Top all-time · #9788
Colin O'Flynn
Personal blog · colinoflynn.comhardwaresecurity
Colin O'Flynn's personal blog at colinoflynn.com covers hardware and security. Since 2015, 8 different Hacker News readers have linked it 8 times, most often “Apple AirTag Teardown and Test Point Mapping”. It is still writing: the last post was on 2026-10-01, and you can follow it by feed.
Too few sampled comments (4) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Colin O'Flynn's hardware security posts, including his AirTag teardown and range test and his ZigBee worm write-up. The comments cite them as sources and do not comment on the writing itself.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 4 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Colin O'Flynn — embedded security, hardware hacking, electronics.
Most-linked posts?
- /iotworm/2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2016-11-07
- Apple AirTag Teardown and Test Point Mapping2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2021-05-12
What Hacker News says?
You might realize this, but just for clarity, Bluetooth LE has similar range to Classic Bluetooth, with the exception of 125kbps LE long range coded PHY, introduced with BT5.0. You can potentially reach from 1km away outdoors. The Nordic Semiconductor NRF52832 used in the airtag, unlike NRF52840, does not support this. https://colinoflynn.com/2021/05/apple-airtag-teardown-test-p... https://www.nordicsemi.com/Product…
Comment linking /2021/05/apple-airtag-teardown-test-point-mapping/
on “I mailed an AirTag and tracked its progress”Submitted Dumping Parallel NAND with Glasgow as a story · 40 points
HN discussionMy work is blacklisting this domain (eyaltro.net) for malware — this URL works for me: http://colinoflynn.com/iotworm/ (Is it the same content?)
Comment linking /iotworm/
on “IoT Goes Nuclear: Creating a ZigBee Chain Reaction”Submitted Side-Channel Power Analysis of AES Core in Project Vault as a story · 13 points
HN discussionThere is what looks like another site hosted by the other person who partnered on this: http://colinoflynn.com/iotworm/
Comment linking /iotworm/
on “IoT Goes Nuclear: Creating a ZigBee Chain Reaction”Submitted Apple AirTag Teardown and Test Point Mapping as a story · 2 points
HN discussionAlso consider the hubs. To take a well known example, Phillips Hue lightbulbs don't connect to the net directly and don't have any significant computational resources to speak of. They are just an 8-bit Atmel microprocessor with a Zigbee radio to talk to the hub ( https://blog.adafruit.com/2016/06/14/teardown-of-a-philips-h... ). On the other hand, the Hue hub is running a full embedded Linux distro (which has even…
Comment linking /2016/07/getting-root-on-philips-hue-bridge-2-0/
on “Of course smart homes are targets for hackers”Submitted Experimenting with Metastability and Multiple Clocks on FPGAs as a story · 2 points
HN discussion