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ABSTRACT
This paper describes a student project examining mechanisms with which to attack Bluetooth-enabled devices. The paper briefly describes the protocol architecture of Bluetooth and the Java interface that programmers can use to connect to Bluetooth communication services. Several types of attacks are described, along with a detailed example of two attack tools, Bloover II and BT Info.
Keywords: Bluetooth hacking, mobile phone hacking, wireless hacking
1. INTRODUCTION
Bluetooth (BT) is one of the newer wireless technologies in use today. The name derives from that of Harald Blaatand, a tenth-century king of Denmark and Norway who united many independent Scandinavian tribes into a single kingdom. Bluetooth wireless communication technology is meant to be a universal, standard communications protocol for short-range communications, intended to replace the cables connecting portable and fixed electronic devices (Bluetooth SIG, 2008a). Operating in the 2.4 GHz range, Bluetooth is designed to allow wire-free communication over a range of short-haul distances in three power classes, namely, short range (10-100 cm), ordinary range (10 m), and long range (100 m) (Sridhar, 2008). Cell phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and smart phones are a few of the devices that commonly use Bluetooth for synchronizing email, sending messages, or connecting to a remote headset (Mahmoud, 2003 a). What are less well known to users of Bluetooth devices are the risks that they incur due to various vulnerabilities of the technology. Bluehacking, bluejacking, marphing, bluesniping, and bluesnafting are just a few of the names given to the act of hacking a device via Bluetooth (Laurie, Holtmann, & Herfurt, 2006). In this paper, we will discuss the technology needed to hack a cell phone, some of the tools, and precautions that users can take to help protect their Bluetooth devices.
2. TECHNOLOGY
Figure 1 shows a diagram of the Bluetooth protocol stack in order to show the various attack vectors. The protocol layers of particular interest in this paper are:
* Logical Link Control and Adaptation Protocol (L2CAP): Provides the data interface between higher layer data protocols and applications, and the lower layers of the device; multiplexes multiple data streams; and adapts between different packet sizes (Hole, 2008a, 2008d; Sridhar, 2008).
* Radio Frequency Communications Protocol (RFCOMM): Emulates the functions of a serial communications interface...