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Cracking Wi-Fi Security

Exploratory Project

Nolan Mungovan

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Personal Background

  • Second-year student
  • Computer science major
  • Systems concentration
  • Interested in cybersecurity, software development, embedded systems

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Cracking Wi-Fi Overview

  • Goal: Capture packets over a wireless network and decipher the meaning of one or more
    • “Network sniffing” using an external wi-fi adapter and Aircrack for Linux
    • Wireshark to view and decipher captured packets using plugins

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Motivation

  • Introductions to most CS fields, except security
  • Extremely important field in modern technological world
  • Good introduction to how networks transmit data, especially wirelessly
    • Useful for my systems concentration

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Cracking: Background

  • Wireless networks and devices transmit radio signals that contain packets
  • IEEE 802.11 standard
    • Header, body, trailer

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Cracking: Set-Up

  • External wi-fi adapter and drivers
  • Aircrack-ng suite on Linux
  • Wireshark

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Cracking: Network Sniffing

  • Drone communication: unsecured network on 802.11 protocol
  • Internet: WPA2 secured network using 802.11 protocol

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Cracking: Drone Communication

  • MAVLink library
  • Drone → Computer
    • Battery status, position, sensor information
  • Computer → Drone
    • ?

Velocity (x, y, z)

Position (x, y, z)

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Cracking: Internet

  • Decryption keys
    • SSID/Passphrase
    • EAPOL handshake
  • Data!
    • TCP, SSL, DNS protocols
    • Need decipherers for these
  • IPs match!

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Cracking: Conclusions

Likes:

  • Interesting field of study
  • Real world applications
  • Lots of area for going further

Dislikes:

  • Time intensive
  • Lots of trial-and-error
  • Not a lot of information available

Final Thoughts: Would explore further after the semester! I will try to decipher TCP/DNS protocols over winter break.

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Thanks!

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Sources