Joe Jesson

Joseph Jesson is CEO of RFSigint Group, a wireless sensor platform IP and SOC supply-chain advisory company, and currently consults with private corporations on wireless sensor networks (LPWAN narrowband digital technology). Joe has 25+ years of experience in designing and implementing - through production - IoT wireless sensors and embedded systems and was awarded General Electric's Innovation prize, the Edison Award, in 2007. Joe was awarded over 15 patents, published in the IEEE IoT Journal, and engineered and tested wireless TEMPEST-shielded secure systems. He currently serves as IEEE Princeton LIFE Affinity Group Chair.

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Wireless Security Risks: Historical Through 2023 Hardware Trojans and International Mobile Subscriber Identity-Catchers

Joseph discusses wireless security beginning with WWII enigma code interception and decryption methods along with the heroes and heroines who worked around the clock to save the allied nations. The cold war, following WWII, introduced additional risks and new challenges and, by example, wireless security failures, ease of wireless packet intercept, and a list of encryption methods with inherent security defects. Finally, wireless risks present in 2023 are shown as security aircraft, ship, automotive, and military cases aircraft, and ship examples.

IMSI-catcher is a telephone eavesdropping device used for intercepting mobile phone traffic and tracking location data of mobile phone users. A "fake" base station may be installed in a building, state police trunk, or UAVs and balloons (!) and targeted cell phones acquired, tracked and logged. This mapping and the service provider's real towers is considered a man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack.

However, sophisticated attacks may be able to downgrade 3G and LTE to non-LTE network services - which do not require mutual authentication - and calls intercepted. State-of-the-art 5G cellular security technology and the identified risks of base-station's dynamically changing protocols, hardware BTS trojans, and group cellids and location interception challenges are highlighted. Originally presented at a Rutgers IEEE dinner, a professor commented it would be a sleepless night after hearing the risks outlined!