Firewalls Don't Stop Dragons Podcast Meet Rayhunter
Sep 1, 2025
Join Cooper Quintin, security researcher at EFF, and The Gibson, founder of Hackers.Town, as they dive into the Rayhunter project, a groundbreaking tool aimed at detecting cellular surveillance. They discuss how our phones inadvertently broadcast our locations and the threats posed by cell site simulators. The conversation highlights privacy activism, the evolution of surveillance technologies, and practical steps individuals can take to protect their digital privacy. This engaging dialogue sheds light on the intersection of technology, activism, and community efforts.
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Community Data Enables Oversight
- Rayhunter's goal is transparency: collect baseline evidence so experts and the public can understand where IMSI catchers are used.
- Lack of vendor and police transparency means community-collected data fills crucial gaps for policy debates.
Real Cases: Scams And Malware Delivery
- Cooper recounted scams and NSO-style exploitation where IMSI catchers enabled SMS fraud and malware delivery.
- He referenced a French car incident and a Moroccan activist whose phone got Pegasus material via an IMSI catcher.
From SDR Labs To $20 Hotspots
- Crocodile Hunter used high-end SDRs but was expensive, hard to use, and produced data hard for nonexperts to interpret.
- Rayhunter pivoted to cheap mass-deployable hotspots to democratize detection and gather interpretable logs.
