A planned talk on
RFID security by a security researcher has been pulled from this week's
Black Hat Federal security conference after secure card maker HID
claimed the talk violated the company's patent rights and threatened to
take legal action against Chris Paget, the researcher, and IOActive,
Paget's employer, if the talk went forward.
The
company decided to cancel the talk after all-night negotiations with
HID collapsed, said Josh Pennell, CEO of IOActive. In response, Black
Hat organizers were forced to tear materials out of printed show
proceedings and will instead present a discussion by a representative
of the ACLU on the criticality of RFID security, said Jeff Moss,
founder and director of Black Hat.
A spokeswoman for HID did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The incident recalled a 2005 dispute over a presentation at Black Hat in Las Vegas involving Cisco Systems and Michael Lynn, a security researcher who worked for Internet Security Systems at the time.
