5. DIY Google Hack

Diggity is a collective of tools that Fran Brown and Rob Ragan, researchers for Stach & Liu, built, to speed up the detection of bugs in security by means of Google or Bing searches. The aim of these tools is to let enterprises find those vulnerabilities in their servers (such as SQL injection, cross-site scripting, etc.) before hackers do. However, search engine hacking could be made a lot more easier if the tool worked the other way around which is why the tools now alert Google or MSN in case a vulnerability is found. This gives them time to halt index the attack while a fix for the bug is found offline.

6. What if laptop batteries turned against you?

Veteran security researcher Charlie Miller demonstrated at the Black Hat USA, that most laptop manufacturing companies (including Apple), didn’t change passwords that permitted them to update the laptop component's firmware of the smart battery system. Apple batteries, in particular, make the system hackable via the two fixed passwords (one default and another identifiable) in the battery system. According to Miller’s theory, a malware could survive a clean install of a system by hiding in the battery.

7. Flying hackers

Mike Tassey and Richard Perkins who are both researchers, bought a radio-controlled a model airplane, fixed a mini computer to it with 4G connectivity, and the final product contained  GPS (Global positioning system),wireless antennae, remote network detection tools, and a Backtrack penetration testing toolkit. This hacking “drone”, or Wireless Aerial Surveillance Platform (WASP) as they called it, could detect wireless networks, intercept cell phone calls, and conduct video surveillance. A station from the ground controlled the navigation of the plane using Google Earth and some autopilot software. What is not clear, is how to protect oneself from such an attack.