Lewis Perdue's Blog, page 10

Cover-Up: Why The FAA Is Wrong When It Says Airplanes Are Not Hackable

The Federal Aviation Administration is wrong and either misinformed or involved in a cover-up when it says hackers can’t take over a modern aircraft: Authorities dismiss alleged airplane hijack hack.

If you click on that link, please read the comments. They are far more intelligent, thoughtful and  illuminating than the FAA’s.

Truth is that neither the FAA nor the global airline industry nor any country’s air transport regulators can afford to let the flying public know how buggy, unpredictable and hackable the flight control systems in a modern fly-by-wire aircraft really are. The economic consequences of those disclosures would be too disastrous. Just look at what the Icelandic volcano flight delays did to airline profits.

The following is from my heavily researched, investigative thriller, Die By Wire. This excerpt shows the “good guys” beginning to figure out how the bad guys are going to do a 9/11 the global aviation industry.

Future posts here will detail (without spoilers) more about how this is so very doable.

FROM DIE BY WIRE

“How could we get a modern fly-by-wire aircraft to commit suicide?”

“Remember, cockpit controls today lack physical connections.” Noord’s voice carried the authority of someone who had flown the very aircraft he had helped design. “No cables, no hydraulic links between the wheels and pedals to the wings, the engines, to the tail.”

Noord paused. His nose and upper lip curled like he had just gotten a whiff of a loathsome odor.

“Pilots today don’t fly an aircraft anymore,” he said. “Much of the judgment is taken out of their hands and placed in the bowels of the computers. We have a saying that the cockpit of today consists of two men and a dog. The first man is there to watch the computer display. The dog is there to bite him if he tries to touch anything. The second man is there to feed the dog. Sadly, today’s airline pilot plays a glorified video game of a Flight Simulator.”

“But why?” Mira asked.

“Economics mostly, “Noord explained. “Eliminating direct physical controls means a big weight savings, no hydraulic pumps, tubing, fluid and reservoirs. That trims fuel costs. The computer software can also build in limits to keep pilots from using their best judgment.”

Noord paused, cleared his throat.

“And in an insane effort to save even more money, the very newest aircraft are starting to use wireless connections instead of wires, a sort of WII Fit and WiFi meets avionics.”

“Sir?” Theo raised a deferential hand. “All of our other aviation sources say that fly-by-wire control systems have backups that have backups. Three different hardware systems from three different manufacturers running three different operating systems that check everything against each other. Nothing has ever malfunctioned.”

Noord’s laughter conveyed scorn, skepticism, weary resignation.

“There have been many reported… anomalies. Loss of power, blanked out displays, instrument and control malfunctions. Some happen only once and most times the software engineers never determine the cause. All have been deemed within operational limits. Pilots have learned to live with the unpredictability of unpredictable events.”

“Unpredictability of unpredictable events ….” Theo’s voice came soft and vague. “Within operational limits.”

Oblivious to the baffled looks around him, the gifted mathematician craned his head at the ceiling, his gaze fixed on a distant horizon. He worked his head this direction and that.

“Chaos theory.” He nodded at something only he could see.

Comprehension pinched his lips and sliced deep vertical lines between his brows.

“You’ve heard of the ‘butterfly effect,’ yes? The concept that a butterfly flapping its wings in the Amazon could create … result in a hurricane in Florida?”

Heads nodded.

“Tiny unseeable effects that strengthen each other in just the right way can amplify a very small effect into a very large one,” Theo continued.

“But wouldn’t system redundancies and flight testing prevent that happening in a computer?” Stocker asked.

“That would make it less probable,” Theo shook his head. “Not impossible.”

“Experience bears that out,” Noord said, “especially with the phenomenon of aeronautical flutter.”

Eyebrows arched.

“No matter how good the design of new aircraft, flight testing always reveals resonant flutters at various speed configurations,” explained Noord. “Many of these can shake the aircraft apart. To prevent that, flutter testing involves an extensive, and expensive, airworthiness certification.

“Because even small changes can alter flutters in big ways, aircraft are tested in every possible configuration: empty, full and partially loaded at every intermediate level, with uneven fuel loadings, with every possible engine, engine cowling, simulated ice build-up. You name it, everything the engineers can think of.

“Before fly-by-wire,” Noord continued, “flutter testing was accomplished by adding weights to the wings, or the control surfaces, physically altering various parts of the aircraft to see what would cause flutter, instability or some other malfunction. But with fly-by-wire, the actual flight control computers are programmed to shake, rattle and roll the plane’s control surfaces. Re-engineering physical components fixes some flutter problems and others are patched up by altering the computer code to prevent pilots from executing maneuvers that would cause an instability.”

“Conversely, you could crash a plane by programming the fly-by-wire system to cause flutter instabilities,” Mira asked. “Especially known flutter problems that engineers fixed only in software, not on the aircraft itself.”

“Theoretically,” Noord said. “But you’d have to have direct access to the computers and software in a manner that could coordinate a number of simultaneous crashes. That level of access is unlikely.”

“Not if you were Tau Partners,” Theo said, “which has the world’s biggest database of system flaws. That could be exploited to create a failure cascade that could predictably cause numbers of aircraft to self-destruct on command. To disappear over deep water without a trace.”

Hijacking Airplanes With A Phone: So 3 Years Ago!

Hijacking airplanes with an Android phone is SO three years ago!

Why?

Because this thriller, Die By Wire details an even more effective way to do this. I wrote it more than three years ago. I was published in December 2011.

The following two links will offer more insight into the hack that goes far beyond the relatively simple Android phone exploit:

Modern Fly-By-Wire Aircraft Could Be Die-By-Wire Death Traps
The Prelude To Fictional (And Real-Life) Aircraft Disappearances: Hacking Unencrypted GPS:

True, the Die By Wire hack used a modified laptop, but the conclusion is the same: The fly-by-wire computers in a modern aircraft can be hacked, hijacked and become a real-time version of Flight Simulator for the bad guys.

FAA, OTHERS POINT OUT WEAKNESSES IN ANDROID HACK

I agree with the two articles, below, that the Android hack described this week is way too simple to do the whole job.

In fact, I started with the same logic and looked at the exact two signals more than three years ago when I started my research. I realized then that it could not take control of the entire aircraft. So, I expanded on the concept in order to make 24 Airbuses disappear over the Atlantic. Simultaneously.

In a follow-up article published yesterday in Bloomberg Businessweek, the U.S. Federal Aviation Admnistration said that the Android phone exploit could not, by itself, allow a hacker to hijack an aircraft.

Then The Atlantic Wire ran this piece: No, That German Hacker Probably Can’t Hijack an Airplane with Software .

Both articles are right about the Android hack. But that still leaves the one I created for Die By Wire.

And, yes, some of the very specific details were omitted in the book.

The last time I got really specific about things I developed, the Iranians who took over the American Embassy used them as step-by-step instructions.

Since then, I have blurred a few things. After all, I travel on fly-by, die-by-wire aircraft too, mostly because there’s little choice left.

Sikhs Continue To Lead The Way In Religious Tolerance

“SIKHS built four doors to the Golden Temple at Amritsar, in north India, to welcome believers from all four corners of their earth. But in the five centuries since, few religions have followed that tolerant example. Hindus and Muslims fight fiercely over religious ruins in ancient Ayodhya. Christians have long wrangled among themselves, and with other faiths, over Jerusalem’s holy places.” — Read the rest from The Economist . 

I’ve often written here about religious tolerance.

My book, Daughter of God, was very much about that and the universality of religious experience — except when dogma and narrow-minded humans get in the way.

I’ve had a number of these conversations with one of my very best friends, tech entrepreneur Inder Singh who gave me the book, below. It’s a prize in my library.

If you read the Economist piece, above, you’ll find how sad it often is that other religions do not live a faith of tolerance as the Sikh’s do.

I believe that finding peace with God begins with finding peace with fellow humans.

 

Thank You Readers! All Over The World. Thank You!

I was wandering around my office the other day looking for a copy of one of my older thrillers.

And ran across a section that contains some of the foreign editions. I think I’ve been translated into 23 languages and don’t know how many countries that spans.

I stopped.

And realized that in the press to get one book after another written, I had lost sight of how incredibly wonderful it was to know that people all over the world enjoy my books.

Thank you readers! Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

It’s The Sheep That Are Polarizing US Politics!

I originally wrote this piece for Dvorak Uncensored, the blog for my good friend, John Dvorak.

Not the useful four-legged species that give us sweaters and butterflied leg of lamb with mint jelly. Nope, we’re talking the far less helpful, two-legged kind, you know: Democrats and Republicans.

A USA Today Poll out today identified the sheep in question:

The survey asked 1,000 Americans to assess two education policies. The first plan was to reduce class sizes and make sure schools teach the basics. The second was to increase teacher pay while making it easier to fire bad teachers.

For half the sample, the first plan was labeled a Democratic plan and the second a Republican plan.

Okay, fair enough, but:

Then the labels were switched for the other half. The “Democratic” plan became the “Republican” plan, and vice versa.

And what did the sheep do then?

In both cases, about three-fourths of Democrats and Republicans lined up behind the plan they had been told belonged to their party. In fact, both sides were inclined to describe their support as intense, to say they “strongly” favored it — regardless of which policy it happened to be.

Sheep happens.

Polarized, mindless sheep so incapable of critical thinking about the merits of an issue that they just line up behind which every party is marching them off the Left cliff or the Right cliff. With the same splat at the bottom.

Read the rest of the USA Today piece. And weep.

Bestsellers: The Easy, Sleazy Way

When all the bets are down on a particular book and a bestseller is what’s gotta happen, publishers — and now authors — have ways of buying their way onto the bestseller lists. I’m not talking just about the megabucks for megabooks promotions that anointed authors can count on.

SLEAZE ROCKET LAUNCH IN 3 … 2 … 1 …

I’m talking about a sleazy secret that the big publishers won’t admit, but most have done: push humongous numbers of books into the retail channels.

Then target those retail outlets who get monitored by The New York Times and other bestseller lists. Then give your minions and spouses of minions enough money to go out and buy copies of the book … thus front-loading sales.

Of course, this works best when you’re a really big publisher and have many, many minions and beaucoup big bucks.

As soon as the book makes the bestseller list, then the headlines start and the new promo can play off bestseller status. If the initial sleaze rocket lands on target, the public gets interested and a genuine bestseller results.

AND NOW, ANYONE CAN BUY A SLEAZE ROCKET

The Wall Street Journal’s Jeffrey Trachtenberg has written one of the best investigative pieces about this: The Mystery of the Book Sales Spike

Trachtrenberg’s piece exposes a long-time, old-school sleazy practice that’s been turned into a lucrative business used by a number of current bestsellers and by Amazon (which claims that it has stopped.)

The new business, started by San Diego-based marketing firm, ResultSource, has turned the traditional publisher’s dirty practice into a business model.

According to Trachtenberg’s piece:

“As ResultSource’s website points out, hitting best-seller lists can mean fame, and potentially lucrative consulting assignments.

“Publishing a book builds credibility, but having a Bestseller initiates incredible growth—exponentially increasing the demand for your thought leadership, skyrocketing your speaking itinerary and value,” ResultSource says.

Soren Kaplan, author of business bestseller Leapfrogging, says he paid at least $75,000 to ResultSource which then bought him a  slot on the Wall Street Journal’s bestseller list.

ResultSource, to be fair, didn’t invent the practice. It just found a way to make a profit off a practice pioneered by traditional publishers.

With this sort of chicanery on top of people paying for reviews, it’s clear that the only reliable reviews of books will come from user-generated writing on sites like Good Reads. And that will remain only for as long as the bloggers remain honest.

See the site for the MBA course I teach — Online Content, Prostitution & Disclosure – for what could happen if bloggers don’t police themselves.

Finally: Good Economic News From Greece!

Well, good economic news for me.

I got a check in the mail this week for royalties from the Greek edition of my book, Daughter of God (one of my thrillers ripped off by The Da Vinci Code).

It’s always good to get an unexpected check.

But that happened because super agent Natasha Kern was very, very smart when she negotiated my contract with Macmillan/Tor/Forge and retained foreign rights. She then used her killer foreign rights network to sell this and other books worldwide.

This is all by comparison with no royalties at all from Macmillan/Tor/Forge who still hold three of my books hostage … out of print with badly produced ebook versions filled with scanner artifacts all that remain.

You can read about those books here: Lew’s Books or at Amazon. But I don’t recommend that you buy them in ebook format. Better to buy a used hardcopy unless, by some miracle, one of them happens to be back in print.

Despite the fact that those three books — Daughter of God, The Da Vinci Legacy and Slatewiper — earned back their royalties years ago, creative accounting means that I haven’t seen a penny from them.

Kudos to the Greeks!

Big Bear Burning: Was Dorner Lynched?

I was born in Mississippi in 1949. Around that time one of the easiest ways to lynch an entire African-American family was to set the house on fire and shoot people as they ran out. That tactic took fewer people than the average hanging, and you didn’t have to show your face.

The technique also worked well in Al-Qaeda’s massacre at the American embassy in Benghazi.

And it worked at Big Bear, too.

The San Bernadino County Sheriff’s knew the grenades they fired into the cabin were highly flammable, and would be set off by a spark. Or a gun shot.

Either the sheriff’s people were stupid about that or the Sheriff lied when he said they had not intended to burn Dorner.

The cabin was surrounded. A siege was in order, not a lynching. Certainly emotions ran high. Anger. Adrenalin surf. But the public has a right to expect that their law enforcement personnel are professional and disciplined. And have an interest in justice rather than revenge.

Law enforcement failed on all of those accounts at Big Bear.

Dorner may very well have been the vicious killer he was painted as.

But the way that law enforcement behaved that night at Big Bear resembled the sort of undisciplined, fury-driven madness that characterized the Ku Klux Klan of my home state. Or terrorists at Benghazi. One can argue that the motivations may have been different, but the results are indisputably the same.

I have written about a number of the many strange, suspicious aspects of this case: L.A.’s “Killer Cop:” Was He Set Up? but law enforcement’s stonewalling, lack of transparency and blood lust to revenge their own losses raises a questions, destroys their credibility, further damages the shaky trust they have with the public and makes a lot of people wonder, “what was so important to cover up that they have to made sure he never got a chance to speak in court?”

I took some minor licks in the 1960s, most notably when a Madison County (Mississippi) deputy wanted to beat the hell out of me and my best friend Arthur for bringing water to a school teacher from Ohio whose car radiator had overheated on Highway 55 during a civil rights march.

I outran the sucker in my 426 Hemi Plymouth, otherwise I might not be writing this right now. I have seen the face of undisciplined law enforcement and know what it looks like.

And right now, it looks a lot like Big Bear.

 

 

We Should NOT Be Crying For Barnes & Noble. Nope. Uh, Uh.

No Crying.

Instead, we should be praying for resurrection through vision, critical thinking and the outmoded notion of customer service.

First independent book stores blamed chains like Barnes & Noble for stealing their customers. Then Crown Books went under. And Borders made a big splat. They blamed Amazon. B&N is the last brick-and-mortar titan standing and it’s against the ropes.

And they blame Amazon too.

Blame is easy to come by in the book biz. Never mind that antiquated business models and the failure to have a glimpse of the future lie at the root of the legacy company failures.

Critical thinking and visionary ideas abandoned legacy publishing sometime in the 1930s.

An article in the Los Angeles Times said:

Barnes & Noble isn’t near dead, but a lot of writers are lining up to lament its passing. They say the chain’s demise would be a blow to books, especially in suburban America.

Last week, Barnes & Noble announced that it would close about 20 stores each year over the next decade, leaving at least 450 stores (before the Great Recession struck, the chain had 726). Suddenly, the book behemoth, once seen as responsible (with its vanquished foe, Borders) for the demise of many an independent bookstore, is being celebrated for its contribution to book culture.

Stop whining.

Sell customers what they want to read, how they want to read it, at a decent price and deliver it in the manner the customer prefers.

 

L.A.’s “Killer Cop:” Was He Set Up?

As a thriller writer, I get paid to see conspiracies behind current events.

I am not saying that former LAPD officer Christopher Jordan Dorner has actually been secretly set up because he needed to be silenced.

But because we now have secret courts in the United States and private hits on American citizens coming from the White House, I am saying that if he is innocent and has been set up, we’d never know the difference between that and the current situation as described by authorities.

It is quite possible that he’s an accomplished former military and law enforcement officer who’s gone totally and tragically off his nut.

But with secret courts and secret killings the order of business, we’ll never actually know.

Government at every level gets less and less transparent every day. And that’s why they are less and less trusted by the public.