Interesting new Tesla Hack!

 This is from the “What will they think of next” file. Imagine you have just purchased your dream car-the Tesla Model X. You drive it home, with the windows down and the music on. Life is good. You park in the driveway and start to walk up to your house with a smile on your face. Just before you unlock the door, you look back at your new purchase. There’s an annoying drone nearby. Your new pride and joy starts acting odd, especially since you are not in the vehicle. The doors begin to open together, then one at a time. The trunk opens and closes rhythmically with the doors. 

As odd as this sounds, this is possible and has been done. Researchers presented this work at the CanSecWest conference (virtual) on April 29, 2021. The researchers used two vulnerabilities to attack the Tesla vehicle. Their new exploit was termed TBONE. 

Method

The Tesla uses ConnMan in their network. The researchers focused on this point for their attack. To design portions of the attack, the researchers used a ConnMan emulation tool, KunnaEmu. With this, they did not require access and use of Tesla at all times when testing. What makes this a bit different and interesting is the configuration. 

ConnMan is used to manage the network connections. The attack itself combined a stack buffer overflow when processing DNS requests vulnerability (CVE-2021-26675) with a loophole in the DHCP stack (CVE-2021-26676). 

For the attack hardware, the equipment is easy to source. All the attacker needs is a Wi Fi dongle and a drone. Nothing too complicated. There is also no user interaction required. The complete attack can be done in three minutes. Once done, the attacker can, among other things, inject malicious code. 

Result 

Once exploited, the attacker can do most things a driver can, except start the vehicle. This includes unlocking the doors, unlocking the trunk, changing seat positions, changing steering modes, and changing acceleration modes. This allows full access to the vehicle. This isn’t a thought experiment. The researchers had a full recording of the attack, which they played during the presentation. 

On a tangent, they could have weaponized this. The vehicle could have uploaded the malware, and be used as an access point to infect other Teslas. This is a big deal since this could compromise any Tesla Model X that has not received the patch, even the parked ones. What makes it worse is the system is used by other OEMs who may not have patched this yet. 

Responsible Disclosure 

The vulnerability and attack weren’t sprung on the interested parties a week prior to the conference. They did inform Intel, who created ConnMan. The vulnerability was remediated with FOTA update 2020.44 by Tesla in late October 2020. 

Resources 

https://www.forbes.com/sites/thomasbrewster/2021/04/29/watch-a-tesla-have-its-doors-hacked-open-by-a-drone/?sh=d6f4c271a2bd 

https://flipboard.com/@HotCars2020/aerial-attack-cybersecurity-researchers-managed-to-hack-tesla-with-a-drone/a-li8iYV-aTQC9yfvTZ3ivig%3Aa%3A3466759924-982d88ebd6%2Fhotcars.com 

https://securityaffairs.co/wordpress/117441/hacking/tesla-model-x-hacking.html?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=tesla-model-x-hacking 

https://www.autoevolution.com/news/hackers-break-into-tesla-using-a-drone-flying-over-the-car-160447.html 

https://www.deskvip.com/a-tesla-car-has-its-doors-hacked-open-by-a-drone 

https://www.torquenews.com/1/tesla-hacked-drone-company-informed-and-fixed-loophole 

https://www.hackread.com/tesla-cars-remotely-hacked-with-drone/ 

https://dronedj.com/2021/04/30/german-pilots-film-their-drone-hack-of-a-tesla/ 

https://www.hotcars.com/aerial-attack-cybersecurity-researchers-managed-to-hack-tesla-with-a-drone/ 

https://kunnamon.io/tbone/ 

Cosmos Bank Compromise

Banks are a universal feature throughout the world. These are present in the varied governmental forms, in various asset sizes, and to make loans in various amounts. The loan sizes vary from the micro-loan of a few hundred dollars to millions of dollars in most cases. India is no different than the other countries as it relates to banking. One of the banks in India is Cosmos Bank, which is the 2nd largest cooperative bank. The bank is based in the western city of Pune.

Attack
Banks are attacked and compromised for two primary reasons. There is ample personal data for the clients. This includes but is not limited to legal name, address, credit score, social security number, account numbers with balances, and an epic amount of further data. There is also the little issue of money, which may be exfiltrated physically or digitally.

This attack occurred from August 11 to 13, 2018. Malware was placed on the bank’s ATM servers, which approve the transactions. In this case, which made this work so well, the main banking system received debit card payment requests through a “switching system”. With the attack, this system was bypassed after the firewall in place had been bypassed. The attackers put a proxy switch in the network. The approvals for the fraudulent payments were made through this alternative, unauthorized false proxies.

The attack operation itself occurred within the three days and was well-planned. This attack was intended to be carried out in multiple phases. First, there were 12k-15k withdrawals done within a relatively short time period from the affected accounts. The fraudulent proxy server approved the transactions without verifying the card’s authenticity. These 12k withdrawals added up to a rather significant amount. Of the 12k transactions, a majority occurred overseas. All of the countries in which these occurred had not been released yet. A sample of these includes Canada, Hong Kong, India, and other countries. The ATM portion of the overall attack operation occurred within 7 hours in these 22-28 countries with 450 cloned cards. Curiously many of these transactions occurred in Canada. Even with merely these specific security issues, the bank’s chairman stated the bank’s security systems had not been compromised. Clearly, this process was well-managed.

Later in the day on August 11, 2018 there were another 2,800 card transactions used to steal 2.5 crore rupees. Also, 944m rupees or $13.5M USD was wired to a Hong Kong-based entity. On August 13, 2018, the last day of the attack $2.1m USD or 13.94 crore rupees was wired to the ALM Trading Ltd., a Hong Kong company. The wires or transfers were done within the SWIFT system.

After the Attack
As a natural standard operating procedure, the bank filed a complaint with the police. The bank alleged in the complaint the malware used by the attackers to breach the system was also used to clone the customer’s cards. With the extent of the breach and what attackers were able to accomplish, the situation makes one question what fraud and cybersecurity processes were in place at the bank and “actively” working.

The bank’s response, in a statement, was the bank had adequate IT security in place, although the facts discourage this interpretation. The bank also contracted with a professional cybersecurity forensic agency. The firm began reviewing the logs. As the investigation continues, there are a number of questions left to be answered. These include:
How many ATMs were used for the withdrawals across the various countries?
A mass number of people had to be involved to operate and manage the attacks. What entity was the primary managing entity for the operation across all the countries?
With this large number of cards used in so many countries, who created and distributed these cards?
There should have been a fraudulent activity monitoring system in place, yet there were no issues noted through a majority of the attack. Was this actively monitoring the system’s transactions in real time?
The attack and exfiltration were unfortunate, however, this was a well-planned and distributed attack. There are many areas to be reviewed.


Resources

Dimitrova, M. (2018, August 16). Indian cosmos bank malware attack ends with theft of $13.5 million. Retrieved from https://securityboulevard.com/2018/08/indian-cosmos-bank-malware-attack-ends-with-theft-of-13-5-million/

Goswami, S. (2018, August 17). Police investigate cosmos bank hack. Police investigate cosmos bank hack. Retrieved from https://www.bankinfosecurity.com/police-investigate-cosmos-bank-hack-a-11379

Hindu Business Line. (2018). Cosmos bank’s server hacked; Rs 94 cr siphoned off in 2 days. Retrieved from https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/money-and-banking/cosmos-banks-server-hacked-rs-94-cr-siphoned-off-in-2days/article24675

Inamdar, N. (2018, August 14). 15,000 transactions in 7 hours: Cosmos bank’s server hacked, Rs 94 cr moved to Hong Kong. Retrieved from https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/15-000-transactions-in-7-hours-cosmos-bank-s-server-hacked-rs-94-cr-moved-to-hong-kong/story-wazUXZs3LRhcbPlg7Lyx

Jadhav, R. (2018, August 14). India’s cosmos bank loses $13.5 mln in cyber attack. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/article/cyber-heist-india/indias-cosmos-bank-loses-135-mln-in-cyber-attack-idUSL4N1V55l1G

Nichols, S. (2018, August 15). India’s cosmos bank raided for $13m by hackers. Retrieved from https://www.tgheregister.co.uk/2018/08/15/cosmos_bank_raided/

PTI. (2018, August 14). Cosmos bank’s server hacked; $s 94 crore siphoned off in 2 days. Retrieved from https://enconomictimes.com/industry/banks-server-hacked-rs-94-crore-siphoned-off-in-2=days/articleshow/65399477/cms

Tanksale, M., & Iyer, S. (2018, August 14). Pune-based cosmos bank loses rs 94 crore in cyber attack. Retrieved from https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/busienss/india-business/pune-based-cosmos-bank-loses-rs-94-crore-in-cyber-hack/cyber-hack/articleshow/65399204.cms

Railway breach in Europe

For a business to be targeted, there needs to be something of value to exfiltrate.
The attackers are not going to go through the effort of the full attack cycle for
practice. If there were to happen to be a breach, there should be tools in place
monitoring activities so the attacker’s actions would be noticed and halted.

An incident occurred in Europe on their railway system. If you happen to be
traveling on the rail in Europe, naturally the traveler has to purchase a ticket.
This process includes the usual information with credit card numbers, full legal
name, mailing address, email, and phone numbers. This information in its entirety
would provide for a nice target for any attacker. THis sensitive data used in unison
could provide for a fair number of successful attacks.

Such an incident occurred in late 2017. On November 29, 2017, the Rail Europe
system was breached. If this was not bad enough for a scenario, the attackers
had accessibility from the breach (November 29, 2017) through February 16, 2018.
During this time, the attackers had time to exfiltrate the PII and data they desired.
To further worsen the situation, Rail Europe was not aware they had been breached.
A bank affiliated with RENA noted this and informed the company. The number of
affected clients was unknown. The number could be rather substantial, as RENA
had transactions with 5M Americans.

The recommendation at this point is for RENA customers to change their password
and watch their accounts. There is also identity theft protection available, which over
the long-term may not have a substantial amount of value, as the attackers would be
able to use certain data indefinitely, not just a year.

The vulnerability involved the webpage used by the clients. This was infected by
malware coded to log the client’s information, including the debit and credit card
numbers, expiration date, and the important CVV numbers.

There are several areas to focus on with this compromise. Primarily, the lesson
would be to monitor the logs, network, and access. The business should have
known something was occurring within the network over the three months of exfiltrating
so many records
(https://www.informationsecuritybuzz.com/expert-comments/rail-europe-customer-data-breach/).
This amount of traffic should have been noticed on some level at some junction of time.