KisMAC Developer Discontinues Project

mgv writes to let us know that the lead developer of KisMAC, a passive wireless network discovery tool for Mac OS X, is discontinuing the project. Michael Rossberg lives in Germany and that country has recently passed laws that would make his participation dangerous. He urges visitors to take a copy of KisMAC and its source as long as the site is up, so that development might be continued outside the US or EU. From the website: "There has not been a lot of time for KisMAC lately. However the motivation for this drastic step [lies] somewhere different. German laws change and are being adapted for 'better' protection against something politicians obviously do not understand. It will become illegal to develop, use or even posses KisMAC in this banana republic [i.e., Germany]."

Can he continue 'remotely'?

[fadilnet]

Can he not have a server setup outside Germany and remotely access it and keep the development going on? Simple Example: VNC The development will be outside Germany, in a way. Or, he can break KisMAC into different components, components which are viewed as 'harmless' by the GOV, unless when they get together.

Re:Its a cracking tool

[mgv]

Free speech is fine but I don't agree with having this tool available to non-professionals in a nice easily installed package.

Well, I have used it a bit, and I'm no professional. But having shown people how quickly their encryption fails is a good thing.

At the end of the day, your comment is one of security through obscurity.

Kismac doesn't hack the unhackable, it can however open up access points that are much less secure than their owners think, mostly due to failures by the vendors to use proper algorithms. Why this should bother you is unclear to me.

At the end of the day, the vendors are more likely to change their hardware if this sort of tool is widely available. If it was kept obscure, most hardware vendors would never patch their access points.

I've used it alot, but never actually hacked into anyone's computer by using it.

Its likely to be forked anyway and exist on in another country...

Michael (as the original poster of the article).

Lost Freedom

[twenty3inhouse]

What bothers me (i've never heard about this software before) is the trend for western countries to move away from individual freedom. I live in Australia, it is happening here - the doctor that was held without charge for 3 weeks [sciencedaily.com]. I know it's happening in the US, but now it seems to be happening in other western countries too. Are there any western countries whose citizens aren't losing their individual freedoms?

At least we are having an inquiry into the matter [news.com.au]. How is it in other countries?

Re:Its a cracking tool

[MichaelSmith]

I can kill people with a hammer, or I can use it to build things. I choose the latter. Should we outlaw hammers because some people illegaly misuse them?

Brings to mind the riots in Sydney about a year ago. A sporting goods shop almost sold out of baseball bats in a couple of hours. The manager called the police to ask for a suggested course of action. The cops suggested the store stop selling baseball bats for the time being.

3 hour tour

[Tablizer]

Open-source should buy and island and form a new "country". Call it Stallmanland? Stalland? Nah. Needs work.

German goverment also sponsors security tools

[timbrown]

The irony of the situation is that the German government actively sponsors [nth-dimension.org.uk] work on security tools such as GPG [bsi.bund.de], OpenVAS [openvas.org], BOSS [bsi.bund.de].

Re:Doesnt work in all Macbooks

[Anonymous Coward]

No, actually, it does work on the new macbook's - you just have to compile KisMAC from sources on your specific "macbook that won't run kismac".

Don't ask me why it works, I have no idea, but works it does - and I'm running the mid 2007 macbook model here.

Somewhat OT: Managers

[Lonewolf666]

Part of being a good manager is that you directly manage only stuff you understand.

So if the owner of the company you work for has hired a competent CIO and lets him do his job, that is perfectly OK. In my experience, those who are halfway tech-savvy and start micromanaging things cause a lot more problems.

Re:Can he continue 'remotely'?

[kju]

First: If he accesses the server from germany, development will not be considered to happen outside of germany. Second: Won't matter anyway, as german law declares itself to be applicable to what a german does even outside of germany.

Re:Its a cracking tool

[Adam Hazzlebank]

I don't buy this analogy, partly because trying your key randomly in order doors isn't going to work (ok there are certain flawed implementations but..) and secondly because it's not the use the tool was designed for. If anything you could say it's like a lock pick. You can use it to test how easy it is to break in to your house or you could use it to break in to someone else's house. Again, the problem is that people might be inclined to agree that lock picks should only be made available to licensed professionals. Don't get me wrong, I think both Kismac and lockpicks are fine. But I'm not sure society in general would agree with me.