CAPEC-606 Weakening of Cellular Encryption

An attacker, with control of a Cellular Rogue Base Station or through cooperation with a Malicious Mobile Network Operator can force the mobile device (e.g., the retransmission device) to use no encryption (A5/0 mode) or to use easily breakable encryption (A5/1 or A5/2 mode).

• Cellular devices that allow negotiating security modes to facilitate backwards compatibility and roaming on legacy networks.

• [Medium] Adversaries can purchase and implement rogue BTS stations at a cost effective rate, and can push a mobile device to downgrade to a non-secure cellular protocol like 2G over GSM or CDMA.

• Confidentiality: Other

• Use of hardened baseband firmware on retransmission device to detect and prevent the use of weak cellular encryption. • Monitor cellular RF interface to detect the usage of weaker-than-expected cellular encryption.