Software-defined radio can derail a US train by slamming the brakes on remotely

https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/14/train_brakes_flaw/

by pseudolus • 1 year ago

14 5 1 year ago

Klaster_1• 1 year ago

I wonder if russian trains are also vulnerable to radio based exploits. Imagine derailing a military train with a cheap drone and an SDR.

dlcarrier• 1 year ago

I live near a railyard, and when playing around with a scanner, I was amazed by how much of their communication is over open voice bands. You could easily buy an off-the-shelf transmitter and make your own unauthorized radio calls.

The same goes for air traffic controllers, and it's happened before: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-05/melbourne-airport-hoa...

spaqin• 1 year ago

Yep, same in Poland (called "Radio-Stop"). Yep, unauthorized uses happen. Generally though you have to be pretty close and can be caught through that. Surprisingly it's not that big of a deal.

persolb• 1 year ago

It’s really frustrating seeing all this about something I know about.

‘Slamming in the brakes’ is the default safe condition for a train. The freight train Positive Train Control does this automatically if the operating engineer breaks certain speed/location rules. It probably happens thousands of times a day at speed.

This whole thing is FUD.

railfan• 1 year ago

Well good work, Neil. You got into El Reg. This will be GREAT for your resume, even if you never actually try the exploit. Spamming HN is like growth hacking for your career.

Software-defined radio can derail a US train by slamming the brakes on remotely

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