AmieDD

AmieDD

INTERVIEW

locked. The bigger security questions I

get asked are more to do with tracking

the individual with a chip in them, and

no, you can’t track me on the internet.

I’ve also had arguments of, “Well, if I

could track my kids, should I?” There are

different opinions on that. There was

a big issue in the US where these three

girls went missing. They were missing

for a number of years and they weren’t

too far away. Would you put one in your

kid on the proviso that you aren’t going

to be watching all the time, but just in

case something happens?

HS There’s a definite air of Black Mirror

about it.

ADD Right, and there’s a whole bunch

of stuff that’s Black Mirror about body

hacking. I think everyone has a different

life experience that turns into ethics at

some point. Would you do that to a child,

knowing that they didn’t have a choice?

Even though they know that they can

track your mobile device?

HS Well, you can turn your phone off, or

leave it at home when you go out. You’re

not compelled to carry it around with

you all the time. My dog has a chip in

him, but he has no rights.

ADD My dog has one too, but it’s more

because the government requires him to

have a rabies tag and identification.

If you got one, what would you use

it for? That’s the question I always ask

people. Me saying what I use it for is

totally fine, but asking what somebody

else is going to use it for, that’s what’s

interesting. A lot of people wouldn’t get

one, but I find that I use mine for more

than I think now I’ve seen what I can do

with it, and that’s part of contributing

back to what you can do or what you can

create with it.

HS I guess if there are devices that

are used by more than one person in a

household, that device could instantly

know who’s holding it and adjust its

settings accordingly?

ADD Yes. For example, at Dallas

Makerspace, the largest makerspace

in the United States, we have so many

members, but some of the tools need an

RFID identification to start the machine,

because you need to have taken a safety

class for that. So, instead of carrying

around your little key fob that’s RFID, it’s

written to my hand. If I want

to use the laser cutter, I scan

my hand, it knows that it’s me,

because it recognises my tag,

verifies that I am allowed to use

it, then lets me use it. As far as

turning on the machine, that’s

not the chip; it’s the access

control that it’s giving me. We

use them for that.

Myself and a couple of

other people are working

on transferring the data from a Tesla

valet key into an implant. As far as the

information you can read from them,

we’ve scanned everything that’s in

there. Tesla does have a bug bounty

programme, so they do give you access

to some of that stuff, because if you can

expose a vulnerability and report it to

them, they can then patch it. But I don’t

really see it as an error; it’s more like an

alternative way of carrying a key.

So, we took apart a few of the valet

keys, and you can take out the chip which

pretty much is just a flat NFC. Have you

ever seen an NFC chip taken out and it

looks like a flat little sticker? It’s just like

that, so it’s very tiny, it’s about 2 mm by

1 mm. Put it in a glass-encapsulated chip,

just like I have, and you could just insert it

and it could work.

”

Would you put one in your

kid on the proviso that you

aren’t gong to be watching

all the time, but just in

case something happens?

”

HackSpace Let’s start off with the

basics; you’ve got a chip in your hand.

As I understand it, there are two sorts

of tech that go in these implants: NFC

and RFID.

ADD Correct. The one I have does both.

They’re both mainly like radio devices.

That stuff has been around forever, right?

It’s a passive read device. If you have a

badge to get into your building, that’s

RFID right there. It’s not a long-range

thing, it doesn’t access the internet, it

does one thing: access control. That’s the

simplest way to put it.

NFC is a more modern version. It’s

still the same kind of thing, it’s reading

information over short distances.

If you have Apple Pay, Google Pay, all of

that type of information on your phone,

you already have NFC on your phone. If

you have a clipper to get into

your building, that is RFID. It

stands for Radio Frequency

Identification. It’s unpowered

• you do not need a charge
  in your hand to pass any
  information. It’s primarily used
  through magnets.

HS How big is it?

ADD It’s about the size of a

grain of rice. If you have pets, the chip

in the pet is pretty much the same

technology. It gets injected with a hollow

needle. In terms of storage, it’s 880 bytes.

HS That’s far more storage than I

thought it would have. Is this consumer-

level stuff? Are companies adding

compatibility with their services?

ADD That chip is from Dangerous

Things. I guess you could go to your vet

and ask for one of those chips, I don’t

know whether they should give it to you.

[As for] readers, NFC is already built into

your phone. I don’t think it’s going to go

away or anything – the security may

change on it a little, but it’s here to stay.

I just tried to get your phone to read

my hand, and it couldn’t because it was