[ISN] Smart Grid Researcher Releases Open Source Meter-Hacking Tool

http://www.darkreading.com/advanced-threats/167901091/security/vulnerabilities/240004014/smart-grid-researcher-releases-open-source-meter-hacking-tool.html

By Kelly Jackson Higgins
Dark Reading
July 19, 2012

A smart grid researcher today released a free open-source hacking tool 
to test the security of smart meters. But this is a different researcher 
than the one who pulled his talk and public release of a similar tool 
earlier this year amid concerns by a smart grid vendor.

  Spencer McIntyre, a member of SecureState's Research & Innovation Team, 
says his company basically lucked out and wasn't pressured by vendors 
worried about the release today of his so-called Termineter tool, which 
he will demonstrate next week at the BSides conference in Las Vegas. "We 
got really lucky, I guess. We worked with power and utility vendors," he 
says. "The [utility] client we worked with has been working with us to 
release this tool."

InGuardians initially wasn't so lucky. Researcher Don Weber was supposed 
to release his firm's tool earlier this year at the ShmooCon conference, 
but had to put the talk and tool on hold after a vendor came forward 
with concerns. The company ended up providing the tool to smart grid 
vendors and utilities -- just not publicly, says Jimmy Alderson, chief 
operating officer of InGuardians.

"We did not feel it was right to make our tool publicly available," 
Alderson says. "It's modified open source, so you can add to it, but at 
the same time it's not widely open to an attacker."

Don Weber, a senior security analyst with InGuardians, is scheduled to 
demonstrate the tool at Black Hat USA in Las Vegas next week. The tool, 
like Termineter, tests for both vulnerabilities and functionality in 
smart grid meters via the devices' infrared ports. The so-called 
OptiGuard is a Python-based tool that demonstrates the way infrared 
ports on a smart meter can be penetrated, looking for vulnerabilities 
and executing attacks. InGuardians looks for vulnerabilities in these 
devices, including weak passwords that could lead to meter fraud and 
taking control of a meter.

[...]


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