AS HEARD ON NH Today with Jack Heath WGIR-AM 610: Roadside Sign Hacking and Voting and Election Chaos

Welcome,

Good Monday morning, everybody. Craig Peterson here. I was on with Jack Heath this morning discussing some of the hacking that has been going on here in regards to Roadside Warning Signs and how easily it is done but warning that it could lead to federal hacking penalties. Then we got into Voting issues and Election chaos and what Nation-states hope to do. Here we go with Jack.

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- CraigPeterson.com

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Automated Machine Generated Transcript:

Craig Peterson: [00:00:00] What they found, by the way, there were people from both sides of the political spectrum, there were law enforcement people involved, from local all the way up through federal, they found that it was very easy to hack our voting.

Craig Peterson (2): [00:00:16] Today's one of those days where I wish that technology had not been pushed into the political realm, technology and science, where now it's more important, what your truth is than what the truth is. This morning I got to speak with Mr. Jack Heath, of course, New Hampshire today. I heard throughout most of Northern New England. And we talked a little bit about a hack that had happened, but we really got into a bit about the election. This fall, the truth is it is going to be very easy to get people to the point where they don't know if the election was valid or not. We got into that and I just hit one point.

There are so many more. So I guess once again, we get a little bit political because somehow the truth about technology is political. Nowadays, my mind is just getting warped here. Here we go with Jack.

Jack Heath: [00:01:18] As I said earlier, we received this morning from one of our great listeners is the picture of one of these digital, electronic, real-time roadside signs that we see in these times, in New Hampshire and other States. In New Hampshire, they fairly, I think, use storm this afternoon or, road construction ahead, slow down. In the state of Maine, as we said earlier, I think they pretty much say if you're hungry, you should pull over and eat. Cause they got to tell everyone, no, they're over the top there.

Here they're pretty much used for construction, roadside stuff. traffic congestion ahead. Someone did hack route 28 in Barnstead and a political message saying something unflattering about Joe Biden and then Trump in 20. It's hacked and they say sent a picture of it. I don't think we could probably post it with the word that's written there, but  I think from a tech talk point of view, it's interesting. Craig Peterson his show airs Saturdays here, tech talk on our iHeart stations. How hard is it to hack these? This has happened before in New Hampshire, someone puts up a message. How hard is it to do and what are the consequences if you're caught?

Good morning, Craig.

Craig Peterson: [00:02:26] Hey, good morning, Jack. Digital hacking, of course, a real problem we're all aware of. Is actually as easy to do. Is getting a pair of bolt cutters. In most cases, a lot of these digital signage machines that are besides this side of the road, have a keyboard right on them, that allows you to program the silly thing. Very easy to do with some of them.

Now, some of the newer ones have a little bit more safety on it, but we seeing these digital signs in some States where you have these huge signs over the freeways hacked statewide.

It is a real problem.

Jack Heath: [00:03:03] So it's not done remotely. You're saying physically it's done right there at the actual sign that sort of chain to something. It's not done remotely.

Craig Peterson: [00:03:13] Absolutely. These small, all signs are almost all local. Some of them are connected. Nowadays, is cheap enough to get digital self-service to them. But yeah, it's probably was done there locally was with a pair of bolt cutters. In some cases, you might need to have a little ethernet cable to program it but these things are fairly simple. Just to make it easier for the people who have to maintain them to run them.

Jack Heath: [00:03:39] All right. What else do you have for us this morning, Craig?

Craig Peterson: [00:03:42]By the way, it would be covered under the hacking statutes. If you did this. So depending on what sign and who owned it, you could be looking at a lot of years in prison or just a, basically a slap on the wrist.

The other big thing this last week has to do with the election coming up. There is a concept called red team blue team that's used in the cybersecurity community, used a lot in the military where you have a red team that's trying to hack in and you have a blue team that trying to defend.

In fact, all of our military colleges right now, the service academies have these types of teams. They put the kids through them and they come out just amazing people able to do this well there was a red team blue team that was conducted last week against voting in the United States.

What they found, by the way, there were people from both sides of the political spectrum, there were law enforcement people involved, from local, all the way up through federal. They found that it was very easy to hack our voting.

You were just talking about mail-in voting here, Jack. You may not be aware of it. These machines that we have, of course, they read bar codes, but yeah, you can send a piece of mail through the post office. You put a specific barcode on that letter and it's known what these are and they will reset the sorting machines. As easy as that, just the cost of a first-class stamp could completely mess up sorting machines throughout the nation.

It gets worse from there. The bottom line, the easiest thing for Russians to do, or for someone in the U S. To do is to create a complete lack of confidence. There are so many things they could do. It's just astounding.

We're not even talking about electronic voting, which is even worse.

Jack Heath: [00:05:41] Craig Peterson thank you very much. On this Monday morning. Make it a good one. Tech Talk. Thank you, Craig.

Craig Peterson: [00:05:46] Hey, I'll be back tomorrow with a little bit more. Of course. We'll be talking with Mr. Jim Polito covering much more of Northern New England in fact, depends on how far North, so that'll be fun also.

We're making some huge headway here. Things are going to change. You're going to see some of the email stuff change. I'm switching over to a lot more teaching, coaching, and mentoring here to help people out, as well as "done it for you" solutions, right?

If you need some help, we will actually take over your security administration, right? We can even provide you with the hardware and the people to run it. The whole nine yards.

Take care, everybody. Make sure you visit me online. Craig peterson.com and you'll be seeing some changes there coming up soon.

 Bye-bye.

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