How can you tell if your alarm company's...
...in cahoots with the "authorities"? In other words, lets say I leave my house for an extended period of time, and "they" tell the Alarm Monitoring company to shut down for a while so they can protect our freedoms. (I assume this is the way they would go about installing various things in one's house while away...wrong?) How can I tell if my alarm has been "down" for a period of time, assuming I don't believe the records of the alarm company in such cases? -TD _________________________________________________________________ The new MSN 8: smart spam protection and 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail
On Fri, 8 Aug 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
...in cahoots with the "authorities"?
Most intelligent and savvy people I know "roll their own" Tivo (PVR, etc.) - I think the answer to your question is that it would be reasonable (and trivial) to roll your own alarm system. ----- John Kozubik -john@kozubik.com - http://www.kozubik.com
On Saturday 09 August 2003 02:01, John Kozubik wrote:
On Fri, 8 Aug 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
...in cahoots with the "authorities"?
Most intelligent and savvy people I know "roll their own" Tivo (PVR, etc.) - I think the answer to your question is that it would be reasonable (and trivial) to roll your own alarm system.
But it's not trivial to roll your own 24/7 monitoring company with the ability to call in the cops. If the monitoring company is compromised, you're \033653337357 anyway, but without them, all you have is one of those car alarms that everyone ignores. The multi-layered approach is the way to go. Your home-rolled layer probably wouldn't be able to call 911 for you, at least not without tipping your hand. Most places, the police require a formal agreement before they will respond to automated alarms, and some departments simply won't. But it could notify you of an invasion and archive the surveillance videos to a remote site. At least you'd know you'd been compromised and could take appropriate steps.
On Sat, Aug 09, 2003 at 08:52:32AM -0400, Roy M. Silvernail wrote:
On Saturday 09 August 2003 02:01, John Kozubik wrote:
On Fri, 8 Aug 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
...in cahoots with the "authorities"?
Most intelligent and savvy people I know "roll their own" Tivo (PVR, etc.) - I think the answer to your question is that it would be reasonable (and trivial) to roll your own alarm system.
But it's not trivial to roll your own 24/7 monitoring company with the ability to call in the cops. If the monitoring company is compromised, you're \033653337357 anyway, but without them, all you have is one of those car alarms that everyone ignores.
But how important is that anyway? Most any half competent burglar knows enough to cut the phone wire before the B&E, so they don't get called. That means that, yes, if some dimwit middleschool kid is doing the job, the cops get called, otherwise no. -- Harmon Seaver CyberShamanix http://www.cybershamanix.com
On Saturday, August 9, 2003, at 04:23 PM, Harmon Seaver wrote:
On Sat, Aug 09, 2003 at 08:52:32AM -0400, Roy M. Silvernail wrote:
On Saturday 09 August 2003 02:01, John Kozubik wrote:
On Fri, 8 Aug 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
...in cahoots with the "authorities"?
Most intelligent and savvy people I know "roll their own" Tivo (PVR, etc.) - I think the answer to your question is that it would be reasonable (and trivial) to roll your own alarm system.
But it's not trivial to roll your own 24/7 monitoring company with the ability to call in the cops. If the monitoring company is compromised, you're \033653337357 anyway, but without them, all you have is one of those car alarms that everyone ignores.
But how important is that anyway? Most any half competent burglar knows enough to cut the phone wire before the B&E, so they don't get called. That means that, yes, if some dimwit middleschool kid is doing the job, the cops get called, otherwise no.
Cellphones are cheap enough, and monthly charges are small enough when N machines share the same monthly account charge (Dad, Mom, Johnnie, Suzy, and Alarm). I would be surprised if today's alarm companies already aren't making good use of cellphones. I have a couple of perimeter lights and alarms on solar panels. Nothing to cut without either first using a ladder or, possibly, an accurate pellet gun to somehow disable the electronics. (One is mounted under the eaves of my roof, very high up. I may put another one in a tall oak.) I've also considered installing a full system with a beeper, with 802.11b cameras wirelessly sending to a laptop on a large battery. (If invaders/thieves/government agents find the laptop, in a closet devoted to this, they may not find the second such receiver, possibly hidden quite well. Or, for those who live near others, kept in a closet in the home of a friend. And even if they find it, I'll presumably still know I was invaded.) I figure that for a few thousand dollars and a spare laptop or two I could have a system very resistant to cutting phone or power lines, and something which would make surreptitious entry teams think twice. (Leave a couple of the 802.11b cameras visible, put another behind a Lexan plate, etc.) --Tim May "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." --John Stuart Mill
On Saturday, Aug 9, 2003, at 19:29 US/Central, Tim May wrote:
I figure that for a few thousand dollars and a spare laptop or two I could have a system very resistant to cutting phone or power lines, and something which would make surreptitious entry teams think twice. (Leave a couple of the 802.11b cameras visible, put another behind a Lexan plate, etc.)
802.11b can be jammed very easily; simply by having an 802.11b card with a really powerful amplifier (just sniff the traffic and find which channel it's transmitting on, then transmit garbage at 50w). Best to have regular ethernet backup channels in at least the most important cameras. Of course someone would need prior knowledge of your system, but I think with the level of professionalism you're talking about we can assume a decent amount of time/effort put toward surveillance.
On Saturday 09 August 2003 07:29 pm, Tim May wrote:
Cellphones are cheap enough, and monthly charges are small enough when N machines share the same monthly account charge (Dad, Mom, Johnnie, Suzy, and Alarm). I would be surprised if today's alarm companies already aren't making good use of cellphones.
The building where I work has a cellular interface to it's alarm system (Small white box with a 800MHz Antenna sticking out of it next to the central alarm panel). I think the name on the box is something like "CellSentry". It's fed off the batteries for the alarm system so cutting off power won't shut it off either. I have always wondered how the arm/disarm keypad works in most alarm systems. I would hope it would send a reasonably secure code to the controller to disable the alarm system, but I fear that it just a nothing more than a fancy remote relay and can be easily bypassed. They recently added security camers to our system. Instead of using video tape they installed a box that records 30 second snap shots continuoulsy to it's hard drive. Security people can access the system over the network (with a dedicated application, no idea how secure it is) and examine the captured images. -- Neil Johnson http://www.njohnsn.com PGP key available on request.
From what I've heard (not confirmed) most of this stuff is either simple sensors (continuity test) or it talks over a variant of rs422 - unencrypted for things like keypads. Not good, especially if these are accessible on the outside.
----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_@_sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Sat, 9 Aug 2003, Neil Johnson wrote:
I have always wondered how the arm/disarm keypad works in most alarm systems.
I would hope it would send a reasonably secure code to the controller to disable the alarm system, but I fear that it just a nothing more than a fancy remote relay and can be easily bypassed.
Harmon Seaver said:
But how important is that anyway? Most any half competent burglar knows enough to cut the phone wire before the B&E, so they don't get called.
A local alarm company here (Alarmforce) advertises an "extra" to their basic package: a backup cellular phone link to their monitoring system. Not sure if it's really functional, or just burgular FUD, but many people have taken it...at an extra charge, of course... -Tim
Harmon Seaver said:
But how important is that anyway? Most any half competent burglar knows enough to cut the phone wire before the B&E, so they don't get called.
A local alarm company here (Alarmforce) advertises an "extra" to their basic package: a backup cellular phone link to their monitoring system. Not sure if it's really functional, or just burgular FUD, but many people have taken it...at an extra charge, of course... -Tim
Roy M. Silvernail said:
But it's not trivial to roll your own 24/7 monitoring company with the ability to call in the cops.
From what I hear, indoor marijuana grow-ops that are alarmed with hand-rolled systems often activate a pager. In that case you DO NOT want the cops to come.
As an aside, watched Das Experiment last night (German movie based on the Stanford prison experiment). Very enlightening/disturbing. -Tim
Add your own 2nd alarm system. You can even use the sensors of your existing one to interface with a computer (just the sensors, mind you, not the actual controllers.) Got a DSL line? Got a modem? Got a cell phone? Got a pager? Got network capable cameras? Got access to another computer outside your house that can also watch when your DSL line is down and notify you? Got a small computer you could hide somewhere non obvious? Like inside a wall? Maybe a still useable old laptop with a broken screen that you could pick up off ebay for cheap? Got an imagination and some wiring/programming skills? ----------------------Kaos-Keraunos-Kybernetos--------------------------- + ^ + :25Kliters anthrax, 38K liters botulinum toxin, 500 tons of /|\ \|/ :sarin, mustard and VX gas, mobile bio-weapons labs, nukular /\|/\ <--*-->:weapons.. Reasons for war on Iraq - GWB 2003-01-28 speech. \/|\/ /|\ :Found to date: 0. Cost of war: $800,000,000,000 USD. \|/ + v + : The look on Sadam's face - priceless! --------_sunder_@_sunder_._net_------- http://www.sunder.net ------------ On Fri, 8 Aug 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
...in cahoots with the "authorities"?
In other words, lets say I leave my house for an extended period of time, and "they" tell the Alarm Monitoring company to shut down for a while so they can protect our freedoms. (I assume this is the way they would go about installing various things in one's house while away...wrong?)
How can I tell if my alarm has been "down" for a period of time, assuming I don't believe the records of the alarm company in such cases?
How can I tell if my alarm has been "down" for a period of time, assuming I don't believe the records of the alarm company in such cases?
There is a plethora of various devices suitable for an alarm system, both off-the-shelf and homemadeable. You can cheaply roll out a camera system with a cheap PC with Linux and a TV-input card with a 4051 analog-multiplexer-based parallel-port-controlled switch for selecting cameras for slow-motion video. Frame rate sucks as there is no means of syncing the cams, so you have to give the card couple frames to lock after every cam change, but you should be able to get about four switches per second (which gives you one frame every 2 seconds for all 8-cams cycle). You can also switch them irregularly, so you get better framerate on the cams whose signal indicates something's happening. The photos may be recorded to a suitably big hard drive in a circular buffer, with suspicious frames optimally flagged for more permanent storage. This, together with a Net connection (and a backup phone line and eventually a cellphone) gives you a relatively very cheap system. Don't forget the UPS. Don't have this system as the only one; the adversary can switch off the power to the house and starve the computer. A new standard for GSM phones is appearing here: MMS - multimedia SMS messages. With suitably equipped phone you can send/receive short sound and video clips, and - which is important for us now - pictures. The alarm system then can send you a picture of the neighbor's cat getting into the house and tripping the sensors instead of just a panic-inducing generic message about activated PIRs and IR gates. I'd advise against relying on 802.11 cameras; they are too easy to both detect and jam. They can add some finishing touch though, and an attempt to jam the cams can be a possible alarm (or at least suspicion) source on its own. A powerful and reliable device may be a door/window-opening logger. A small chip with a little switch (or a reed-relay magnetic switch, which allows it to get completely sealed in the doorframe, or an IR beam gate, or just about anything). A microcontroller running with slow clock in low-power mode, a serial EEPROM for storing the circular-buffer log of the times when the contact was opened/closed, a RTC chip with I2C bus, a small battery for making the device independent on the power. (It can even log the times of power blackouts; a sequence of blackout - door open - door close - power-up when nobody is home is VERY suspicious.) If you use a wireless interface there (eg, use AT24RF08 for the EEPROM), you may read the door open/close times without any direct contact with the device, which makes its concealmentability much easier. It can then reside in the doorframe, a little magnet in the door triggering its reed contact, read/write being done with a handheld reader held over a certain point of the doorframe. Scatter couple such devices in the object, and you have good idea about what was happening there. There is no authorization there; they will just log visits, including you - but you KNOW when you were there and can ignore these entries on your own. This is suitable as an audit device, just to make sure. Be aware that in the highest-threat situations the adversary may enter by unconventional means; there were cases of entry through the roof, the floor, even the wall. The cellphone-based uplink can be strengthened by a trick. There are cellular jammers that can be employed together with the plain ol' cutting of the lines. However, if you have good visibility to some cell base stations, you may employ a directional antenna pointing at it, which makes the setup much more resistant against localized jamming from directions other than the antenna's one. For high-budget people there are also satellite phones. The system can also report to you once every interval, telling you about status changes and if there was anything that could look suspicious but wasn't worth of an asynchronous alarm. Consider using an anonymous phone with a prepaid card, for both sending and receiving the alarms and status messages. The adversary could othervise visit the phone company and ask for cancelling your service for the given time, so you'd miss your alarm. If the neighbourhood situation is suitable, you can combine the efforts of several people in the area, and form a sort of Neighbourhood Watch - a decentralized P2P web of alarm systems talking with each other by any suitable means - from an over-the-street IrDA to 802.11b to Ronja-grade optical links for longer distances. (The network can also double as a community network for TCP/IP communication and Net connection.) This can make an eventual attack very unlikely to pass unnoticed. An interesting low-tech backup system could be a cheap one-time film camera triggered by eg. a fishing line tied to the door or lead over the floor. Even if everything electrical goes down, there is still a chance to get a picture of the intruder. Use different technologies in overlapping layers. Employ your fantasy. Be aware about what dependencies you have in the system (eg, camera system can run for no more than two hours of mains blackout, certain sensors depend on the computer, some alert modes depend on the telephone or cellphone), be prepared for different failure modes - both natural mishaps and intentional sabotage, compensate for them, design the system to fail gracefully and to keep at least some functions (at least the autonomous audit switch loggers) even in the reasonably worst case. This makes the adversary's job less pleasant.
On Saturday, August 9, 2003, at 11:41 PM, Thomas Shaddack wrote:
How can I tell if my alarm has been "down" for a period of time, assuming I don't believe the records of the alarm company in such cases?
There is a plethora of various devices suitable for an alarm system, both off-the-shelf and homemadeable.
You can cheaply roll out a camera system with a cheap PC with Linux and a TV-input card with a 4051 analog-multiplexer-based ...
By the way, Americans and those in the American Empire (Iraq, Britain, Kuwait, Italy, Spain, Czech Republic, Liberia, Transylvania, etc.) should be very careful about discussing alarm techniques. In this post-Bill of Rights era, such talk can get you a year in a federal penitentiary, or if one is a Little Brother in one of the Affiliated Nations, an indefinite stay in our newest concentration camp, Camp X-Ray. Just as it is illegal to fortify doors against midnight raids (the African Central Republic of the District of Columbia has laws outlawing the hardening of doors...I'm not kidding), helping perps deploy alarm systems which make "sneak and peak" and pre-dawn SWAT raids harder is criminal conspiracy. Americans need to watch what they say. Talk about drugs, face a bust under paraphernalia and proselytizing laws. Talk about explosives, get a year in the pen. Talk about medicine, have the AMA goons call in the cops. Talk about the law, have lawyers claim that only Bar Association members may give legal advice. Talk about Hollywood, have Jack Valenti file charges. I hear it's still legal to give an opinion about "The Brady Bunch," though Valenti says that loophole will soon be closed by Congress. America died in 1861. Another political entity stole its domain name. --Tim May
participants (10)
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Greg Pelcak -
Harmon Seaver -
John Kozubik -
Neil Johnson -
Roy M. Silvernail -
Sunder -
Thomas Shaddack -
Tim May -
Tim Meehan -
Tyler Durden