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Android Dev Demonstrates CarrierIQ Phone Logging Software On Video
Token_Internet_Girl writes with a followup to last week's news about Android developer Trevor Eckhart, who was researching software from CarrierIQ, installed on millions of cellphones, that secretly logged a variety of user information — from button presses to text message contents to browsing data. CarrierIQ tried to silence Eckhart, but later backtracked. Now, Eckhart has posted a video demonstration of CarrierIQ's logging software. From the article:
"The company denies its software logs keystrokes. Eckhart’s 17-minute video clearly undercuts that claim. ... The video shows the software logging Eckhart's online search of 'hello world.' That's despite Eckhart using the HTTPS version of Google, which is supposed to hide searches from those who would want to spy by intercepting the traffic between a user and Google. ...the video shows the software logging each number as Eckhart fingers the dialer. 'Every button you press in the dialer before you call,' he says on the video, 'it already gets sent off to the IQ application.'"
There is an asymmetry in the system as it works right now. Which private customers have the will, time, and money to sue companies that illegally wiretap their customers? Isn't there anything that can be done against this? (Of, I'm talking about action against CarrierIQ but about action against the carriers that use their software.)
That's just nasty. First try to silence the researcher, then try to deny what's going on when you've already been caught.
The question is, will this have any effect? Will carriers stop shipping this stuff ? Will consumers care?
My guess is no, they'll just try to hide it better in future.
Always been suspicious of the countless android apps that REQUIRE device permissions such as "full internet access", "read phone state and identity" etc...
Clearly that's what it is, it spies to enrich the company at your expense.
What software is actually affected? What phone models? What platforms? What applications?
If it's just AT&T and its victims, well, it's their own private little hell. Otherwise, some facts would be nice.
For now, (quoting from the article), phrase of "millions of Android, BlackBerry and Nokia phones" smacks of cheap propaganda and scaremongering.
Regards,
Ruemere
So, will someone set up a list for which products not to buy?
If I get a phone here in Sweden which is just plain vanilla stock version will that contain the software or is it something the service providers install on "their own" phones?
FTA: "it cannot be turned off without rooting the phone and replacing the operating system"
So even more reason to flash your droid with CyanogenMod or custom ROM of your choice.
When somebody installs a skimmer on an ATM or fuel pump, there are criminal penalties for (attempted) fraud. How is this software any different?
would like to know whether apple/AT & T or apple/any other carriers do this on iphone too?
I believe this rules out all Android devices with CarrerIQ agents from being used to handle payment card numbers. There's no obvious mention on CarrerIQ's website of PCI compliance or how they protect the user's data. It probably also contravenes SOX, HIPAA and and host of other industry regulations. Bye bye lots of commercial use of Android handsets, especially Blackberry.
...someone with skillz makes a freely installable CIQ clone that sends them back fake, randomly generated results.
You're only jealous cos the little penguins are talking to me.
GP's point was that CarrierIQ is as much part of Android as Flash or Opera is part of Linux. The fact that it runs on Android and that carriers install it on Android doesn't change that.
How does it feel to fail even at basic reading comprehension skills?
He didn't demo it in the video, but there was one bit where he showed permission list for the app - and it basically owns the world. And yes, this includes recording audio. Whether it's actually using that permission for anything is an interesting question.
In this video, the researcher is looking at debug logs from the phone itself, not network traffic logs showing remote communication. He clearly shows that keystrokes and URLs are being passed to the IQ software running on the phone, but presents no evidence that the data is actually sent to anything outside of the phone.
Has anyone determined what the IQ software does with all this information besides writing it to the debug logger? Is it actually sent somewhere, or saved to persistent storage on the phone? (I'm no Android expert, but I'm under the impression that debug messages are discarded when there's no debugger attached.)
Having this software running in the background is sneaky and certainly makes spying more possible than it would be otherwise, but it's not necessarily the huge immediate privacy violation that everyone seems to be assuming it is.
Some other folks were speculating that since you signed an agreement with your carrier that it somehow makes this legal. This is absolutely false. There are certain rights that you can sign away, certainly, but don't think of it like that. Think of it like, "What is Verizon doing with this data and how are they transporting it?"
Here's a few laws and industry regulations they are violating (by recording all keystrokes) off the top of my head:
1) The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS): If anyone ever (ever) enters credit card information into their phone (via an app, web page, whatever) that data must be protected according to the DSS (because all the carriers accept credit cards, that is). That means it must be encrypted in transit, when it is stored, and more importantly: certain information must *NOT* be stored (again, ever). For example, if a user enters the CVV2 from their card into an online form the carrier must ensure that this data does not get stored (good luck with THAT regex! hah!).
2) Graham Leach Bliley Act (GLBA). Undoubtedly, personally identifiable financial information is being recorded, transported, and stored without the user's knowledge or consent (each transaction/event would need its own notice and agreement with the carrier). That could add up to literally MILLIONS of violations.
3) Sarbanes Oxley: If they're recording this data they had better damned well keep an audit trail on it and be regularly disclosing that they're doing so to all their investors. They also must have documented controls & procedures and (likely) perform regular audits to ensure that said controls & procedures are being properly followed.
4) They can be held liable for having knowledge of crimes but not reporting them.
5) They can lose their common carrier status: Since they're now recording literally everything users do online they can be held (partially) accountable for what those users do. If you recorded the data you certainly could've audited it for fraudulent activity. "Have you been the victim of a crime that took place over a cell phone? Call the law offices of Sue & Win."
6) There's probably a dozen laws that say you can't intercept and/or store information related to people's banking accounts and financial transactions (unless you're the bank that the customer is interacting with). These laws are the ones that should make the carriers quiver in their boots. Some of these were written specifically to deal with gangsters and organized crime and as such could land executives in prison (not that I think the U.S. Attourney General would prosecute since our government is sadly, "stupidly hard on individual crime but soft on corporate crime").
7) Unless their contract specifically spells out that they're going to record every keystroke you enter into your phone they've opened themselves up to millions of lawsuits. If anyone ever wins one of these it will be game over for the carriers. "verizon" and "at&t" will likely become some of those "$50-per-click" Adwords on Google.
8) If they're not using proper encryption of this data in transit and storage, the PCI DSS will be the least of their problems... That's criminal negligence right there. After hearing all the controls the Payment Card Industry requires of the carriers for something as simple as a credit card number what jury could be convinced of a defense such as, "We didn't know!"?!? I mean, seriously. Forget being fired. If someone knowingly decided it was a good idea to record all keystrokes they should go to prison. It is the penultimate example of why you don't put non-technical people in charge of making technical decisions.
-Riskable
"Those who choose proprietary software will pay for their decision!"
Disclaimer: I have thoroughly reverse engineered CarrierIQ's software.
This issue has been blown out of proportion. CarrierIQ has hooks that respond to events triggered by keystrokes, web traffic, and SMS messages. It also makes the mistake of printing debugging output containing plaintext of some of this data, which is a pretty bad screwup. Additionally, there's no real reason CIQ should have hooks in those places in the first place.
What they don't do is actually store any of this information and report it to your carrier (keep in mind I know this because I actually looked at the application). In terms of what's actually being stored, I've seen no evidence that CIQ is collecting anything more than what they have publicly claimed: anonymized metrics data. That doesn't mean users shouldn't be able to opt-out of this software, since it still represents a potential risk to privacy. But at this point, this whole thing has turned into a witch hunt.
In short, there's a big difference between "look, it does something when I press a key!" and "it's storing all my keystrokes and sending them to my carrier!". This video demonstrates the first, but the second doesn't actually happen. They shouldn't be doing what they're doing, and users should be able to opt out, but this isn't nearly as evil as people are making it out to be.
...capitalists spy on you.
Apple develops the hardware, the OS, and the debugger - and it is all closed source.
Most of iOS is open source.
There could easily be something like CarrierIQ in the closed parts of iOS. However, it would not be useful to Apple unless it phoned home somehow, and that network activity is detectable whether or not the platform source is open.
To a Lisp hacker, XML is S-expressions in drag.