Exclusive: Iran hijacked US drone, says Iranian engineer

Exclusive: Iran hijacked US drone, says Iranian engineer

www.csmonitor.com

Iranian electronic warfare specialists were able to cut off communications links of the American bat-wing RQ-170 Sentinel, says the engineer, who works for one of many Iranian military and civilian teams currently trying to unravel the drone’s stealth and intelligence secrets, and who could not be named for his safety.

(visit the link for the full news article)

So, apparently it WAS hacked (per earlier speculation). Of course, this raises more questions than answers. How did they know the location of the drone? How were they able to actually "spoof" the software?

I found this tidbit interesting as well:

"The revelations about Iran's apparent electronic prowess come as the US, Israel, and some European nations appear to be engaged in an ever-widening covert war with Iran, which has seen assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists, explosions at Iran's missile and industrial facilities, and the Stuxnet computer virus that set back Iran’s nuclear program."

Again....widely speculated but reported here as fact.


www.csmonitor.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

reply to post by JoeGuitar


I'm sure Russia is sharing statellite and flight path information with Iran...once again Obama is full of crap and how would they think that this would not leak out...must have used a micorsoft operating system for this drone...what a joke...I'm sure the parts were made in China anyway and they as noted not long ago were able to spy on us using these types of circuits...perish the thought that we need to build this stuff in the US...

reply to post by JoeGuitar


It wasn't really Iranian tech that did the job, they just got some new portable units from Russia that did the deed.

Either way it was stupid of us to have these drones so unsecure.

It was even dumber to fly them over Iran in the first place.

reply to post by AGWskeptic


I was amazed at how "easy" it was to be able to not only cancel the previous guidance, but to then reprogram the guidance in what seems to be a fairly primitive way (I say this because, despite the flight path recalc, the drone still defaulted to the altitude it was previously programmed to). This from something that is the product of one of the most cover programs in the US today.

Unless, of course, this is a Trojan Horse like many of you are saying.

remote drones use radio wave sofr communication, all you would need to do to "jam" it for a while to send it off course etc, would be to focus as much radio energy at it as possible.

I think its far more likly that it either malfuntioned due to fault or had an enviromental effect that caused it to malfunction, or that of course the USA lobbed a stripped out one over there on purpose, misfino drone? YOu think they wouldnt?

Originally posted by Biigs
I think its far more likly that it either malfuntioned due to fault or had an enviromental effect that caused it to malfunction, or that of course the USA lobbed a stripped out one over there on purpose, misfino drone? YOu think they wouldnt?

As I posted elsewhere on the same subject earlier.

I've been thinking, Let's try deductive reasoning here...

The recent publicly available Sat images of the Plant explosion in Iran was taken by a commercially available Satellite and dispersed all over the web and media. So, How is it that high quality images of a supposedly secret installation can be almost instantaneously released to the public?





Yet, We are to believe that the US needs to fly a drone into Iran to observe their covert activities at other locations?

Seems like a plant. The Drone IMO was a test to see just how well Iran's Air defense would react to the intrusion of it's Airspace. Let's be real here for a second. Drones by their nature are expendable. The Pentagon damn well knows that nothing is "fool proof" and may fall into the oppositions hands. Would they really put some of the "Higher Technology" at risk? Or would they use a stripped down version [In case it was captured] to probe Iran's air defense capability?

Keep in mind it was supposedly shot down/captured [Whatever the case may be] over 150 Miles inside Iran & The US isn't really "Demanding it's return" all that vigorously either. As a matter of fact YAWN So far only one or two statements to the affect.

Originally posted by Biigs
remote drones use radio wave sofr communication, all you would need to do to "jam" it for a while to send it off course etc, would be to focus as much radio energy at it as possible.

I think its far more likly that it either malfuntioned due to fault or had an enviromental effect that caused it to malfunction, or that of course the USA lobbed a stripped out one over there on purpose, misfino drone? YOu think they wouldnt?

You mean with something like this?

www.emirates247.com...

seem like they made the equalizer after stuxnet... 1:1 - next round, FIGHT

IF anyone wanted to Hijack any radio controlled device....which will maintain level flight if the signal is lost...All one would have to do is...


1. Jam Control Signal Frequency Signal originating from the direction of Afghanistan.

2. Drone begins looking/seeking to regain signal according to protocol after loss of signal is triggered in the software.

3. Begin pinging the Drone with a new Secure Channel KNown US Frequency that adheres to the protocol. Which has been learned by recording messaging protocol from previous drone flyovers.

4. Resume control of the craft with your own signal while jamming the original signal's frequency.

5. Voila ....Fly Hijacked Aircraft away using your signal ....and landing at your favorite Iranian air strip.


As I have said repeatedly here is that the Iranians educated their Engineers here in the US.
I used to compete against them and they were very well educated and Intelligent people.

This act of Hijacking one our Drones does not at all surprise me !

Peace

Interesting. How do we know they intercepted it in Iranian airspace? If they electronically grabbed it over Afghanistan wouldn't that be tantamount to international piracy?

reply to post by JoeGuitar


Sorry, I don't buy it....sounds like Iranian bragging.

I was amazed at how "easy" it was....

See, this is why the Iranian's story stinks. I mean, if that "easy" then they (Iran, and name any other country) would have a hangar full of them!

And, for those who bang on about it "shouldn't have been in their airspace", it seems most logical that it was a mistake (which you -- the U.S. Gov't -- would not wish to admit) and they simply had no control, for whatever reason, so the crossing the border was probably accidental. It certainly wasn't near any critical areas that I've read about, so it seems like this is a P.R. bluff and stunt by Iran.

Just hard to believe the drones (any of them) can be so "easily" hacked.

reply to post by ProudBird


Point taken. I fully recognize that there is so much more to this story than just the propaganda in the press releases. To me, the most curious thing about the ENTIRETY of the Iran situation is how close to the vest all parties are playing it right now. This is not a rapid escalation of events but rather a very dangerous, slowly boiling pot. I am not looking forward to seeing it boil over.

Apparently everybody overhere seems t think that the little bugger was "radio controlled" , like some RC toy.

Let me end that dream, it is controlled by satellite, more or less straight up directed.
It has an upward directed dish on board, not only for control, but also for direct data uplink.

So, just jamming it from below seems nor very helpful.

Originally posted by nh_ee

IF anyone wanted to Hijack any radio controlled device....which will maintain level flight if the signal is lost...All one would have to do is...


2. Drone begins looking/seeking to regain signal according to protocol after loss of signal is triggered in the software.

3. Begin pinging the Drone with a new Secure Channel KNown US Frequency that adheres to the protocol. Which has been learned by recording messaging protocol from previous drone flyovers.


Peace

As was mentioned earlier, I am not underestimating their capabilities (especially if this is a case of proxy aggression with Russia....or China!) But it's the 2 points above that I am having a difficult time with. How could these signals not contain packets of data that were encrypted and near impossible to reproduce.

Unless (again) this was intentional by the US. After stux, I would be very wary of any technology with Made In the USA stamped on it.

Originally posted by JoeGuitar
Unless, of course, this is a Trojan Horse like many of you are saying.

I'm an R/C plane pilot and in the last few years 2.4 gig Spektrum has become the hot new trend in R/C. Why? Because unlike the old 72mhz technology, the new tech makes "stepping" a thing of the past. Stepping is when someone else turns on their radio on your frequency, which if you're flying usually results in a crash. The new tech scans the band and finds unused frequencies and locks onto them. It also recognizes the model it is synced to, so once you sync the transmitter to a receiver then only that transmitter will control it. What I'm telling you is that if you're flying Spektrum, it has become impossible in the R/C world for another pilot to take over your plane or cause it to crash through radio stepping. Now let me ask everyone this, knowing that hobby grade equipment has this type of failsafe, does anyone here believe the government would be using lesser equipment? I think not. Iran did not hijack this aircraft. Now I could believe that they jammed the signal such that no one could control it, but their claim that they hijacked it, flew it and landed it themselves is laughable. Indications are that if the aircraft were jammed it would go into failsafe mode and either fly itself back to base or self-destruct. It did neither, instead it gently landed itself in Iran. In my eyes everything adds up to it being a Trojan Horse.

reply to post by nh_ee


believe me, its not "easy" as that. Do you think its just recording of previous radio commands? Acctually, they said that they downed the drone by making it believe its the airfield in afghanistan. You can do that if you send altered GPS signal packets wich must be fitted to a certain runtime because the runtime of the signal is needed to calculate the distance between sat and receiver. If you have more than two sats online you can calculate your position. its a little bit reduced what I wrote but this fits it.

reply to post by verschickter


I like your post. You still have to consider the fact that you need a satellite in orbit to pull this off.
So it is logical to assume the Russians or Chinese were involved.

www.msnbc.msn.com...

"The GPS navigation is the weakest point," the Iranian engineer told the Monitor, giving the most detailed description yet published of Iran's "electronic ambush" of the highly classified US drone. "By putting noise [jamming] on the communications, you force the bird into autopilot. This is where the bird loses its brain."

The “spoofing” technique that the Iranians used – which took into account precise landing altitudes, as well as latitudinal and longitudinal data – made the drone “land on its own where we wanted it to, without having to crack the remote-control signals and communications” from the US control center, says the engineer.

Originally posted by THE_PROFESSIONAL

The “spoofing” technique that the Iranians used – which took into account precise landing altitudes, as well as latitudinal and longitudinal data – made the drone “land on its own where we wanted it to, without having to crack the remote-control signals and communications” from the US control center, says the engineer.

Are these the same type of Iranian Engineers that blew themselves up recently at the missile facility? Also, if they were able to land it so precisely why are they hiding the under carriage damage? And the drone in question shows obvious signs of wing damage? [which they poorly taped up for the photo op]

I think the Iranians are grandstanding/showboating and trying to milk this for all it's worth and many here at ATS [Supposedly outside the box thinkers] are falling hook, line and sinker for it.