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Compromising Wired Keyboards

Flavien writes "A team from the Security and Cryptography Laboratory (LASEC) in Lausanne, Switzerland, found 4 different ways to fully or partially recover keystrokes from wired keyboards at a distance up to 20 meters, even through walls. They tested 11 different wired keyboard models bought between 2001 and 2008 (PS/2, USB and laptop). They are all vulnerable to at least one of the 4 attacks. While more information on these attacks will be published soon, a short description with 2 videos is available."

26 of 277 comments (clear)

  1. No comment.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I won't type what I think about that...

    1. Re:No comment.. by walt-sjc · · Score: 2, Funny

      Great - now I have to tinfoil my house as well as my head!

  2. Dubious claim by Drakkenmensch · · Score: 5, Funny

    Is this going to be another one of those hollow claims backed up by a viral video, like unlocking car doors with a tennis ball?

  3. Hmm... by pzs · · Score: 3, Funny

    I might have to extend my tinfoil hat to some kind of head-mounted lead telephone box.

    1. Re:Hmm... by Tetsujin · · Score: 3, Funny

      Chief, don't you think we should use the Cone of Silence?

      --
      Bow-ties are cool.
  4. If it only works on Wired keyboards... by The+Ultimate+Fartkno · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...why should I worry? I work for BoingBoing.

  5. Easier way to open the car... by MindKata · · Score: 5, Funny

    "like unlocking car doors with a tennis ball".

    Its much easier with a cricket ball. Just use it to break the window.

    --
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    1. Re:Easier way to open the car... by nacturation · · Score: 5, Funny

      Its much easier with a cricket ball. Just use it to break the window.

      That may be how the Brits do it, but using a bowling ball generally meets with smashing success.

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    2. Re:Easier way to open the car... by ddusza · · Score: 4, Funny

      No wonder my car is always unlocked when I get out of the tennis club....

      --
      Don't fear the penguins
    3. Re:Easier way to open the car... by HTH+NE1 · · Score: 4, Funny

      Obviously, you'll have to turn the car upside-down if you're going to use a bowling ball. Some people would find that inconvenient.

      Canadians seem to find it easy enough: they use curling stones. Maybe it's easier to flip a car on ice?

      --
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  6. Re:Time for a Faraday cage? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Which is why you move to Pennsylvania and live among the Amish. Also, your crazy hacker beard will look a little less crazy.

  7. Re:TEMPEST by Hoplite3 · · Score: 3, Funny

    The TEMPEST attack is nothing compared to the TEMPEST 2000 attack. Pew pew pew!

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  8. Re:Time for a Faraday cage? by UnknowingFool · · Score: 4, Funny

    The solution to this is simple. Have at least one computer outside the cage. If you have a teenage, even better. Cause nothing would drive those eavedroppers crazy than listening in on teenage conversations:

    No way!
    4sho!
    LOLZ
    idc. let's go w bff jill

    Of course, this might be one of those cases where the solution is worse than the problem.

    --
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  9. But did they test with a Model M? by sirwired · · Score: 4, Funny

    As everyone should know, the IBM Model M is the One True Keyboard. Surely all of the steel plating inside that thing must be good for something! If all else fails, the relentless clicking while they listen to your bugged cube or house should drive them completely insane.

    Even if it doesn't prevent snooping, you could still use the thing as a self-defense weapon when Mysterious Men From the Shadows come to capture you.

    SirWired

    1. Re:But did they test with a Model M? by thered2001 · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'm not so sure...I would expect that the Model M probably produces a spark-gap kind of effect which can be picked up on AM radios a block away.

      --

      If your only tool is a hammer, every problem becomes a nail.

  10. Re:Encryption by fprintf · · Score: 2, Funny

    Holy smokes. Either a coincidence or you have been snooping my network, but that is exactly the beginning of my AES key...

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  11. Re:Cryptonomicomics by mikael · · Score: 2, Funny

    Or you could always get a second keyboard and a monkey. Combined together, they should generate enough random data to disguise what you are typing.

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  12. Re:TEMPEST by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    You know something, it would be a total bastard to get a virus for those kinds of keyboards.

    Just imagine you're sitting there, working away, then BHAM, massive penis replaces all your key-set.

    Or 5 goatse...s, goatsii? What would that be?

  13. Re:TEMPEST by ATMD · · Score: 4, Funny

    Oh great, now you've given them the idea.

    One goatse was bad enough :(

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  14. Re:Time for a Faraday cage? by ddusza · · Score: 1, Funny

    We got them Amish here up nort in Indiana, ya. Ya know how hard it is to get a computer to keep working when the wind isn't blowing the windmill? Really hard, ya. Besides, we aren't allowed any of those electric things. It's harder to hack an abacus, now ain't it!

    --
    Don't fear the penguins
  15. Re:Time for a Faraday cage? by Aphoxema · · Score: 2, Funny

    Oh, wow, I don't know how it happened but you're both right, and I'm not even in a cube!

    --
    "Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"
  16. Re:Encryption by Aphoxema · · Score: 2, Funny

    I see you shelled out for the decoder monkey.

    --
    "Most people, I think, don't even know what a rootkit is, so why should they care about it?"
  17. Re:TEMPEST by VorpalRodent · · Score: 3, Funny

    Not a virus...a security system. No password, just hit the button hidden in the one place that no one wants to go.

    On second thought...I need to go wash my mind out with bleach now.

    --
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  18. Re:Time for a Faraday cage? by ddusza · · Score: 2, Funny

    Ya, we has them soybeans too...

    --
    Don't fear the penguins
  19. Re:TEMPEST by Jay+L · · Score: 5, Funny

    I think the big news flash on this is that they actually performed four different, real attacks on real, physical keyboards.

    When the first mass-transit-quality teleporter is installed in a major city, there will be a commenter on Slashdot, sneering at it: "This isn't news. They've been doing that at the quantum level for years."

  20. Re:TEMPEST by ORBAT · · Score: 2, Funny

    "If you gaze too long into the abyss, the abyss will gaze into you"