When you find out that hackers are getting a huge kick out of cracking the code to gain access to drones, you may wonder why hackers are so focused on drones in particular. Is it because hackers love a challenge and the security guarding drones is so airtight that it’s incredibly difficult to get inside them? Hardly.
Nothing against the minds of teenagers, but it’s somewhat alarming that drone hacking can—and will—be taught to high school students in Iran. Even if Raspberry Pi computers are being issued in elementary schools, should a sixteen-year-old really be capable of hacking a drone's computer systems to not just gain access to the classified info that a drone possesses but also to track and bring down drone aircraft?
Surely some sort of new technology or hacking practice is to blame for this glaring loophole in what should seemingly be a piece of machinery designed to be as unhackable as possible, right? Unfortunately, no. David Axe at Wired reports that American drones were being hacked by Shi'ite insurgents back in 2008.
While those overseas may remain secretive about their hacking methods, those hacking into drones here in the United States have been most enthusiastic about sharing their hacks and encouraging others to see if they can take it even further. Wired’s article notes:
Josh Begley, a 28-year-old NYU grad student, has just created an application programming interface—basically, a collection of building blocks for software development—that allows anyone with basic coding skills to organize, analyze and visualize drone-strike data from Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia dating back to 2002.
Though not quite at the “unmanned drone that can kill you" level, Mashable recently released a video of a quadcopter drone not just being hacked but also being controlled by a coder wearing Google Glass.
Mashable’s article on Blaine Bublitz’s hack provides the link to the control program from his GitHub profile.
