Nokia 1100 seemingly hackable, making a big comeback
By Laura June 
posted Apr 21st 2009 11:21PM
posted Apr 21st 2009 11:21PM
Apparently some shady hackers and cyber-criminals have recently started offering upwards of $30,000 for the Nokia 1100 which were manufactured at a specific plant in Bochum, Germany. You may ask yourself, "why?" Well, beyond the obvious answer (style), certain makes of the super-popular handset can apparently be reprogrammed to use someone else's phone number, allowing them to receive text messaged bank passwords (common in parts of Europe), thus making it much, much easier to steal people's money. The software flaw has been pointed out by Ultrascan Advance Global Investigations, who were contacted by police who had noted the curiously high offering prices on the old-timey candybar. Nokia has contended that it has not identified any software problems which would allow such use, so it's hard to say what exactly is going on at this point, but we'll let you know if we hear anything concrete.[Via SlashGear]
can i get a discount with a contract?
Judging by the headline I thought you can hack it to make free calls or something... for some reason I don't find this worth the $$. I know certain old Nokias can be hacked to trick the sim into thinking you are making 911 calls...
No, they are using it to steal / intercept other people's bank passwords.
More details here:
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9131906&source=NLT_PM
One question from someone that actually know some mobile tech stuff:
WHAT ABOUT THE Ki?!
I'm thinking of an exchange. Might get a couple of Tata Nanos for one.
I've got 10 of these. Any bids?
Wow. I have one of these sitting in my safe... time to put it on eBay!
You have a safe. Can I please have your phone number?
a safe?
anti-virus is the way to go!
/sarcasm
Your statement didn't make no sense at all.
Ravicai, that don't make no sense
/sarcasm
"So, what are you gonna do with your $30,000?"
"Buy a car. What about you?"
"Buy a cell phone."
Now, we all know not to have our personal info sent to our cell phones until this is proven to be false.
Buy 3,000 more 1100's. 2nd-hand units cost only $10 here.
More like
"So, what are you gonna do with your $30,000?"
"Buy a car. What about you?"
"Buy a cell phone, then your car, and your house. Maybe your wife too."
LOLOLOL NOOBS ENJOY YOUR NOKIA POS I WOULD GET 100 IPHONES AHAH
And do what? "Remote" your iTunes 100 times?
Unless there's an app that lets you use someone else's number, your iphone ,sir, is a POS compared to this
I don't even see why I would need 1 to start off with.
National Treasure 2?
Looked familiar.
I have 2 phones - An HTC 5800 for the summer, and Samsung M500 for the winter. About once in every 5 text messages, the deactivated phone will receive a copy of a text sent to the activated one, both registered with the same number of course. I guess if I could change the programmed phone number on one of my phones when it's deactivated, I'd get their text messages too.
What service is that on, becuase these are with SIM cards.
Yeah, no SIM cards here... KMTS, MTS, Bell.
Let's not even start talking about non-GSM phones...
While everyone else is asking you valid questions, I ask:
Why do you need seasonal cell phones? No malice, just curious.
Winter here is like -40 and the Samsung has bigger buttons. It's easier to type on when I'm out on the snowmobile trails, and it's cheap if I lose it or break it in the snow :)
in the same vein as triscuit
why are you texting while snowmobiling?
I have two of them and pretty sure one of my friends does too.... (never thrown out a single cell phone I owned) no, not selling. gotta try this sh&$%
man i wanna get one of these old school phones that does nothing. This "smart" phone dick measuring contest is getting out of hand. when somebody takes out their n95 i'll just whip this thing out. shit it doesn't even do mms how life would be simple ... send and end that's it....
.....
......
hum maybe i should just get an iphone ...... BAAAA ZING !!!!
Don't call them hackers.
These people aren't "Hackers" they're criminals.
Would you call someone who breaks into pyramids and steals the treasure an archeologist? No. You'd call them a criminal.
entrepreneurial archaeology
Then you'd better lock up Steve Wozniak.
If the system allows you to take someone else's phone number, the system itself is broken.
(That's why GSM uses IMEI numbers and SIM cards)
Im pretty sure I have one of those somewhere around the house.
I wonder if where it was manufactured?
Hold on, I'll just check for you
No, you don't have it anymore... you reported on your 07 taxes that you donated it to a charity that sends them to 3rd world countries. Currently a man is using it who wants to give you 10 million dollars if you will just send him 85k first.
ah...the quality and love people have for nokia.... :)
You would think that if its possible for them to reprogram the cell phone to do this that they cant be that far from just making a cell phone just for this purpose? Makes sense in my mind.
Relying on SMS text messages for bank security was always an idiotic idea. It was never a question of if, only a question of when do organized crime rings start using this to steal money.
I'm pretty sure there would be cheaper options for this than $30k too... hack one of the many chinese brand cell phones, or obtain a development platform cell phone from somewhere, for example.
It doesn't rely only on SMS, the SMS is used to transmit the TAC (which is arguably more secure than having a list sent to you via post), which is then valid for 5 minutes. The TAC alone is useless, you also need the account number, password and PIN.
another reason i don't use txt messaging to send vital information..only the dumb would
somebody please photoshop the screen of the 1100 with bundle of money on the bigger hand :)
family guy!!
Why this phone in particular? Nokia must have slapped this OS on dozens of phone models...
Yes that was a sweet Family Guy reference lol
Dammit I meant to reply to Ryoga Vee
triple fail
Hmmm, $30.000 huh,..I can buy Honda CR-V in Indonesia, sound interesting. But, if this cellphone has ability for that 'negative' purpose, why as a blessed people with talented skills in programming, they didn't reprogram the cell phone for more 'positive' purpose. I agree with Roy.
Wouldn't a SIM reprogrammer come in more handy? I don't get why this specific model is special, because GSM stores the phone number data on the SIM card.
Giggity!!
Nokia knows what it is being used for. The dutch governement also knows what its being used for.
When you sent text-messages to a phone on the same network (e.g. Vodaphone) there is no record being kept of which telephone-number you sent the text-message to.
This way criminals can do drug-deals and other stuff with no communication records being kept (they do everything trough text-messages). The only way to find out to which numbers text-messages have been sent is by confiscating the phones.
Source in dutch: http://zoeken.rechtspraak.nl/resultpage.aspx?snelzoeken=true&searchtype=kenmerken&vrije_tekst=nokia+1100
But what has it got anything to do with the 1100 in particular?
(Sorry Google Translation isn't making sense!)