Cody Brocious, a software developer at Mozilla, showed off his latest hack at the Black Hat Security Conference in Las Vegas. He has found a way to hack over four million hotel rooms that are locked by Onity programmable key cards. What’s even worse is that the hack only costs a little under $50 in supplies.

So how does this particular hack work? Brocious has identified a 32-bit key that identifies the hotel’s “sitecode.” The worst part is that every Onity lock has this key. By reading the key back to the lock, the lock opens. The hack is so simple that he’s surprised more people haven’t found out about it yet.

Like most hackers, Brocious doesn’t intend people to use this information maliciously. He exposed the security flaw to make Onity change the locks. When an electronic lock can be opened so easily, it’s only a matter of time before something bad happens.

Brocious has created a hypothetical scenario that we hope never happens:

Given the ability to read the complete memory of the lock, it is possible to gain access to the master key card codes. With these — in combination with the sitecode for encryption — it is possible to create master cards which will gain access to locks at the property.

Let’s look at a hypothetical situation:

An attacker uses the beforementioned vulnerabilities to read the memory of the lock

Attacker uses the sitecode and master key card codes to generate one or more master cards

Attacker uses a master card to enter a room

Attacker murders the victim in the room

Attacker escapes

During the course of investigation, it’s quite possible that the criminal investigators may look at the audit report for the lock, to see who entered the door at what time. Upon doing so, they will see a specific member of the staff (as the key cards are uniquely identified in the ident field) using a master key card to gain access to the room near the time of death.

Such circumstantial evidence, placing a staff member in the room at the time of death, could be damning in a murder trial, and at least would make that staff member a prime suspect. While other factors (e.g. closed circuit cameras, eyewitnesses, etc) could be used to support the staff member’s case, there’s no way we can know whether or not the audit report is false.

Will this happen? Probably not. It’s all just a hypothetical scenario to get security experts to replace these locks with better ones. If it’s electronic, it can be hacked. I think I’ll stick with my old fashioned keys for now. At least I can protect against lock pickers.

[h/t: ExtremeTech]

Defeatist thinking aside, it appears as if expensive hotels aren’t the only ones who enjoy sticking it to their customers who would like to surf the web from their hotel room. As pointed out by the Frequent Business Traveler, the top hotel pet peeve remains “Expensive Internet.”

To reach this conclusion, FBT conducted a survey that had over 750 participants, as well as participant in an online discussion at FlyerTalk.com. The culled conversation had over 300 comments and close 40,000 overall views. Voluntary response biases associated with surveys aside, the findings concerning hotel pet peeves are about what you’d expect, with Internet access cost winning the day. The finding were presented in an HTML table format, of which, screenshots have been taken:

Over 750 readers participated in the survey, and their top peeves – expensive Internet, inaccessible/insufficient electrical outlets, and weak/slow Internet – were all tech related. These results speak to business travelers’ priorities these days, as they try to stay mobile and work on the go.

The question is posed about why is it so difficult for these businesses to provide reliable Internet service for their customers, preferably for prices that are reasonable, if not free*. Unfortunately, no answers or solutions are provided, meaning the best way to combat such price gouging is to let your wallet speak for you. That is, don’t order the Internet service from hotels. Go find a restaurant or Starbucks that has free WiFi instead.

*Instead of free, hotels could, quite easily, alter the way they charge for Internet access by building these charges directly into the price of staying at the hotel. Add an additional surcharge to every bill, something along the lines of two or three dollars on each bill, which, in turn would allow every patron to access the Internet, whether they use it or not. Considering the way other hotel charges exist to assist in the upkeep of the facility, an additional surcharge to ensure quality Internet access doesn’t seem like a bad idea.

According to a study performed by Hotels.com, 38% of hotel guests chose free wi-fi over any other amenity provided by the hotel they were staying in. This amenity succeeded at the top, where free breakfast (25%) and free parking (18%) fell right below it.

This premise makes perfect sense, because the common medium that helps people stay connected to their business, family, and friends is the Internet. This is even more validated with the use of smartphones and tablets dominating the tech industry.

I do have to say, when I travel around the country, a hotel that offers free wi-fi is definitely part of the criteria where I stay overnight.

To show how important free wi-fi is at hotels, I provided some tweets from the Twitter community that are microblogging about their hotel’s wi-fi connection.

Is free wi-fi a priority for you when choosing a hotel? Let us know below in this post’s comments section.

The decision was based off of a Nielsen research study,”U.S. Advertising Spend and Effectiveness,” which found that recommendations from “personal acquaintances was cited as the most trusted form of advertisement by U.S. Internet consumers (76%). Forty-nine percent said they trusted consumer opinions posted online.” This makes a lot of sense. If you know that you like a lot of the same things as your bingo buddy Sally, then you are more likely to purchase the same Sandals resort package in Jamaica that she did versus what some stranger suggests.

TripAdvisor launched its Trip Friends product in June 2010. The places that a user’s friends and associates have been is highlighted on the Cities I’ve Visited Facebook app. They can also see this information on the FB Timeline. People can also view hotels that their FB friends have rated on TripAdvisor and they are listed first in the company’s hotel rankings section. This was made possible through the travel site’s continued integration with Facebook.

Adam Medros, vice president of global product for TripAdvisor stated in a recent press release that “we are excited that 100 million travelers have had a personalized experienced on TripAdvisor, making TripAdvisor the world’s best site to plan a trip using the wisdom of your friends.” He went on to explain that “providing travelers with a social trip planning experience will continue to be a strategic focus at TripAdvisor, and we look forward to having even more travelers see their friends’ travel recommendations on TripAdvisor.”

Almost 90% of these travelers expect free Wi-Fi to be available as part of their accomodations. Over 40% report that they have never paid for Wi-Fi in a hotel and 65% report that they have used Wi-Fi in hotel lobby’s and other common areas to avoid additional room charges for the service.

93% of the hotel representatives surveyed reported that they do offer some variety of free Wi-Fi for customers. Also of interest, over 50% of travelers claim they have canceled reservations because they found other places to stay that did offer free Wi-Fi.

The second most important factor in deciding to stay at a hotel was whether breakfast was included in the stay, followed by the availability of guest loyalty points. The number four factor was the availability of nearby restaurants. And finally, the number five deciding factor was the availability of some form of shuttle service.

Hotel representatives and customers alike, rated the above five items as the most important factors in deciding what hotels to stay at. This reveals, at least in the hotels surveyed, that representatives truly understand their customer’s needs.

In fact, according to a study reported on by CNN, if you want cheap and/or free Internet while staying at a hotel, you would be wise to avoid the five star offerings, and stay at cheaper hotel instead. According to the report, most of the higher end hotels charge customers a premium for Internet access, which, after paying in excess of $500 a night to stay, is pretty ridiculous. It becomes even more silly when you realize the cheaper hotels don’t go that route, instead preferring to “comp” Internet access for their customers.

From the findings:

Three-quarters of luxury and “upper upscale” hotel chains — segments that include brands such as Four Seasons, Hilton and Marriott — charge for in-room Internet access, according to the American Hotel & Lodging Association 2010 Lodging Survey conducted by STR Global.

In comparison, just 2% of full-service midrange hotel chains — a segment that includes brands such as Holiday Inn — ask you to pay a fee for surfing the Web in your room, the survey found.

Clearly, the lesson here is avoid the big time hotels if you’re a business traveler who needs to connect to the Internet while in your hotel room. This becomes even more obvious when the reason why these expensive hotels charge a premium for Internet access–because they can.

Granted, the sheets and pillows at the four seasons are better than they are at the Holiday Inn, but is luxury the motivating factor when deciding on a hotel or is affordability? Obviously, if you’re paying for $500 a night, you can probably afford to pay for Internet access, but the question is, why would you? Especially when less expensive hotels don’t gouge customers in such a manner?

As with most things related to supply and demand, as long as these customers willingly pay for their Internet access, these expensive hotels will continue to charge for it. If business travelers began eschewing the more expensive hotels that charge for cheaper places that don’t, it’s easy to see these charges either reducing or disappearing altogether.

The question is, are these kinds of travelers willing to swallow their pride and stay in cheaper hotel that has free Internet access or is the allure of the local Four Seasons just that hard to overcome?

By searching for hotels on Google Maps, users will be able to plug-in dates they plan to stay and see prices on selected listings.

Google’s Lat Long Blog offers more details. "You can click on the price to see a list of advertisers who have provided pricing information for that hotel, indicated by the "Sponsored" text, and click through to reserve a room on the advertiser’s site."

"By showing you this relevant hotel rate information directly in the Google Maps results panel we hope to make this aspect of your trip planning more speedy and efficient."

Google emphasized the new feature will not change the way hotels are ranked in Google Maps. While testing the feature, Google said it is working with a limited number of advertisers and it will only be visible to a small number of users. If the test goes well Google said the feature will be made available to more users over time.
 

Hotel guests spent 60 percent more time online and downloaded 50 percent more data, based on tracked packet and session length information. This confirms the predictions from an iBAHN- commissioned, 2009 study of business travelers conducted by Ypartnership.

Ypartnership found more than two-thirds of frequent business travelers have downloaded music onto their computers (67%) while nearly 60 percent have downloaded video. More than half have downloaded news (54%) or entertainment (52%). Downloads of video and music consume considerably higher bandwidth and data than the average email or browsing session.

"The implication of this trend for hoteliers is profound as it clearly points to the conclusion that the "free to guest" model of providing free access in all locations of the hotel at all times to all guests is economically unrealistic given guests’ differing bandwidth needs," iBAHN said.

"Because costs for bandwidth continue to increase exponentially, hoteliers will continue to see higher overall expenses related to their broadband offering, without commensurate benefits in either daily rates or occupancy."

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"We believe the (online) companies are, essentially, pocketing the money that should go to occupancy tax," Mayor Bill White told the Houston Chronicle. "It’s unfair to those who are paying the price where the full taxes are paid."

The lawsuit is similar to one in San Antonio that won approval for class-action status this week, allowing other cites in the state and nation to join the suit. Houston says it will pursue its own case for now.

If the lawsuit is successful, White said it should not hurt tourism in Houston. "The Internet companies are obligated to charge a certain percentage of what they’ve collected," he said. "It should not affect hotel rates."

Hotels in Houston are required to pay the city the hotel-occupancy tax of 7 percent, based on the price of the rooms they sell. The city brought in $57 million in occupancy taxes in 2007.

On Tuesday, a federal judge granted San Antonio’s motion for class-action certification in its lawsuit against 16 companies including Hotels.com, Expedia.com, Priceline.com and Orbitz. The San Antonio suit alleges the online companies collect hotel tax at the retail rate but only pay taxes on the bulk wholesale rate they are charged.

The companies maintain they do not control occupancy and only offer a service for customers and should not have to pay the difference. They say the suit could hurt tourism.

"It just doesn’t make sense that increasing the costs of travel won’t decrease the amount of travel," said Paul Chronis, Orbitz’s lawyer. "That’s pretty basic stuff."

 Farecast Hotels features Hotel Rate Key, a pricing comparison tool that allows users to see if they are receiving a good value on their hotel. The feature flags hotels as a deal or not a deal.

"Where should I stay? Am I getting a good deal? These are important questions when shopping for a hotel," said Hugh Crean, Farecast’s president and chief executive officer.

"No other travel search site offers expert advice and information to help you make the right tradeoffs and smarter hotel purchase decisions."

The initial beta version will use historical rates and offer Hotel Rate Keys for more than 5,000 hotels in 30 major cities in the U.S. for up to 90 days in the future. The Hotel Rate Key compares individual hotel’s current rates to its past rates for the same travel dates and other travel dates on the same days of the week.

Along with the Hotel Rate Key, Farecast users can shop 80,000 hotels in cities around the globe. Farecast Hotels provides an interface with tools to help users find the hotel they are looking for. Features include searching current hotel rates and detailed information on the hotel properties. Mapping property locations in your destination using Microsoft Virtual Earth and filtering to narrow search results, sort by listings or identify hotels close to an address, or point of interest.