Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Because if, for example, it has a 300 GHz clock rate, the radiation it emits will have a wavelength of 1 millimeter. So you can only figure out where things are within one millimeter at best. (Again, if you have a metamaterial lens and can get it within a few wavelengths or less of the chip, you could in principle make out smaller details - for mm radiation this means you need to get within a few mm or less, though).

If it has a much slower clock rate, you can always actively scan it with 300 GHz microwave radar to get details of the size of its components down to about 1 mm - assuming that there is nothing in the device that blocks 1 mm wavelength microwaves. Actively scanning like this will not tell you what it is doing, however.

If you go much above 300 GHz, you start getting into the region where your signal starts getting absorbed by matter. Maybe it would work at close ranges with THz radiation, but that seems kinda iffy (actually, using mm radar to map out the internals of an electronic device to 1 mm already sounds pretty technologically demanding, and I expect it would require substantial increases in signal processing - but this is the future we are talking about so we can assume that they have made these advances).

Luke

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

And the whole idea assumes that there is no electronic hardening to interfere with the signals you're getting out - if such technology existed hardening would be the wave of the future and nearly everything would be offered with a hardened version at a increased price and most likely since everyone would want it not too much of a terribly increased one.

Another reason why using the Van Eck method works is because the emissions from a monitor are NOT shielded, they all have to fall under civilian legal technology laws and have to accept interference from class ... something or other devices.

Now, you may not even be able to shield a monitor effectively to stop Van Eck Phreaking (you have to be able to read the screen) - that's a hypothesis based on how its supposed to work. If it were shielded however you'd have to be pointing your device directly at the user's viewscreen unless I'm way off base.

(As a side note I'm back!)

EDIT: Actually, the TEMPEST project does exactly what I was talking about but also tampers with the radiation; just looked that up.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Okay, so it is limited by the frequency/wavelength vs. component size relationship in this case; it's the serial nature of monitor refresh data which makes that irrelevant and allows Van Eck Phreaking to work. Only if the internal data of a computer passes through some kind of "serial bottleneck," at least 1mm away from other radiating components, can you determine with any certainty what it's doing at any given time.

So maybe reading (and manipulating) the state changes in the serial buses....

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

lwcamp thanks for donating your knowledge to our thread, I thought it had a population explosion when I woke up. :)

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

If I understand it correctly, it's not the radiation from the image on the monitor that you're reading, but from the stream of data through the video cable; the process works because you have (a) an emission that's not closer to another radiating component than the wavelength of the radiation it's emitting, and (b) a signal presented in a known sequence, so that you can determine which bit goes where based on their order, as long as you know the resolution and refresh rate of the monitor it's being displayed on.

As to hardening components to resist it ... in a setting where this kind of hacking was about as common as guns, I'd expect electrical shielding to be about as common as body armor -- most "average" people won't expect to be hacked any more than they expect to be shot, simply because they don't spend time around people who are apt to shoot or hack them.

It does introduce a new dimension to the PCs' equipment-buying needs, but if that dimension is simply "buy hardened versions of all electronic gear, so that remote hacking attempts are rolled at a penalty," it's not that huge a hassle.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Yes, and thank you for answering my incessant questions; it was enlightening. :)

And with that, I'm off to bed myself.... 'night all.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

Goodnight, sleep well.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

If anyone wonders, as a typical (in at least some respects) middle-aged American I would be unlikely to do my own dirty work unless a known hacker with a suspicious box was in the same room with me.

I might even give him a verbal warning although if decks are truly concealable and operated by wireless neural link I could not _safely_ do even that.

In such a case though I'd probably get away with it as self-defense, much the same as if I'd shot a mafia hit man with his hand in his pocket holding a suspicious bulge.

So cyberdecks that function as death rays don't get policed as illegal instruments used in economic crimes. They are policed as if they were terroristic weapons and all raids to apprehend a suspect hacker are carried out by a Homeland Security SWAT team who probably do my shooting on sight for me.

You also don't get on an airliner or into any secure building with any electronic device that might in any possible way be concealing a cyberdeck. You hope that the security of the time is not only better but faster and more convenient to deal with than today's too.

So, a technology capable of producing this extreme level of danger is extremely unlikely to produce a situation where the technology is universally adopted and everyone takes moderate precautions according to their personally evaluated threat level.

Instead this is a technology that very, very probably gets stomped on with hobnailed boots even if you have to issue those boots to stormtroopers.

So if I was setting up a cyberpunk setting I'd make sure that "cyber" part still left the users being considered as "punks" who potentially threaten no more than the bottom line of giant, faceless corps rather than direct and immediate threats to the life and safety of human beings within visual range of them.

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

How are you identifying this known hacker, and how is his box suspicious if the only thing that makes it different than the one you're carrying is some illegal programs?

Well no, no more than you could safely warn a man with what you suspect to be a gun in his pocket pointed at you.

If this hacker was on some kind of wanted list, probably. If your excuse is "he had a computer on him" you'd probably be going to the looney bin. Unless he was SINless and you weren't, in which case they'd probably agree he was a threat, make a note in your file for your corporate boss about paranoia, and you'd be free to go. Or if he DID have brainhacking stuff on his deck (and wasn't licensed to carry it) and you just got lucky.

You do realize that in 2075, everyone is carrying a cyberdeck, don't you. It's how you broadcast your SIN, interact with stores, social media, gridguide.... NOT carrying a cyberdeck is a sign you're a societal outcast.

Unlikely. They probably just have a couple people with guns on the plane and a fairly high quality firewall defending it. If it registers an attack, it traces you and you get shot by the air marshals. Unless you're very, very good.

I think that's a very large stretch. But if it works in your games, whatever.

.... unlike people with guns?

Re: GURPS Shadowrun
 

I'm glad I could help!

Luke