The bluetooth rifle

(via), the bluetooth rifle by USC student John Hering:

John Hering, a student at the University of Southern California, has developed the BlueSniper rifle, a tool that looks like a big gun which can "attack" a wireless device from more than a mile away -- several times the 328-foot maximum range of Bluetooth.

Hering, cofounder of a wireless security think tank called Flexilis, says he uses the "rifle" only to determine security vulnerabilities, not to actually hack wireless devices to obtain personal information. (...) Hering says his goal is to boost awareness of the vulnerabilities in Bluetooth. But in laboratory testing, Hering says, his company has been able to access SMS messages, passwords, phonebook contacts and camera phone photos from Bluetooth-enabled phones.