War Driving Notacon 2009
Monday, April 27, 2009
I know this isn't a new subject by any means but I think it's still interesting and most of the material that's useful out there right now is antiquated so I thought I'd write my own version.
Background
The reason I got into war driving was to:
- Learn the specifics about the technologies (Kismet, gpsd)
- Have something to do on the drive to Notacon
- Be a geek
Hardware
Here is the list of hardware that I used:
- Laptop (Wireless card, serial port)
- Garmin eTrex - Craigslist $35
- Garmin eTrex serial cable - $8
- Edimax RT73 (optional) - $43
Software
Software I used:
- Kismet - wireless sniffing tool
- GPSD - receives GPS data
- Ubuntu 8.10 - OS
- GPSDrive - (optional) Maps your current location as you drive
- Festival - (optional) Text to speech plugin for announcing when an access point is found
- KisGearth - convert kismet data to KML for GoogleEarth
- Google Earth - place access points on a map
GPS Setup
- sudo apt-get install gpsd
- Telnet to gpsd server and type "r" to receive the coordinates and "b" to confirm the console settings
- Plug in garmin using the console cable
- In the garmin, page over to the setup > Interfaces and make sure the output format is NMEA and the transfer rate is 9600 baud
- If you are successful you should see coordinates pop up in console of GPSD
Kismet Setup
- sudo apt-get install kismet festival
-
- Configure kismet.conf for your wifi cards (see KismetWireless.net under the Capture Sources section for a listing of your network card)
- Configure kismet.conf for festival
- Configure kismet.conf to save waypoints for GPSDrive
- Configure kismet.conf to save GPS data in the log files
- Start kismet to use your wifi cards. (only put in the cards you've setup in the sources or leave blank)
GPSDrive Setup
NOTE: GPSDrive is a fun tool to show you access points while you drive. It's unnecessary if you're going to be mapping the coordinates on Google Earth later
- Download the latest deb from the GPSDrive website or download the stable release with apt-get
- Before you go on your war drive, make sure you download the maps for the location you'll be driving, otherwise you won't be able to get the specific streets. I'd suggest getting used to how gpsdrive works because there's a little bit of a learning curve.
The Drive
This is a no brainer but I wanted to give a few tips that I learned:
- Plan laptop power settings before hand - make sure your laptop isn't going to shut off the hard drive after 15 minutes of inactivity
- Setup the equipment beforehand so it doesn't slide
- kitchen drawer sponge - a friend of mind gave me the idea of using that spongy material that goes at the bottom of a silverware drawer. Throw it on your dash and put your hardware on it so that it's not sliding around during turns.
- Secure the laptop however you can in your car
- Ideally buy a magnetic antenna to latch onto the top of your car so nothing is sliding around
- Test everything a couple of times before trying to do it in the car - reboot, unplug, undo everything because sometime or another it's going to happen and you're going to need to know what to do
- Make sure your GPS always has a good signal or your maps will be inaccurate
Importing into Google Earth
So you've finished your drive and you want to map out everywhere you've been. Google earth is perfect for this.
- Install google earth either from Google Earth's site or from the Ubuntu repositories
- Download an extract KisGearth
- Run kisgearth to use the kismet .xml file and .gps file. (You can use just .xml but using the .gps file as well makes it more accurate)
- Open Google Earth and go to file>open and open the KML file you created
With a little luck you should have an accurate map of where all the access points are using Google Earth's satellites. Just for fun I've attached the KML file that I used for Notacon.
You can download it here.
External Links
http://code.google.com/p/kisgearth/ - Kisgearth
http://www.gpsdrive.de/download.shtml - GPSDrive
http://www.kismetwireless.net - Kismet
Labels: gps, hacking, Notacon, Notacon 2009, security, war driving, wifi
I know this isn't a new subject by any means but I think it's still interesting and most of the material that's useful out there right now is antiquated so I thought I'd write my own version.
Background
The reason I got into war driving was to:
- Learn the specifics about the technologies (Kismet, gpsd)
- Have something to do on the drive to Notacon
- Be a geek
Hardware
Here is the list of hardware that I used:
- Laptop (Wireless card, serial port)
- Garmin eTrex - Craigslist $35
- Garmin eTrex serial cable - $8
- Edimax RT73 (optional) - $43
Software
Software I used:
- Kismet - wireless sniffing tool
- GPSD - receives GPS data
- Ubuntu 8.10 - OS
- GPSDrive - (optional) Maps your current location as you drive
- Festival - (optional) Text to speech plugin for announcing when an access point is found
- KisGearth - convert kismet data to KML for GoogleEarth
- Google Earth - place access points on a map
GPS Setup
- sudo apt-get install gpsd
- Telnet to gpsd server and type "r" to receive the coordinates and "b" to confirm the console settings
- Plug in garmin using the console cable
- In the garmin, page over to the setup > Interfaces and make sure the output format is NMEA and the transfer rate is 9600 baud
- If you are successful you should see coordinates pop up in console of GPSD
Kismet Setup
- sudo apt-get install kismet festival
- Configure kismet.conf for your wifi cards (see KismetWireless.net under the Capture Sources section for a listing of your network card)
- Configure kismet.conf for festival
- Configure kismet.conf to save waypoints for GPSDrive
- Configure kismet.conf to save GPS data in the log files
- Start kismet to use your wifi cards. (only put in the cards you've setup in the sources or leave blank)
GPSDrive Setup
NOTE: GPSDrive is a fun tool to show you access points while you drive. It's unnecessary if you're going to be mapping the coordinates on Google Earth later
- Download the latest deb from the GPSDrive website or download the stable release with apt-get
- Before you go on your war drive, make sure you download the maps for the location you'll be driving, otherwise you won't be able to get the specific streets. I'd suggest getting used to how gpsdrive works because there's a little bit of a learning curve.
The Drive
This is a no brainer but I wanted to give a few tips that I learned:
- Plan laptop power settings before hand - make sure your laptop isn't going to shut off the hard drive after 15 minutes of inactivity
- Setup the equipment beforehand so it doesn't slide
- kitchen drawer sponge - a friend of mind gave me the idea of using that spongy material that goes at the bottom of a silverware drawer. Throw it on your dash and put your hardware on it so that it's not sliding around during turns.
- Secure the laptop however you can in your car
- Ideally buy a magnetic antenna to latch onto the top of your car so nothing is sliding around
- Test everything a couple of times before trying to do it in the car - reboot, unplug, undo everything because sometime or another it's going to happen and you're going to need to know what to do
- Make sure your GPS always has a good signal or your maps will be inaccurate
Importing into Google Earth
So you've finished your drive and you want to map out everywhere you've been. Google earth is perfect for this.
- Install google earth either from Google Earth's site or from the Ubuntu repositories
- Download an extract KisGearth
- Run kisgearth to use the kismet .xml file and .gps file. (You can use just .xml but using the .gps file as well makes it more accurate)
- Open Google Earth and go to file>open and open the KML file you created
With a little luck you should have an accurate map of where all the access points are using Google Earth's satellites. Just for fun I've attached the KML file that I used for Notacon.
You can download it here.
External Links
http://code.google.com/p/kisgearth/ - Kisgearthhttp://www.gpsdrive.de/download.shtml - GPSDrive
http://www.kismetwireless.net - Kismet
Labels: gps, hacking, Notacon, Notacon 2009, security, war driving, wifi
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