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Tamper Evident Village Walkthrough

A look at seal manipulation, evidence-tampering analysis, and covert physical inspection techniques at Tamper Evident Village.

Summary

Silk visits the Tamper Evident Village at DEF CON 30, exploring physical security controls designed to indicate unauthorized access across sensitive cargo, election equipment, and electronic hardware.

[02:03] An instructor explains the threat model of physical tamper-evident seals and tape, using cryptocurrency hardware wallets as a prime case study. Attackers intercepting hardware in transit can attempt to open packaging, extract private keys or seed phrases, and reseal the box to deceive the recipient.

[04:08] The walkthrough demonstrates practical physical bypass techniques. The instructor shows how applying controlled heat (via heat guns) or cooling agents softens pressure-sensitive adhesives, allowing seals to be lifted intact without triggering the characteristic "VOID" pattern. The demonstration covers solvent manipulation, adhesive reconstruction, and resealing methods [06:11], underscoring why organizations must not rely solely on visual inspection of physical seals for critical chain-of-custody verification.

(AI summary — Gemini Flash)

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