Keystroke Logging Increases

JamesAlfaro writes "Hackers are likely to release more than 6000 keylogging programs this year--up 65 percent from the number in 2004--according to Reston, Virginia, security vendor iDefense." From the article: "Each variant could lead to anything from a few to several thousand infections, Ken Dunham, senior engineer at iDefense, said. Keylogger software typically tracks keystrokes on infected computers and is used to try to steal sensitive information such as user names and credit card data. The biggest problem with keyloggers, which silently relay data to attackers, is that they often go undetected, easily slipping past firewalls and antivirus software, iDefense, a division of VeriSign, said. "

Comments

Charmap?

[TubeSteak]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keylogger

It is also said that using an onscreen keyboard is a way to combat these, as it only requires clicks of the mouse. That is, however, false information, because a keyboard event message must be sent to the external target program to type text. Every software keylogger can log the text typed with onscreen keyboard.

The most undetectable keylogger

[Saint37]

Obviously software keyloggers are a huge threat. But there are also hardware keyloggers that hardly ever get mentioned. They get plugs in usually between your ps2 port and your keyboard. They are very small and can store MB's of data. Since people hardly ever look back there, they are very hard to detect. Of course physical presence is required to use this, but I'm sure some of my coworkers would love to play with one of these.



http://www.stockmarketgarden.com/

FCheck or anti-keylogger may help?

[digitaldc]

More info here:
http://security.resist.ca/keylog.shtml
Anti-Key logger:
http://www.anti-keylogger.net/
FCheck: http://www.geocities.com/fcheck2000/fcheck.html

I don't know if will stop a keystroke logger, but it is a cool idea, nonetheless: http://www.kittytech.com/defaultx.html

Who needs software?

[Sierpinski]

If you have access to a computer (or more specifically behind a computer) just add one of these:

for PS/2 Keyboards

or for USB Keyboards

Anti-virus and anti-spyware won't protect you from this kind of technology.