Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

I previously mentioned dumping memory contents using SPI, with a BusPirate. Sometimes that’s not feasible – such as if the flash memory module is a little inaccessible and you’re not feeling like deconstructing the board just yet.

An alternative is to pull memory over JTAG. I talked about accessing JTAG and interacting with a chip using OpenOCD previously, however this time around I’d like to go a step further.

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

Logic Analyzers are inexpensive devices that allow you to just take a look at what a small number of pins on a chip are up to. They can be hooked into software like PulseView to read pin output and decode it into something more useful. Many decoders are available, but in this introduction we’ll have a quick look at PulseView and reading (decoding) UART data.

I’ve previously written about UART and how to find them with a JTAGulator, but here’s a different approach.

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

JTAG is short for Joint Test Action Group and generally refers to on-chip debugging interfaces that follow the IEEE 1149.x standard. The standard doesn’t mandate a certain connection – it just dictates a standard for communicating with chips in a device. It uses 5 pins: TCK, TMS, TDI, TDO and (options) TRST; which are (Test) Clock, Mode Select, Data In, Data Out, and Reset.

It can be useful to hardware hackers in various ways, such as extracting device IDs, extracting firmware, overwriting memory.

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

So I’m playing around with a device right now and I’m currently pulling out the contents of its flash memory over SPI – so I figured I’d write a few notes about how to do just that!

Here’s what I’m playing with, in case you’re curious:

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

UART stands for Universal Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter, however in the context of Hardware Hacking we’re generally looking for an serial interface which will give us text output from the system and possibly allow for command input. The general intention from the manufacturers point of view – is to allow easy debugging, both out of the factor (to check the system is working as intended) and if a device is returned as broken.

As with JTAG, sometimes it’s conveniently highlighted on a target board for you, as with this example. The below photograph showing an exposed UART in yellow (and incidentally JTAG in red). Here it’s neatly placed to one side of the board to allow for easy access. That’s not necessarily the case, but either way you can find possible UART access with a JTAGulator, as I’ll show.

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 03 July 2023

In my introduction to hardware hacking, I mention that radio systems may be part of the attack surface for a hardware device penetration test. So I thought I’d give a gentle introduction to hacking with an SDR here!

Firstly, what’s an SDR? It stands for software-defined radio, and refers to a category of devices which allow you to interface with radio. There are a lot of SDR devices on the market to choose from when you first get started – a RTL-SDR can be picked up for £15 and devices from Ettus Research go well into the thousands of pounds.

Published: 06 August 2021    Last Updated: 05 July 2023

I’m currently writing up a series on hardware hacking fundamentals, and before I get into the specifics – I thought it sensible to add a piece on why hardware security is important and to lay out the major themes of what I’ll be discussing.

Firstly, with physical devices, threat actors have more options when it comes to attacking the devices and it should be noted that breaking a specific device might not be the final aim. As an attacker over the internet, I only have exposed network services to “play” with, but if I’m testing a physical device the attack surface can be much wider. With options including network services, radio frequency input/output, on-chip debugging, exposed serial ports, memory extraction, etc, etc.