Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
Millions of low-cost wireless keyboards are susceptible to a vulnerability that reveals private data to hackers in clear text.
The vulnerability – dubbed KeySniffer – creates a means for hackers to remotely “sniff” all the keystrokes of wireless keyboards from eight manufacturers from distances up to 100 metres away.
“When we purchase a wireless keyboard we reasonably expect that the manufacturer has designed and built security into the core of the product,” said Bastille Research Team member Marc Newlin, responsible for the KeySniffer discovery. “Unfortunately, we tested keyboards from 12 manufacturers and were disappointed to find that eight manufacturers (two thirds) were susceptible to the KeySniffer hack.”
The keyboard manufacturers affected by KeySniffer include: Hewlett-Packard, Toshiba, Kensington, Insignia, Radio Shack, Anker, General Electric, and EagleTec. Vulnerable keyboards are always transmitting, whether or not the user is typing. Consequently, a hacker can scan for vulnerable devices at any time. A complete list of affected devices can be found here.
Wireless keyboards have been the focus of security concerns before. In 2010, the KeyKeriki team exposed weak XOR encryption in certain Microsoft wireless keyboards. Last year Samy Kamkar’s KeySweeper exploited Microsoft’s vulnerabilities. Both of those took advantage of shortcomings in Microsoft’s encryption.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Wednesday July 27 2016, @12:27PM
There is absolutely no need to worry about that. Nobody is going to go to all the trouble of lifting prints from your grease covered computer screen (how do you read through that anyway?) to get access to your fingerprint locked devices.
They'll just cut off your finger.
ROFL biometrics.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 27 2016, @05:20PM
No, he's talking about how the position of the 4 smudges on your phone screen reveals the 4 digits of your unlock code, not lifting the fingerprints themselves.