Iran releases decrypted footage from US' RQ-170 drone

Originally posted by Zaphod58
I have to say, for a "top of the line UAV" that's a pretty crappy video resolution. It's obvious that it's from a US base, because there's a Predator, and what appears to be a Global Hawk sitting next to it. But I question whether this was really from the Sentinel. I would expect the Sentinel to have a much higher resolution camera. The part where it was in flight, you couldn't even tell what was on the ground below it, except fields.

A crappy camera is exactly what they want. they dont even want the kids with the remotes to see what they're doing in any kind of detail. They just want them to shoot stuff so they can buy more missiles. If they could make out innocent civilians from "terrurists", they would be less likely to follow orders and murder people.

That's my take on it after what I've seen.

reply to post by ImaFungi


Yep, and then they ask where these "terrorists" come from.

Originally posted by eXia7
I don't think Iran is as primitive as people think, it looks like they studied up on exploiting the weakness in other countries technologies.

Half the guys in the college engineering classes I took were Iranian (although they preferred to call themselves "Persian"), and that was years ago. They're learning engineering and computer science in U.S. colleges, just like the people who build the drones and the software and systems that run them.

Well, Obama's asked for it back, 'nuff said. "Hugely embracing" as the video says for the white house spokesmen.

reply to post by live2beknown

Only thing that I can think of, is that Iran took out it's engine and stripped everything and put there own engine and camera system, hense why it's so terrible hah

You are watching a utube video. Please use your nous.

Originally posted by Juggernog

Originally posted by Swills
reply to post by ugie1028

 

Iran decrypted footage did they? Being that I was a cryptologist in the USN & understand how the military encrypts their data I call BS on Iran.

But then again, did anyone need my verification to call Iran out on its lies?

nah

Yea, just like people called BS when Iran first announced they captured the drone, that is until Obama went on record asking Iran if he could pweety pweaze have his drone back

Trust me, Iran is not capable of decrypting any drone, HF, LF, or satellite signal coming from the western military. There's a big difference between "capturing" a drone & cracking military encryption.

Originally posted by definity
reply to post by Swills

 

They did have the whole drone, which they reversed engineered also they probably reversed engineered the algorithm to encrypt and decrypt data.

I'm going with no.

2nd

reply to post by Mr Tranny


Yep, I think you nailed it on the head. You can even see in this still shot at 1:33 there is writing on the top of the video that does not match the earlier video.



Somehow, Iran found a bunch of really crappy UAV footage and cobbled this together. I have a feeling this is more of a morale booster to the Iranian people than a scare tactic meant for us.

Originally posted by MystikMushroom
reply to post by Mr Tranny

 

Yep, I think you nailed it on the head. You can even see in this still shot at 1:33 there is writing on the top of the video that does not match the earlier video.

Somehow, Iran found a bunch of really crappy UAV footage and cobbled this together. I have a feeling this is more of a morale booster to the Iranian people than a scare tactic meant for us.

The whole thing is on a loop and repeated as a background to the narrative, just as you would see in a documentary here, and the explosion bit is an insert, probably to make a not so subliminal point, just as you might see here. Fact is they have the drone/a drone, lethal or not, and landed it, making it another expensive piece of digital obsolescence, so be ready to fork out again for something even more advanced by the busy bees at Lockheed, while Iran now has a platform that they can piss about with, ad infinitum. I mean, let's get real here, these are supposedly the guys to fear because they are 'dabbling nuclear weapons' on the other hand, and all according to who you talk to, they can't decrypt the 1's & 0's, does that make sense?

reply to post by smurfy


They actually didn't land it. If you look you can see damage consistent with a hard landing on the leading edge of the wings.

The story I got, from a reliable source, is that it had a mechanical failure, and lost comms with it's base station. At some point it lost power and crash landed in Iranian territory. One of the more interesting comments came from a USAF Sentinel operator, when he said "If we had been flying it, instead of Lockheed, it never would have come down intact." So apparently the USAF operated ones have some sort of failsafe system, where the ones operated by LM don't.

There are many ways to be in a position to crack encryption.

Brute force is possible, it takes time and enormous resources but China could do it given time.

Brute force gets easier if you know some of the parameters of the password and I am guessing that the military has strict guidelines on passwords. If you know the guidelines, brute force gets magnitudes easier.

The easiest way to to discover the password is when it is input. A spy comes in handy. The fact that as far as we know Iran has only taken one drone would indicate this as a possibility.

It would not surprise me if the encryption had a back door, put there in case the drone controllers were killed. It would allow another base to take over the mission. Hell, the CIA, NSA could have an override key let alone the Pentagon.

In general, the weakest link in modern encryption is the human element in setting the password. A single program sneaked in to the drone control consol could read the password and send it out to the enemy.

The fact that only one drone has gone missing would indicate a loss of security at the drone's mission control.

P

Originally posted by Zaphod58
reply to post by minkmouse

 

That's true, but I would expect a little better detail on the people that were so close to the camera. And if this was for taxi and takeoff, as I've heard claimed in some places, why put it where the nose gear blocks it? And why focus so much on the people as it's heading to wherever? It's just odd really. I'm not saying it's faked, because the RQ-170 was a fill in UAV for a later project, but I just would expect more from it, with the advances made since the 1990s. It also adds up that this was Kandahar, so it's entirely possible that it is real (I suspect it is honestly), just some things about it are rather odd.

The camera is focused on the people and it does swing around to other views....My thoughts are they are testing all systems to make sure they work before going airborne.....

Just a thought
Regards, Iwinder

Originally posted by Chadwickus
reply to post by ImaFungi

 

Tit for tat if you ask me. The Iranians are/were developing their own stealth drone.

What do you think that would be used for?

Certainly not for buzzing the USA, unless they plan on launching from Mexico or Canada......check your paranoia at the door.

Regards, Iwinder

Originally posted by Zaphod58
reply to post by smurfy

 

They actually didn't land it. If you look you can see damage consistent with a hard landing on the leading edge of the wings.

The story I got, from a reliable source, is that it had a mechanical failure, and lost comms with it's base station. At some point it lost power and crash landed in Iranian territory. One of the more interesting comments came from a USAF Sentinel operator, when he said "If we had been flying it, instead of Lockheed, it never would have come down intact." So apparently the USAF operated ones have some sort of failsafe system, where the ones operated by LM don't.

That must mean Lockheed Martin is CIA then, so not only does Lockheed get paid, so does the CIA, that means they get paid twice.

security.blogs.cnn.com...

Originally posted by live2beknown
reply to post by Zaphod58

 

I think Iran is BS and that they didn't decode nothing.. I highly doubt for hundreds of millions of dollars for this baby, it would have that bad of a camera system.. Only thing that I can think of, is that Iran took out it's engine and stripped everything and put there own engine and camera system, hense why it's so terrible haha.

Doesn't it sound suspicious though that the USA would just let this high tech drone just land in Iran and not even go blow it up? C'mon it's common sense that doesn't sound like USA..

It was probably sent to Iran for them to capture so they would download some false information the Americans wanted them to have. Why else would it crash there? and why didn't all the information it carried self destruct?
The British used the same on a body for the Nazi's to find during second world war. False information.

You can't have it both ways......If you deny you even lost a drone then you cannot possibly go in and blow it up where sure as heck there will be video of the proposed attack.

Plus I doubt it was sitting in a parking lot right by their border.

Regards, Iwinder

Originally posted by MysterX
I'd be careful about catagorically claiming what Iran can and can't do.

Nobody thought they could down the drone in the first place, yet there it sits...completely intact too.

The ONLY way for that drone to be completely intact and in the hands of the Iranians...is if they have been able to hack the remote satellite signals being fed to it, and feed new comands themselves.

Of course, even forgetting whether or not they have been able to get at the encrypted onboard data, the very fact they seem to be able to reprogramme a military drone, on the fly, and basically take control of it should send shivers down the spines of many US military commanders.

If they can do it with one drone, they can do it with hundreds. And why stop at drones? Most manned fighters might be vulnerable to being hacked remotely too, the only way to prevent a foreign army taking control of your airforce would be to switch off the advanced avionics and electronic devices onboard...which would leave them at a serious disadvantage in combat.

If the Americans were smart, they should have completely redesigned both the software and the encryption used in the control down/uplinks.

Your last sentence makes me think of all the outsourcing to China for military chips???????
I believe you are correct.


Regards, Iwinder

reply to post by Iwinder


That's exactly what they're doing, but even on a youtube video, I would expect a little better. The new generations of FLIR cameras are supposed to be head and shoulders over the ones that I saw in the 1990s.

One of the more interesting things though is that the RQ-170 is not the top of the line UAV that people think it is. It's a filler platform, which is why they only got 20 of them. They needed something to fill in the mission gap between the Predator/Reaper/Global Hawk, and the new system that's coming online (which from what I hear, there are possibly two, and both are very very interesting. I know what one of them is, and it will fill the mission very nicely). Several of the systems were "off the shelf" systems, so they could get it airborne pretty quickly and start flying missions.

Originally posted by Zaphod58
reply to post by Iwinder

 

That's exactly what they're doing, but even on a youtube video, I would expect a little better. The new generations of FLIR cameras are supposed to be head and shoulders over the ones that I saw in the 1990s.

One of the more interesting things though is that the RQ-170 is not the top of the line UAV that people think it is. It's a filler platform, which is why they only got 20 of them. They needed something to fill in the mission gap between the Predator/Reaper/Global Hawk, and the new system that's coming online (which from what I hear, there are possibly two, and both are very very interesting. I know what one of them is, and it will fill the mission very nicely). Several of the systems were "off the shelf" systems, so they could get it airborne pretty quickly and start flying missions.

Like I said more digital bucks to play with. OMG, just realised the CIA is a corporation.

reply to post by Neocrusader


Ok, I had this whole response typed out, and lost it.

Basically, the only landing gear that seems to match up is the Sentinel, but it doesn't appear to quite match. The door on the left side of the nose gear appears too small in the video, when the camera pans around to the left side after landing.

reply to post by smurfy


LM isn't CIA, it's a contractor for the CIA. They made the aircraft, and the know the systems best, so the CIA contracted them to fly missions for them. They've done it before, as has the military. It makes sense, instead of having to train your own operators, which can take a long time, when you have the people that were involved in building and testing of it.