this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2024
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Hardware

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USB-C cable CT scan reveals sinister active electronics — O.MG pen testing cable contains a hidden antenna and another die embedded in the microcontroller (www.tomshardware.com)
submitted 3 weeks ago by Alphane_Moon to c/hardware
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[–] halcyoncmdr 21 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I mean... Yeah... That's what the cable is designed for.

Cool images through.

[–] Alphane_Moon 10 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

To be honest, the article wasn't very clear on this, but do we know that the "secondary die hidden under the primary microcontroller" was for malicious purposes?

I would expect a pen-testing cable to be for more sophisticated than a regular USB-C cable.

It seems like tomshardware is hinting at the possibility of supply chain attacks, without referencing any newly identified examples.

[–] halcyoncmdr 17 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

I'm not sure I understand what you're trying to ask.

The cable exists for malicious purposes. That's the purpose of the cable.

The article seems to be just comparing it to standard cables which just have the circuitry for charging. Since this cable has additional capabilities, can host its own wifi network, etc. it needs additional controllers and antennae to support that.

Actually reading more of the article... It seems like the author doesn't really know what the OMG cable is and is trying to frame it as some sort of unexpected thing. Comparing it to a standard USB cable makes no sense.

[–] Alphane_Moon 5 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (2 children)

I thought the pen-testing cable was compromised. Which would make for an interesting supply chain attack.

The article wasn't really clear on this, but I did get that they were simply referring to the large amount of circuitry.

[–] halcyoncmdr 6 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah it's a weirdly written article if it's just comparing the OMG cable to regular ones. Doesn't really explain well what they're trying to say.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 3 weeks ago (1 children)

At first I was going to say that’s silly, why wouldn’t they target more volume.

But then I realized that it would be interesting to have a focused ability to see what black hats and whitehats are working on at any given time.

And yeah that is an interesting angle…

[–] Alphane_Moon 1 points 3 weeks ago

Not to mention mass scale HW supply chain attack would likely have massive geopolitical and economic risks.