Presented at
DEF CON 29 (2021),
Aug. 8, 2021, 2 p.m.
(45 minutes)
For decades, the EICAR test string has been used by antivirus and security vendors to safely test their detection engines without having to use live virulent samples which could cause harm. What would happen if you took that string, encoded it into a machine readable format like a QR code and started scanning various devices with the QR code? This talk shows how there are a lot of systems out there that aren't expecting an input string like EICAR and how many of them just collapse when shown the code. We will also discuss the types of systems you can target and how you may be able to extend this to more than a nuisance attack.
REFERENCES:
EICAR test string: https://www.eicar.org/?page_id=3950
EICAR wikipedia entry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EICAR_test_file
QR codes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_code
Risks surrounding QR codes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QR_code#Risks
Presenters:
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Richard Henderson
Richard Henderson is a writer, researcher, and ham radio/electronics nerd who has worked in infosec and technology for almost two decades. Richard has taught multiple times at DEF CON and leads the annual DEF CON Ham Radio Fox Hunt Contest. Richard is currently co-authoring a book on cybersecurity for ICS/Scada systems.
@richsentme
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