Project 1: EFF's Rayhunter

 Digital privacy is a topic of great interest to me. While there will be many cybersecurity projects to come, I wanted to start with this one. The EFF, or Electronic Freedom Foundation, has advocated for digital privacy and government transparency worldwide for a long time. I became aware of them in 2006. Let's get into Rayhunter, after the jump. 

Stingray is a well known method of law enforcement but not much is public. Stingray is a cell site simulator. It mimics cell phone towers, capturing your data once connected to it. You most likely would not even be aware of it. 

It took some time to find a cheap one, but I was able to get my Orbic RC400L on eBay for $22. The Orbic RC400L is a small, old Verizon hotspot. Once Rayhunter software is loaded, it becomes a Stingray detector. The instructions from the EFF were easy to follow. I went to GitHub and downloaded the latest release. I downloaded the Linux x64 and the SHA256 file so I could verify the file's integrity. I used Terminal to run the SHA256 check, everything was perfect. 

I did visit this page from the EFF GitHub to make sure I was doing this right. I followed the instructions and installed the Rayhunter software over WiFi. I had no difficulties and the Orbic device rebooted. Once it rebooted, the signature green line like the photo above appeared. 

Today I got back into the Rayhunter software on my device, and downloaded my first PCAP logs. While this was a simple project, I enjoyed it. Drop me a comment if you have your own Rayhunter!