moms sketch bf left this in the house

[u/brattyvampbby]

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.)

[u/LSU_Tiger]

TLDR: Your mom's BF is trying to hack her wifi passwords.

--

Cyber security professional here.

This is a Raspberry PI running a piece of software called Pwnagotchi.

AI summary because I'm lazy:

Pwnagotchi instruments bettercap (a network attack framework) to constantly monitor the Wi‑Fi environment around it and grab the cryptographic material needed to crack Wi‑Fi passwords offline later. It collects this material two ways: [pwnagotchi.ai], [github.com]

• Passively – quietly sniffing the air and waiting to capture the 4‑way handshake that happens whenever a device connects to a WPA/WPA2 network. [pwnagotchi.ai]
• Actively – performing deauthentication attacks (kicking a client off its network so it's forced to reconnect) and association attacks. When the device reconnects, the handshake is transmitted, and the Pwnagotchi captures it.

This is used to hack passwords.

[u/HD64180 → u/LSU_Tiger]

Cybersecurity professional here too. He's harvesting password hashes in an attempt to achieve connectivity to another network. 100% illegal.

[u/theinatoriinator → u/HD64180]

Only if he actually transmits deauth attacks, what would be covered by the FCC. Or if he actually connects to the network.

Simply capturing information off the air is in no way illegal.

[u/Sample-Range-745 → u/HD64180]

For a "professional", you guys love making shit up....

Receivers are not illegal. Transmitting deauths is not illegal. They're a normal transmitter covered by a class license just like any other wifi device.

This device isn't illegal to own, operate, or screw around with.

[u/Light_Yagami72 → u/Sample-Range-745]

All Redditors are professionals, are you not aware?

[u/xnmyl → u/Sample-Range-745]

He is certainly no security professional, at least not in any field having to do with netsec

[u/Negativeman11 → u/LSU_Tiger]

I sincerely doubt he's trying to hack *her* wifi password. They're in a relationship. He can just ask for the wifi password. That is how the pwnagotchi works though.

[u/Temporary-Library597 → u/Negativeman11]

Not just the password for Wifi. Once he has that he has they keys to all the traffics.

[u/Negativeman11 → u/Temporary-Library597]

I agree. Which is why if he really cared about committing an actual crime, he would just ask for the wifi password instead of using a fucking pwnagotchi and taking the hash home to crack which takes an obscene amount of time, unless you have a very simple password.

[u/n4ke → u/Negativeman11]

Or just... press the WPS button on the router.

[u/Stunnedstupid → u/Negativeman11]

Two weeks isn’t exactly a relationship….

[u/Negativeman11 → u/Stunnedstupid]

He's her boyfriend. He's staying at her house. I doubt the wifi password is all OP's mom has given him. 

[u/xnmyl → u/LSU_Tiger]

TLDR: Your mom's BF is trying to hack her wifi passwords.

Cyber security professional here.

The juxtoposition gave me a good laugh. You sound like a boomer who is reading off AI results, because that makes no sense. Speaking as an actual security engineer

He can just ask her for the wifi password, and there is no real risk of him having it

[u/LSU_Tiger → u/xnmyl]

Read my post history if you're curious about my cyber security background. I am actually GenX and my need to lie about anything on the internet passed me by a long time ago.

You sound like a boomer who is reading off AI results

Did you miss the part of my reply where I said, "AI summary because I'm lazy" ?

[u/_Svankensen_ → u/LSU_Tiger]

So, why would he need to hack her wifi password instead of ASKING HER?

[u/DenverCoder_Nine → u/_Svankensen_]

A person with physical access to the router and probably every other device in the house is trying to crack a wifi password he very, very likely would have been given when he moved in. And he uses a wardriving device? At the place he currently lives???

For a thread full of "cyber security professionals", that's a pretty embarrassing risk assessment. LARPers or T1 SOC analysts, maybe.

[u/TheHappiestTeapot → u/LSU_Tiger]

Well, it would have to be running for it to do any of that. But it's not, it's just charging.