-source open-hardware programmable-by-the-user secure element.