Is Your Hotel Key Hackable?

May 7, 2018 By E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

By sunday hill @ Shutterstock.com

A group of savvy hackers has found a way to compromise one of the more popular hotel room lock systems, Vision by VingCard. The Swedish manufactured system is used in 42,000 properties in 166 countries. Zack Whittaker reports at ZDNet:

These electronic lock systems are commonplace in hotels, used by staff to provide granular controls over where a person can go in a hotel — such as their room — and even restricting the floor that the elevator stops at. And these keys can be wiped and reused when guests check-out.

It turns out these key cards aren’t as secure as first thought.

F-Secure’s Tomi Tuominen and Timo Hirvonen, who carried out the work, said they could create a master key “basically out of thin air.”

Any key card will do. Even old and expired, or discarded keys retain enough residual data to be used in the attack. Using a handheld device running custom software, the researchers can steal data off of a key card — either using wireless radio-frequency identification (RFID) or the magnetic stripe. That device then manipulates the stolen key data, which identifies the hotel, to produce an access token with the highest level of privileges, effectively serving as a master key to every room in the building.

E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

E.J. Smith is Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. His focus at all times is on preparing clients and readers for “Times Like These.” E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zildjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart (RIP) of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West (RIP JB) and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@yoursurvivalguy.com To sign up for my free monthly Survive & Thrive letter, click here.

Latest posts by E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy (see all)

A Word on Stock Prices and Their Nephew - September 9, 2024
In Your Retirement Life, This Matters the Most - September 9, 2024
Americans are Bullish on Stocks, Should You Be? - September 9, 2024
It’s Time to Evaluate Your Portfolio - September 6, 2024
Congratulations Babson College - September 6, 2024

A Word on Stock Prices and Their Nephew

A word on stock market prices and their nephew past performance. When investors pile into the S&P 500 the way so many do—automatically with their 401(k) contributions—there’s a tremendous amount of money riding on the same stuff. Investors, knowingly or unknowingly, get piled into the same boat, hoping and praying to get to their retirement […]

In Your Retirement Life, This Matters the Most

Remember, it’s not what you invest in but how you invest that matters most. With the mini pullback in stocks, look at how well-balanced portfolios have done. In The Wall Street Journal, Jon Sindreau explains that the last few months have shown (once again) the value of a balanced portfolio of stocks and bonds. He […]

Americans are Bullish on Stocks, Should You Be?

The stock market has minted millionaires this year, reports Gunjan Banjerji in The Wall Street Journal. That’s not bad, but Americans, as Banerji explains, “have rarely been this giddy about the stock market.” Banerji writes: U.S. households’ stock allocations have steadily inched up this year, according to JPMorgan estimates, and recently accounted for around 42% […]

It’s Time to Evaluate Your Portfolio

When investors are feeling good about the stock market, like they are now, it’s time to evaluate your portfolio. As Warren Buffett said you want “to be fearful when others are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.” Remember the big pullbacks in stocks this century and think how you would handle […]

Congratulations Babson College

Congratulations to Babson College, coming in at #2 on the 2025 list of Best College in America from The Wall Street Journal. That’s a big jump from last year’s already impressive rank of #10. Here’s what Tom Corrigan and Kevin McAllister have to say about Babson in the WSJ: At second-ranked Babson College, the emphasis […]

Biden Admits to False Advertising

Joe Biden has finally admitted to what everyone who was paying attention already knew. The so-called “Inflation Reduction Act” had nothing to do with inflation and everything to do with making Biden’s “Green New Deal” palatable to Americans looking for relief at the gas pump and grocery stores. While Americans suffered to buy the essentials, […]

Your Survival Guy’s Update on the Kittens

“No one gets out alive,” is a thought running through my head as I think about integrating our kittens into life as we know it. For a little background, we brought home two Bengal kittens—Phantom and Fred—a couple weeks ago. Together they make a whole lot of chaos. But did I mention our daughter’s cat, […]

What I Do When I Hear “Digital Advisor”

When Your Survival Guy hears “digital advisor,” I run. Vanguard is “allowing” smaller accounts into “Digital Advisor” services. Alex Ortolani reports at Plan Adviser: Vanguard announced Wednesday it will lower the asset minimum for its automatic advisory services to expand access to a broader swath of clients. The asset management giant has lowered the minimum […]

Don’t Rely on a Crystal Ball

Remember, as the great Ben Graham would remind us, it’s not what you invest in that matters most, it’s how you invest. In other words, a mix of bonds and stocks is how a balanced portfolio might look. It’s not about one stock vs. another. Stocks can stay down for a long time. Don’t rely […]

What Causes School Shootings? Join the Discussion

Originally posted May 23, 2018. My friend Tim Jones, a.k.a. the Stissing Mountain Man, who I profiled for you last month, has a unique take on school shootings. Tim asked on his Facebook feed, what has changed at schools? In the 70s, when he attended, students would bring their guns to school and store them […]

A Conversation with Dick Young about Father Time

“Investors are on edge after Tuesday’s selloff, with U.S. stock futures falling and markets in Asia and Europe on the retreat,” reads this morning’s WSJ. Are we having fun yet? Now that Labor Day is to our stern, the market seems a bit more serious, don’t you think? Can it really continue at this pace for […]

2 Reasons to Roll Over Your 401(k) to Fidelity

When you can, Your Survival Guy wants you to roll over your 401(k) to an IRA Rollover at Fidelity. Here are two reasons why, as explained by Olivia S. Mitchell in The Wall Street Journal: Rolling over to an IRA You’ll likely have more investment options. One of the primary benefits of rolling over a […]

When Age Comes Crashing Down like a Wave

When it comes to money, Father Time is on your side. Compound interest works better the longer you give it to run its course. But what hurts is your own body aging beneath you. It turns out that aging may not be a “gradual” occurrence, but may instead happen in waves that crash down on […]

When the Coast Is Clear

When the Coast is Clear — By Jimmy Buffett/Mac Mcanally “The tourist traps are empty, Vacancy abounds, Almost like it used to be, Before the circus came to town” Yes, it’s that time of year when Labor Day’s to our stern with some more summer ahead, but change is in the air now that the […]

America’s Absurd Energy Regulations

You may remember back in 2019 when Your Survival Guy and Gal were dealing with a natural gas outage in Newport, RI, that many blamed on not enough gas capacity in the New England region. Part of the problem then, as it is now, is regulatory barriers that block new pipelines from bringing America’s abundant […]