Grand Idea Studio

Exotic Liability

Admin — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 22:39:23 +0000

Hosts Chris Nickerson and Ryan Jones interview Joe Grand in this cutting edge, explicit, no holds barred computer security podcast.

AVRSimon

Admin — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 23:05:33 +0000

AVRSimon is a re-creation of the addictive, flying saucer-shaped memory game of Simon launched in 1978 by Milton Bradley. The premise of the game is simple: Repeat the sequence of lights and tones.

Based on the Atmel ATtiny2313 AVR microcontroller, this kit is intended to introduce hobbyists to the world of electronics and soldering. When successfully assembled, the portable, battery-powered game provides optional twists including sound-only, lights-only, reverse order, and fast play.

All contents of this kit are distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.

Kits can be purchased from Parallax, Inc. For questions and technical support, please contact support@parallax.com.

For Grand Idea Studio’s Microchip PIC-based Simon kit, visit here.

Documentation:

User’s Manual & Assembly Instructions
Schematic
Bill-of-Materials
Gerber Plots
Source Code: Atmel ATtiny2313V (avr-gcc)
Article: AVRSimon: A DIY Game Kit ( Nuts & Volts Magazine, March 2010 )

Government Computer News

Admin — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 13:34:56 +0000

As the world becomes increasingly dependent on information technology and digital communications, persistent vulnerabilities — some of which have been known for 50 years — continue to expose the world’s networks and applications to attacks.

Joe Grand Becomes Columnist for Nuts & Volts Magazine

Admin — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 14:22:30 +0000

Joe Grand of Grand Idea Studio has signed on as a columnist with Nuts & Volts magazine for 2010. Joe will be writing a series of technical articles on topics including hobbyist projects, creating the DEFCON badges, and his experiences as a co-host of Discovery Channel’s Prototype This.

Nuts & Volts is written for the hands-on hobbyist, design engineer, technician, and experimenter and is the leading magazine for those interested in electronics. The diversity of subjects appeals to all levels of experience and spans such topics as amateur robotics, circuit design, lasers, computer control, home automation, data acquisition, new technology, DIY projects, electronic theory, analog, and microcontrollers.

USA Today

Admin — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 13:44:16 +0000

Deep inside millions of computers is a digital Fort Knox, a special chip with the locks to highly guarded secrets, including classified government reports and confidential business plans. Now a former U.S. Army computer-security specialist has devised a way to break those locks.

Black Hat DC 2010 Briefings and Training

Admin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:00:00 +0000

Joe Grand will present “Hardware is the New Software,” a look into how hardware hacking is changing the computer security industry.

CNET News

Admin — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:48:49 +0000

When I am asked the question “Which is more secure, Mac or PC?” I find myself stumbling around for a response because I don’t have a clear-cut answer. I use both. And I use antivirus software with both. So I decided to conduct an informal survey of a bunch of security experts and see what they had to say in the hopes that people can use the information to help them come to their own conclusions.

The CyberJungle

Admin — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 13:51:33 +0000

Host Ira Victor interviews Joe Grand, electrical engineer and proprietor of Grand Idea Studio, about hardware hacking and how hobbyists, researchers, and innovators are modifying electronic devices in greater numbers.

LoftLife Magazine

Admin — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 11:31:35 +0000

With the countdown to Hanukkah already underway, what better time to look at some of the extraordinary ways the quintessential symbol of the Festival of Lights has been reimagined as an objet de art, at times playful, but always creative. If you have not yet found your own personal platonic ideal of a menorah, then look to our round-up below.

The New York Times

Admin — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 11:25:55 +0000

The designer Jonathan Adler is known for bringing whimsy and exuberance to the interiors and objects he creates. But when it comes to decorating his home for the holidays, he takes a more minimalist approach.

UAT Technology Forum 2009

Admin — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:02:30 +0000

Joe Grand will present “Lessons from Prototype This” and share his experiences and behind-the-scenes stories as a co-host of Discovery Channel’s Prototype This TV show.

The Star Online

Admin — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 01:17:48 +0000

If you ask Joe Grand, president of Grand Idea Studio — an R&D and product design company, he’ll tell you that no piece of hardware can ever be safe enough from hackers.

Hardware is the New Software

Admin — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 20:11:39 +0000

Society thrives on an ever increasing use of technology. Electronics are embedded into nearly everything we touch. Hardware products are being relied on for security-related applications and are inherently trusted, though many are completely susceptible to compromise with simple classes of attacks that have been known for decades.

Bolstered by the flourishing hobbyist electronics/do-it-yourself movement, easy access to equipment, and realtime information sharing courtesy of the internet, hardware is an area of computer security that can no longer be overlooked.

Slides: Hardware is the New Software

Hack in the Box Security Conference 2009

Admin — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 17:00:00 +0000

Joe Grand will present the keynote address with a presentation entitled “Hardware is the New Software,” which discusses the hardware hacking process and how it is changing the computer security industry.

The Huffington Post

Admin — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 20:50:02 +0000

Nearly every artistic medium is accounted for in this exhibit — a collection ranging from comics to installation to sculpture to film to jewelry. Many of the pieces — such as a menorah made out of metal piping by Joe Grand, or a set of mezuzahs made from recycled materials by Alix Mikesell — tend toward the typically twee Jewish object art.

NYTimes.com: The Moment Blog

Admin — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 20:54:01 +0000

You don’t have to be Jewish to appreciate “Reinventing Ritual,” the contemporary art and design show that opened Sunday at the Jewish Museum and runs through February 2, 2010. But it helps.

Tablet Magazine

Admin — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 20:45:38 +0000

The show’s 58 artists, chosen by the Jewish Museum’s Assistant Curator Daniel Belasco, tailor Judaic rituals to their values, identities, and circumstances. (Most, but not all, of them are Jewish.) They work in every conceivable medium: drawing, sculpture, textile, graphic novel, and industrial design, to name a few.

San Francisco Bay Guardian

Admin — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 20:29:17 +0000

Joe Grand and his accomplices, Jacob Appelbaum of Noisebridge and Chris Tarnovsky of Flylogic Engineering, have had their way with San Francisco’s new “smart” parking meters, hacking their way into the systems, exposing how easily they are manipulated, and sharing the entire experience with whoever would listen.

Galvanized Steel Candelabra Included in Jewish Contemporary Art Exhibition

Admin — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 05:00:45 +0000

Joe Grand’s Galvanized Steel Candelabra will be included in an exhibition entitled Reinventing Ritual: Contemporary Art and Design for Jewish Life appearing at The Jewish Museum in New York City from September 13, 2009 to February 7, 2010 and the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco from April 22 to September 28, 2010. The exhibition maps the 21st century avant-garde expressions of design in Jewish ritual objects.

CNET News

Admin — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 18:41:27 +0000

Most badges from conferences and trade shows end up in the trash. Not so the badges from the DEFCON security show, which are stylized, mysterious, and highly customized electronics equipment designed to be hacked.

Threatpost: Digital Underground Podcast

Admin — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 05:01:55 +0000

In this episode, Dennis Fisher talks with Joe Grand of Grand Idea Studio about the design for this year’s DEFCON badge, the secret feature he added that no one has uncovered yet and his research on hacking smart parking meters.

Wired.com

Admin — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 18:29:11 +0000

For the last four years DEFCON’s badges have been designed with circuit boards that attendees have been encouraged to hack as part of a contest. This year, the badge hackers were competing to win a black über badge, which gives the recipient free entry to DEFCON for life.

Forbes.com

Admin — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 18:25:41 +0000

Electronic enthusiasts demonstrate what’s possible with evolving semiconductor technology.

San Francisco Examiner

Admin — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 18:01:17 +0000

The system of paying for parking in San Francisco with prepaid cards should be scrapped in order to keep them safe from tech-savvy hackers, said one man who helped expose how technology can provide rides at meters in The City.

MAKE: Online

Admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:38:48 +0000

Every year, Joe Grand, aka Kingpin, aka The Sultan of Solder, and hardware hacker extraordinaire, designs the badges for DEFCON the annual hacker convention in Vegas. The badges are more than just conference ID badges, they have electronics on-board that do something, and conferees have to figure out what that something is.

Network World

Admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:35:34 +0000

Hackers modify the DEFCON 2009 badge to act as a lie detector, confuse facial recognition systems, and get around motion detection systems.

Boing Boing

Admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:05:03 +0000

A group of tinkerers and security researchers announced findings that prove it is possible to bypass the controls of “e-meter” parking meters — which means it’s possible to park for free where such meters are in use.

DEFCON 17 Badge

Admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 13:06:54 +0000

The DEFCON 17 Badge was created for the 2009 edition of DEFCON, the largest and oldest continuously running hacker and computer security convention in the world. The badge uses active electronics, features an artistic circuit board, and provides an open design to allow attendees to experiment with and modify the badge to their liking. The goal of this year’s design was to be elegant and stark, yet powerful.

The badge is based around a Freescale MC56F8006 16-bit digital signal controller, Knowles Acoustics SPM0408LE5H amplified MEMS microphone, and Kingbright RGB LED. Its three operating states are determined solely by the sound level received by the microphone:

Party: The multicolor LED is affected by audio input volume and frequency
Quiet/Idle: The LED slowly blends through a pattern of colors
Sleep

Other features include multi-badge communication via a wired interface and a static serial bootloader for in-the-field firmware upgrades. Source code was developed using the freely available CodeWarrior for 56800/E Digital Signal Controllers . A single CR2032 3V Lithium coin cell battery provides the required power.

A total of 6,694 badges were manufactured with a unique badge shape used to denote each type of DEFCON clientele: Human, Goon, Press, Speaker, Vendor, Contest Organizer, and Uber (awarded to the winners of official DEFCON contests). Each shape serves as a puzzle piece and the puzzle can be completed by placing the seven badges in the correct positions.

Grand Idea Studio once again hosted the DEFCON Badge Hacking Contest to award the most ingenious, obscure, mischievous, or technologically astounding badge modification created during the weekend conference. There were 32 official entries in this year’s contest. The winning entry by Zoz was a two-part anti-surveillance system: Defeating automated facial recognition by generating alternating colors and patterns of light in order to create optical noise and aiding in bypassing motion detection by measuring ambient temperature and guiding the user as to how slowly to move through the room. Additional contest information can be found at the official DEFCON 17 Contest Results page.

Documentation:

Schematic
Bill-of-Materials
Assembly Drawings
Source Code: Freescale MC56F8006 for CodeWarrior
Slides: Making (and Hacking) the DEFCON 17 Badge
Poem: DEFCON 17 Haiku

Selected Badge Hacking Contest Entries:

Video Samples ( Joe Grand )
Pictures ( Joe Grand )
Project Files: Blue Box/DTMF Dialer/Voice Amplifier ( 501d3r Guy )
Project Files: Sound-Fearing Blimp: Three badges attach to the bottom of a toy blimp. Each badge drives a fan based on the sound level detected on its microphone, which effectively steers the blimp away from high noise areas ( Team Hack the Badge )
Project Files: Fffft! 32-bin Fast Fourier Transform with a 15 LED PWM-controlled display ( Simap )
Project Files: Badge Bulletin Board System: An incomplete attempt to port an old school BBS to the badge ( Mark Renouf and Jason Scott )

DEFCON 17

Admin — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 05:00:17 +0000

Joe Grand will be giving three talks: “The Making of and Hacking the DEFCON 17 Badge,” “The Projects of Prototype This!” with Zoz, and “‘Smart’ Parking Meter Implementations, Globalism, and You” with Jacob Appelbaum and Chris Tarnovsky.

The Usual Suspects Radio Show

Admin — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 20:40:54 +0000

Audio: Please follow the link to listen.