That little blip on the radar is my iPhone. Now I know that it's within range of me and is accessible via Bluetooth. Someone a whole lot craftier than I am might already be able to do some damage. Now, this is just me sitting in my house. But imagine if I were using this on, say, a college campus. I'd see blips all over that radar just waiting to get their blues snarfed. Creepy, sure, but bluebugging is even worse. Now that I know your Bluetooth is there, I would activate my second bit of software, which can connect to your device, giving me access to your phone's features. I can track your location, listen to your calls, make my own calls, read and send text messages, and load your phone with pictures of an old man's wiener if I wanted to.

Now, let's talk about John Hering.

Thos Robinson/Getty Images Entertainment/Getty Images

He's a student who developed something called the BlueSniper Rifle, a device that can see Bluetooth connections from up to a mile away. Hering says that this is to sniff out vulnerabilities and not to exploit anyone, which is exactly what an unassuming supervillain would say if prompted. So that whole 32-foot-range thing I mentioned earlier is a bit of a moot point. Now we're dealing with Batman-esque Bluetooth tech, where people can listen to your phone calls from a mile away. Don't believe me, though. Take it from the NSA. They have some experience in the field.

When you work in IT, part of the job is to figure out which equipment you purchase will be best for long-term use. In the case of printers, I've found that older model HP printers stand the test of time best of all. Some old HP printers were built like brick shit houses. They're never going to die. So when you find yourself a good workhorse like that, you won't need to upgrade for a long time. But it's that kind of frugal attitude that will get you killed, because those old printers are just ripe for exploitation.

When you send a print job, your document is sent over the network to the print server, which then zaps the words onto paper before running it through a heating element that dries the ink immediately.

macbrianmun/iStock/Getty Images

That part about the network? That's how they get you! They can sneak in the back door and see everything your printer prints. But you're not stupid enough to print anything personal like tax information or banking materials or nude pictures, are you? Just kidding; those are the only things anyone ever prints anymore. So that's a concern.

Then you've got the heating element, called a fuser, which is also known in hacking circles as "harbinger of death." With only a couple lines of code, a hacker can make that sucker so hot that the paper actually burns as it runs through. If a hacker were to time a printer fire for the exact moment some little goth kid started printing out demonic incantations they found on an archived GeoCities page, it would be the most wonderful thing that ever happened.

The technology has gotten even better since then. So much so that now doctors don't have to open you up to tinker with your ticker. They can just access it remotely using software. But the technology that allows a better quality of life is the same technology that people just love to exploit. So, if a doctor can control that device in your chest, why couldn't a hacker?

The FDA doesn't get involved with the security of medical devices, so often the security measures in place (or lack thereof) don't do a whole heck of a lot to prevent tampering. Because of these lax security measures, an attack on your pacemaker could go undetected in a coroner's office. If someone were to get at the pacemaker's regulatory software and speed your heart up to 10,000 beats per minute, your death would just look like you died of a heart attack. No muss, no fuss.

nebari/iStock/Getty Images

Turns out that moment in Homeland where the vice president is assassinated after his pacemaker is hacked wasn't a stupid plot contrivance at all. It was a real thing that could happen.

So far, there are no reports of anyone successfully pulling off an assassination in this manner. But experts have tested the possibility of these attacks, and it is totally something that can be executed if the right person decides to graduate from hacker to murderer.

It would kind of suck, right?

That's what you get for buying a nice car, chump! Every year, the computer systems in cars get better and better, controlling more and more on-board features. Better technology means better safety features. But with great technology comes great vulnerability. Watch what happens when 60 Minutes' Lesley Stahl drives a car that's had its emergency-communication system hacked and controlled remotely:

The hacker sprayed the wiper fluid and honked the horn before straight-up disabling her brakes as she tried to stop -- all this from his laptop. It turns out it's really not all that difficult to hack someone's car. When you think about it, it makes sense. Example: Most key fobs are equipped with a door unlock button as well as a remote start. What more does a car thief need? And the key fob is just a tiny little box. Imagine what an entire computer could do.

Ferli Achirulli/iStock/Getty Images

Imagine if some asshole got a hold of this kind of power. Good thing a device capable of doing this is way too expensive for the average hacker. Surely, the technology is priced in the high thousands? Nope. Try 60 bucks. Why spend $60 on a video game when you can cut someone's breaks, crash them into a wall so their head is sticking out the windshield, and then spray them with wiper fluid for an extra dose of humiliation?

Ever since The Jetsons made it look so enticing, humankind has been striving to make our homes smarter. Whether you want to control your thermostat from your cellphone or show off to your neighbors that you can close a garage door with your iPad, it can all be done by transforming your home into a smart home. The problem, aside from your wife not turning off the dog-walker treadmill when it malfunctions, is security. I'm about to show you a really dumb thing about smart homes.

Hanna-Barbera

Let's all take a field trip to Google real quick. Search this:

"inurl viewerframe mode=motion"

You should come to a page of results that are a mix of IP Addresses as well as website names. Each one of those IP addresses is a webcam somewhere in the world that you can view and sometimes even control. When you install a webcam like this, it also includes remote-operation software. The software used to display the webcam in a web browser sets it in such a way that you can access it anywhere at any time. But if you don't lock that shit down, you could end up with a bunch of randos on the Internet accessing your personal webcam.

Webcams use code strings that are easily searchable in Google. The same thing works for the software running smart homes; without proper security, the access page is publicly accessible by anyone. The webcam thing was no big deal. A lot of places leave the webcams open so you can go to their website and watch it. Smart homes are a bit different. When you connect to their access page, you could potentially see every smart device in the home along with an on/off switch to control it.

www.insteon.com

This isn't a hypothetical situation, either. There was a vulnerability discovered in the Insteon brand of smart home that allowed this very thing to happen. So they'll open my garage door and switch my porch light on and off. What's the worst thing that they could do, really? How about turning your heat off in 20-degree weather? Or what if they were able to gain access to any other connected devices in your house, say, your router or laptop? If you were as lax about securing those devices as you were about your smart home software, your personal information may be in a bit of a pickle. But, of course, hackers always have the option to just bypass all that shit and go right for the front doors.

If you suspect your house might be haunted due to unexplained things happening, at least you can take solace in knowing that it's probably not a ghost but some psychopath on the Internet just having a laugh while rolling around in your pension fund.