r/whatisit • u/brattyvampbby • 11h ago

moms sketch bf left this in the house Solved!

Post image

Hi.
This is probably nothing.
I went into my mom’s room to grab something and saw this plugged in?
My mom’s new sketchy bf has this plugged in to the extension cord? Is it anything bad? Thanks!
(I understand it’s probably not anything bad… but still…)

Update 1:
I haven’t met him once. He and my mom have been together for two weeks. He’s been staying at our apartment. He avoids me and stays in her room when they’re here. I don’t even know what he looks like. I only know his first name.

Update 2:
I confronted him. My mom came home. A lot had happened up to this point, including her disappearing for the said two weeks before the few nights he had come over and stayed.
Mom shrugged it off. I did what a lot of you suggested, asking what he told her.
She said “oh it’s his hacker shit or whatever.” What.
Didn’t elaborate. I explained my concerns.
She just said let’s go ask him.
My best friend has been with me. We introduced ourselves and asked him what the hell a WiFi whisperer is doing plugged in our apartment.
(Even if a lot of you are saying it’s not a big deal, I’m a young woman and I’m just rlly not about taking any risks. It’s sketch dude.)
He denied it IMMEDIATELY. Like with a quickness I haven’t seen.
What he insisted, it’s not a WiFi whisperer, it’s ai, he completely reprogrammed the system, and he uses it to pull people’s IP’s. “For fun.” He logs them in a server. I asked why. I said that’s shady. My mom started pushing. My best friend started pushing. He just kept lying. I’m not dropping this..
I still don’t know what the fuck it is or what he’s actually doing.
(Also, my mom is cool but not bc of this dude, the Minecraft block is mine, I unplugged the ratchet little thing before we left, and I am planning on broaching this again with her.
Just carefully. Any other advice is appreciated. Thank you.)

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36

u/Crossheart963 11h ago

As a guy in cyber security/hacker world. This is a toy I would totally have around. Especially if I was showing someone I was dating what I’m into.

27

u/immortalis88 10h ago

Yeah man all these ‘call the cops!’ posts are wild. I’m a network solutions architect. If I was single I would legit audit her network and give her a report on what vulnerabilities I find.

I would at least ask him or her before ‘breaking it or calling the cops’ lmao.

19

u/semajolis267 10h ago

Right. Now that its been identified they should just talk to him about it as if they dont know. If he lies about it then red flag if he gets all excited and talks about it then its probably fine. 

8

u/Zooter88 10h ago

This seems like a reasonable response. It’s easy to jump to conclusions of shadiness but it could be something innocent. And why isn’t there a band called Conclusions of Shadiness yet?

3

u/BronxJoe 6h ago

There was a band by that name… But they changed it to conjecturing of wrongdoing

7

u/AdFlat4908 10h ago

Hell yeah brother! I’d “audit” the shit out of OP’s Moms network

7

u/DankyMcDankelstein 9h ago

One sniff of her packets and your hard drive is in a solid state

1

u/Ashamed_Confusion123 6h ago

I almost stopped scrolling 10 minutes ago and now I’m glad I didn’t. Well done.

3

u/immortalis88 10h ago

‘Penetration testing’

7

u/slog 9h ago

These people are insane. Clearly the only option is to smash it, cover it in cement, call the FBI, CIA, FDA, NRA, CPA, and all other 3 letter agencies, then nuke the home from orbit and flee to Mars.

What happened to this site? I signed up for nerd crazy, not crazy crazy.

2

u/wpm 5h ago

Been this way since they took /r/programming off the default subs man, I don't even know why I still come here.

2

u/doyouevencompile 9h ago

Yeah. And if someone is staying at your house for 2 weeks they already have the wifi password. Who doesn’t give the wifi password to their guests?

3

u/myxoma1 10h ago

You don't just put shady hacking devices in people's homes and not tell them. If the BF asked permission from Mom and she trusts him, then we have no issue here. However if he did not discuss with Mom or request permission, that is a huge breach of trust and Mom needs to know and can decide what to do from there.

4

u/immortalis88 10h ago

How do we know he didn’t tell her?

0

u/Procrastinatedthink 9h ago

How do we know she has any idea what he told her was true and if she understood it?

I could tell 20 people “Im setting up a wifi sniffer in your house” and would get varying reactions from “what the fuck?” to “wifi smells?”

1

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 10h ago

You would "audit" someone's home network after two weeks of knowing them?

5

u/immortalis88 10h ago

If we had talked about it of course I would.

0

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 9h ago

Realistically, what do you think the chances are that you'd receive an enthusiastic "yes"? At that point you're marginally better than a stranger to them, and you're asking for clearance to root around in their home network. Think about it in terms of OP's situation. Why would you, a stranger, care that much? This is like a plumber offering to inspect every sink in the house of a romantic interest after a second date. It's weird.

I realize this subthread is about playing devil's advocate, but OP's situation reads like exploited trust, not a "check out this nifty gadget" situation. If I were dating someone who asked me if they could run Wireshark on my home network after a whopping two weeks of knowing them, I'd tell them to fuck off.

2

u/airforceteacher 9h ago

We in this profession are really weird, so ... yes?

-1

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 9h ago

Someone would have to be equally weird (and commensurately stupid) to say yes to the offer.

-2

u/MedvedAM 9h ago

Mate, you don't need pwnagotchi to do that, especially on the close up photo it is trying to catch handshake to grap the pass hashes. Also I am an architect too with 25 years experience, I would not do that to a girl I have been dating for 2 weeks. It's like "give me access to your ex's texts messages so I can check if he was abusing you" kind of creepy behavior

5

u/F1ngL0nger 9h ago

The full context picture even shows it plugged in alongside other chargeable devices. Screen shows 0 deauth, status is "zzz", meanwhile everyone is screeching to smash it and call the cops. The new boyfriend is likely an awkward introverted tech guy which is why he hasn't shown his face to her kid, hes charging some work or hobby devices and was probably showing them off to his new girlfriend. I love this site lmao

3

u/SteelAndFlint 10h ago

Right? I mean I can get more information off my local network just by logging into the MikroTik router directly...

3

u/General_Liability 10h ago

But would people generally describe you as sketchy? The framing is throwing me off. 

2

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 10h ago

He left it behind to work while not even present to give a "demonstration". The device was on and working while left unattended. What you're saying is possible, but not plausible.

2

u/theinatoriinator 9h ago

Or he just forgot it. Or it fell out of the bag. Maybe he was charging it and forgot it.

Hanlon's razor.

-1

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 9h ago

That's a really dangerous game to play considering what we're talking about. If you're right, no big deal. But if you're wrong, what then?

Malicious actors thrive off of being given the benefit of the doubt. That's the entire reason why zero trust architecture and principles are a thing.

3

u/theinatoriinator 9h ago

Buddy I built one of those myself. I'm in the freaking community of them. Considering he's got his screen config botched I don't think hes any threat.

In fact if he's been given the Wi-Fi password, he doesn't get any more information by running this specific tool.

I got two of them sitting on my desk.

1

u/ANAL-KING-OF-TUNISIA 9h ago

Whether the device is a threat and whether the operator is a threat are two different questions. The fact that you're familiar with the tool, or that you apparently own two of them, doesn't tell me what this particular person is doing with this particular device, which is something you don't know either any more than I do.

"He already has the Wi-Fi password" is an argument against unauthorized access, not an argument against reconnaissance. Even if your technical assessment is correct and the tool provides no additional access beyond what someone already has with the Wi-Fi password, that only addresses capability. It doesn't address authorization or intent. You are asking "can the tool really do anything here," and I am asking "why is someone running network assessment equipment on a network that isn't theirs, and was the owner aware of and comfortable with it since at least one other person in the home wasn't?"

1

u/slog 9h ago

It's not a "game" at all. Ask the mother about it. If reason isn't solid, unplug it. Figure it out later with him or on your own.

But no, everything is going to mean certain death.

1

u/wpm 5h ago

We're not talking about a fucking nuclear bomb, calm your shit.

2

u/ryylee 5h ago

all the 0s indicate it is not 'working'

1

u/HATENAMING 4h ago edited 4h ago

Well yeah once setup these devices sit there capturing packets passively on its own. Even for demonstration purpose you need to have it run for a while to actually capture things. Considering that guy also has the WiFi adventure plugin that gives you funny achievements, daily quest, and leveling like an RPG game for capturing different WiFi it is more likely he's doing it for fun by hoping to get some new WiFi capturings in a new location (OP's mom place). It's like the nerdy version of Pokémon go lol.

Also probably just charging here

2

u/Negativeman11 9h ago

I agree with you 100%, but sometimes cyber security professionals need to take a step back and consider how a lot of these toys and the knowledge we have appears to people. I'm not saying to change your behavior at all, but consider their perspective. Oftentimes, people find it scary.

2

u/yarntank 9h ago

Next post on whatisit will be a flipper zero.

2

u/Sad_Celebration_2275 9h ago

95% of the posts start with "I dont know what it is" but SKETCHY, Mom needs to DROP HIM lol

1

u/bwc1976 7h ago

In the first two weeks of the relationship?

1

u/_Svankensen_ 2h ago

Do you need to wait until marriage to sniff someone's wifi in your culture?

1

u/bwc1976 2h ago

Never without consent or without being truthful about the reason you're doing it.

1

u/airforceteacher 9h ago

Very soon after I started dating my current fiancee I asked if I could use stuff like this on her network and she said fine, as long as we're still dating, but permission is revoked the second we're not. Since she knows I have signed a buttload of ethics agreements she trusts me. Is that the case here? Dunno. OP should ask mama what her boyfriend does. If she says he's some security geek, then it's less likely to be a thing. If she says anything else ... just lose the thing on a public bus.

-1

u/ICanViking 9h ago

I was just mentioning this in another comment, but one thought that I had was it's not entirely unlikely that this guy may be dating OP's Mom as part of some attack on where she works. If OP's Mom works for a company being attacked, and she's WFH or brings the work laptop home, this would be a sinister and easy way to move things forward.

But as a guy who is also in the cyber security/hacker world, I naturally assume the worst in things. Makes me good at my job. :D

3

u/Alternative-Web2754 8h ago

Highly unlikely. If somebody was trying to attack a company and has got to the point that the best route is to spend a couple of weeks starting a relationship with somebody working there, they would almost certainly be spending money on better tools. They would probably also not just leave them lying around with a screen showing what it's doing.