SATAn: Air-Gap Exfiltration Attack via Radio Signals From SATA Cables

guest · Jul 19, 2022

Devilish SATAn Hack Turns Drive Cable Into Antenna to Steal Data
July 18, 2022

Researchers today revealed a new 'SATAn' attack that can turn a SATA cable into a radio transmitter, thus allowing a hacker to exfiltrate data from a system that isn't connected to a network and transmit it to a receiver 1m away — all without physically modifying the SATA cable or hardware. The software-based technique can work from user space or through a virtual machine (VM), and you can see a short demo in the embedded video below.
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Some of the most sensitive data on the planet is stored in air-gapped systems.

As such, it requires ultra-sophisticated techniques to steal data from them. Researcher Mordechai Guri at the University of the Negev, Israel, has accomplished the feat by converting a standard SATA cable into a radio transmitter, but without actually making any physical modifications to the hardware.
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As with all computer interfaces, the SATA bus generates electromagnetic interference during normal operation, and if used correctly, that interference can be manipulated and then used to transmit data.
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arXiv: SATAn: Air-Gap Exfiltration Attack via Radio Signals From SATA Cables

This paper introduces a new type of attack on isolated, air-gapped workstations. Although air-gap computers have no wireless connectivity, we show that attackers can use the SATA cable as a wireless antenna to transfer radio signals at the 6 GHz frequency band.
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EASTER · Jul 20, 2022

New Air-Gap Attack Uses SATA Cable as an Antenna to Transfer Radio Signals

"Although air-gap computers have no wireless connectivity, we show that attackers can use the SATA cable as a wireless antenna to transfer radio signals at the 6GHz frequency band," Dr. Mordechai Guri, the head of R&D in the Cyber Security Research Center in the Ben Gurion University of the Negev in Israel, wrote in a paper published last week.

The technique, dubbed SATAn, takes advantage of the prevalence of the computer bus interface, making it "highly available to attackers in a wide range of computer systems and IT environments."

Put simply, the goal is to use the SATA cable as a covert channel to emanate electromagnetic signals and transfer a brief amount of sensitive information from highly secured, air-gapped computers wirelessly to a nearby receiver more than 1m away.
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SATAn: Air-Gap Exfiltration Attack via Radio Signals From SATA Cables

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