Planet Arduino

Christmas trees normally have a star on top, and Super Mario famously becomes invincible when he grabs the star power-up. Naturally, for retro game enthusiasts, these two are begging to be united. 

In this project, Doug Lenz (AKA “Freshanator”) did just that by morphing the Mario star into something that can be placed atop a tree, using a 3D-printed body and addressable WS2812B LEDs to provide the “twinkles.”

The unit is printed in yellow PLA, with a pair of black eyes glued on. Inside, LEDs are arranged near the tip of each of the star’s five points, which diffuse through the printed material. Power is supplied by a Micro USB breakout, and the lighting is controlled via an Arduino Nano. The device runs on the “Fire2012” example program from the FastLED library, though Lenz may revisit its operation in the future.

Mario Super Star Christmas Tree Topper DIY

Looking to take your holiday decor to the next level? More details on how to make your own can be found on Imgur, or you can purchase one from Etsy.

If you are an Android user and a big fan of Super Mario beware: there is no Android version! There has been no official news on the Android version yet, let alone a version of the game. There is, however, a version circulating outside of Google Play market that will steal your bank account.

Right now attackers are taking advantage of the game’s popularity and Android users despair to spread malware posing as an Android version of Super Mario Run as they did in the past for Pokemon GO. The trojan is called Android Marcher and has been around since 2013, mostly targeting mobile users financial information. After installation, the application attempts to trick users with fake finance apps and a credit card page in an effort to capture banking details. The malware also locks out Google Play until the user supplies their credit card information.

In this new variant of Marcher, it can monitor the device and steal login data of regular apps, not just banking and payment apps, and send the stolen data back to command and control (C&C) servers. Facebook, WhatsApp, Skype, Gmail, the Google Play store are all vulnerable. Criminals can exploit these stolen accounts to carry out additional fraud.

Zscaler researchers advice is:

To avoid becoming a victim of such malware, it is a good practice to download apps only from trusted app stores such as Google Play. This practice can be enforced by unchecking the “Unknown Sources” option under the “Security” settings of your device.

We may add to turn on “App Verification”. Verify Apps regularly checks activity on your device and prevents or warns you about potential harm. Verify Apps is on by default, as is Unknown Sources turned off. Verify Apps also checks apps when you install them from sources other than Google Play. Of course, there is a privacy trade-off. Some information has to be sent about the apps you install back to Google.

The main advice is: use common sense. It’s common practice for companies to release official apps versions through Google Play and highly unlikely to do it via any other way.

Filed under: Arduino Hacks, news, security hacks

If you’re familiar with Super Mario Brothers, you’re certainly familiar with this character, the fire-breathing Piranha Plant. If you would like to have a replica of one in real life, you can build your own following instructions found here. The plant, which could probably double as a prop for Little […]

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