Slovakia finds Russian backdoor in traffic speed cameras
112 points by dredmorbius 3 hours ago | 45 comments

gumby 2 hours ago
Slovakia has had a longstanding pro-Russia political stance and supports Russia’s invasion of Ukraine (and opposes the EU sanctions).

You reap what you sow, MFs!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slovak_opposition_to_sanctions...

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chimpontherun 35 minutes ago
I find it amusing that the biggest supporters or Russia in its current war of aggression against Ukraine are/were Hungary, Slovakia, and Serbia -- precisely the countries that should know better, since they were the principal recipients the "love and friendship" from Russia:

- Hungary: November of 1956

- Slovakia: "spring" of 1968

- Serbia: the Stalin's betrayal at the end of WW2

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codedokode 4 minutes ago
Hungary and Slovakia are largest importers of Russian natural gas in Europe. France is third as I remember.
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spiderfarmer 10 minutes ago
My brother visited some of these countries. He said most people there are oblivious to what happened to their countries. They simply don't care. It also didn't help that everyone he met (agricultural sector) was a day-drinker.

That's why they're doomed to repeat it. Again and again.

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vkou 22 minutes ago
Geopolitical decisions aren't made by countries, they are made by individual people.

Sometimes those people are a plurality that organically endorses that decision and votes some representative in. Sometimes those people are a plurality that has been brainwashed by compromised media to do it. Sometimes those people are just a small ruling elite that get voted in by people who didn't think very hard about those particular geopolitical decisions and just want, I don't know, their political and cultural enemies brutalized and $1.99 gas.

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inglor_cz 9 minutes ago
The Slovaks ultimately got federalization of Czechoslovakia from the crisis (1969), which both distracted them and made their memories less negative.

As far as Hungary goes, I asked my friend who studied Hungarian history. He explained to me that while the Soviet invasion was very traumatic, the subsequent Kádár "goulash socialism" was a lot more lenient on the people than all the other Soviet Bloc regimes, and that the Hungarians made an incorrectly confident conclusion that losing a small war to the Russians is not catastrophic.

Of course, this is NOT the experience of basically anyone else who happened to be in a similar situation. A potential puppet regime of Russia in Ukraine wouldn't look like Kádárs by any means, it would rather look like the Kadyrovian microstate in Chechnya, minus the Islam of course.

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cindyllm 32 minutes ago
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vrganj 48 minutes ago
One could say that Fico himself is a Russian backdoor...
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tonyhart7 38 minutes ago
acting like western nation didn't spy to each other
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reaperducer 28 minutes ago
acting like western nation didn't spy to each other

Is he? I don't see that in his comment at all. Can you point out that part to us?

Perhaps your handlers never taught you that two things can be bad at the same time.

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tonyhart7 57 seconds ago
tone of comment acting like Russia is the bad guys while Western country doing the same thing in middle east for 20 years
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throwaway_49409 34 minutes ago
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greenavocado 56 minutes ago
You must be new to state sponsored malware. Recent false flags are a thing: 2018 Olympic Destroyer, Marble Framework, Silver Fox, MuddyWater Chaos
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sofixa 31 minutes ago
> Recent false flags are a thing: 2018 Olympic Destroyer, Marble Framework, Silver Fox, MuddyWater Chaos

How are any of those false flag? They're state sponsored, by different state actors.

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bdhdhduuyd 2 hours ago
So they bought the cameras and some people pointed out they look exactly the same as Russian cameras. The government denied this but after they figured out the serial numbers matched the Russian cameras they started this investigation.

Good they investigated this before using them, but this sounds like a big fu...

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caminante 16 minutes ago
This would be far more impressive if not for:

> multiple reports in Slovak media that linked the purchase to a Cyprus shell company with fake certifications.

We're talking about this as if it's some precursor to a James Bond plot, but it really fizzles after learning Nina in the sourcing department skipped the compliance paperwork. James Bond doesn't need to leave the bed!

Trojan exploits aside, I just assume that it'd be easier for someone in SVR/GRU to bribe an admin.

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NuclearPM 2 hours ago
A big what?
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GauntletWizard 2 hours ago
A big fuck-up, but some people prefer (nobly even if I don't abide by the same rule) to keep some words out of their mouths.
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bdhdhduuyd 2 hours ago
fuck up
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yieldcrv 49 minutes ago
Russians just like to embarrass people

Like, it’s not just Putin, or the government, it’s just cultural

If there is an opportunity to embarrass someone from your position of power or discretion, it will be taken

People try to be aligned with Russian interests to avoid it, but there is no exemption

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phatfish 21 minutes ago
Sounds plausable.

There is a video somewhere of a Finnish university professor from around the time the war started (maybe a bit before), explaining the Russian attitude to sportsmanship, or whatever you want to call it.

Basically he suggested cheating is not considered unethical in Russia. If you are not using all means available to reach your goal you are leaving something on the table and are weak. This applies to all levels of society.

I would be cautious of such generalisations normally. But the industrial scale cheating at the winter Olympics says a lot.

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FpUser 6 minutes ago
>"it’s just cultural" - so is being fucking racist
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spwa4 36 minutes ago
They also like to bomb people, so probably best to not let them locate individuals (or anything else) easily by using Russian traffic cams ...
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varjag 29 minutes ago
It's remarkable how much the Russians love fighting given how generally inept they are at it.
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vkou 21 minutes ago
They are only losing one war in the last few decades, another major empire has in that timeframe lost one and is currently losing another.
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sssilver 9 minutes ago
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flohofwoe 7 minutes ago
The article is neither about Germany nor about the US.
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tokai 41 minutes ago
It seems like a silly mess. But its easier than it sounds to end up in such a situation. We're are a lot of HN Kagi users that just have to trust that the Yandex collaboration is fully watertight.
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tomas789 2 hours ago
Imagine somebody being able to track almost anyone using road side cameras. Good thing such things happen only in eastern Europe wink wink
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somenameforme 36 minutes ago
Most cameras are insecure by default. Check out: http://www.insecam.org/en/ or https://www.shodan.io/ The first isn't even using default access creds, which I suspect is what was 'discovered' in this case, but cameras that immediately hook up to the internet with 0 restrictions to access.
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lifestyleguru 53 minutes ago
For the goal of recording a cat scratching their car or catching an imaginary thief neighbour (a magpie or fox stole that thing that one time, you dullard) people will plug into Chinese, Russian, and American video surveillance networks in no time and pay for it.
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lifestyleguru 45 minutes ago
Slovakian prime minister is doing proud photos with Putin despite the ongoing war so the backdoor looks like a desired feature not a bug or fuck up.
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irishcoffee 2 hours ago
Next up, chinese solar inverter firmware.
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victorbjorklund 2 hours ago
To do what? Turn off the power in random individual houses?
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rollulus 55 minutes ago
Any idea what happens to the grid when a significant chunk of solar power suddenly disconnects?
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wongarsu 2 hours ago
I'd be worried about the inverters in large commercial solar plants. On a sunny day you could easily cause a blackout by turning enough solar capacity off at once. Maybe shut down the entire grid when the sudden power imbalances trip the self- protection in half the grid. That's a pain to recover from. Spain went through that not too long ago

But maybe rapidly switching residential solar on and off in a coordinated way can also do funny things to grid equipment

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nom 13 minutes ago
nah, the ones connected to the grid... you turn them all off during peak sun hours at the exact same time

same issue with large loads like boilers, this stuff should never be connected to the internet, but it is

if you can control enough load on the grid you can do real damage

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randoot 2 hours ago
DDoS, anonymizer proxy, and turn off power in large commercial installations. They kinda deserve it for investing in solar. US holds all the power in social media, can't blame China if they want to utilize their lead in solar for something too.

Hopefully mutually assured annoyance keeps everyone at bay.

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bdhdhduuyd 2 hours ago
To set roofs on fire?

In the end it's all about trust. Right now I don't see why China would like to burn down their market.

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cyanydeez 2 hours ago
guys, do we need to reinvent the same Hanlon razor but for capitalism: Dont attribute to malice that which can easily be explained by capitalism?
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probably_wrong 51 minutes ago
If we're reinventing sayings, I suggest Clarke's third law first: Any sufficiently advanced capitalism is indistinguishable from malice.
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emdash 2 hours ago
Some of those are networked I think?
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tomas789 48 minutes ago
Most of them are. Including the biggest ones.
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newsclues 2 hours ago
Track usage patterns to know when people are at home and then rob them.
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2OEH8eoCRo0 2 hours ago
The HN version of "I have nothing to hide."
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giancarlostoro 2 hours ago
The nothing to hide thing isnt even an HN only thing unfortunately.
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szundi 2 hours ago
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LogTrim 49 minutes ago
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yodon 24 minutes ago
Zero chance of vulns in flock, so we're good in the US /s
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