Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Mitigating the identified risks
If you find yourself the target of a state, this project alone is not going to help much. We
can protect ourselves somewhat from the cracker with two strategies. The first is instead of
connecting the BBB to your laptop or computer, you can use the BBB as a standalone ma-
chine and transfer files via a microSD card. This is known as an
air-gap
. With a dedicated
monitor and keyboard, it is much less likely for software vulnerabilities to break the gap
and infect the BBB. However, this comes as a high level of personal inconvenience, de-
pending on how often you encrypt files. If you consider the risk of running the BBB at-
tached to your computer too high, create an air-gapped BBB for maximum protection. If
you deem the risk low, because you've hardened your computer and have other protection
mechanism, then keep the BBB attached to the computer.
Note
An air-gapped computer can still be compromised. In 2010, a highly specialized worm
known as Stuxnet was able to spread to networked isolated machines through USB flash
drives.
The second strategy is to somehow enter the GPG passphrase directly into the BBB without
using the host's keyboard. After we complete the project, we'll suggest a mechanism to do
this, but it is slightly more complicated. This would eliminate the threat of the key logger
since the pin is directly entered.
The mitigation against the ex-lover is to treat your BBB as you would your own wallet, and
don't leave it out of your sight. It's slightly larger than you would want, but it's certainly
small enough to fit in a small backpack or briefcase.
