SpyPi: A Rugged, Portable Hacking Station for Teaching Network Security

Network security, particularly wireless network security, is an important topic. Unfortunately, it’s one that many people underestimate or simply don’t care about. For her high school graduation project, Reddit user sarah314 decided to build a portable hacking station designed to highlight common security vulnerabilities.

The station, called “SpyPi,” is built on a Raspberry Pi, and contains a number of programs and scripts that take advantage of simple security holes in networks. It has a network scanner for sniffing out information about nearby networks, and hacking tools like bruteforce dictionary attacks and login data catching.

Another interesting feature is a Twitter analyzer, for mining information about a given Twitter user. It sifts through the user’s tweets to find whatever it can, such as the user’s interests and things they talk about often. The purpose is twofold: to show how much personal information we put out publicly, and to point out the fact that this information can be used for nefarious purposes.

Of course, sarah314 doesn’t intend to do any black hat hacking with this (and doesn’t want any one else to either). Instead, she wants it to be used for educational purposes. She hopes it will help illustrate just how easy it is to exploit networks and to gain someone’s personal information. Ideally, this will help people realize the importance of taking security seriously, and motivate them to take the proper precautions.