Sounds from typing could be security risk

I thought that this was very interesting.
"SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Forget about watching, Big Brother may be listening.

Sounds from typing on computer keyboards are distinctive enough to be decoded, allowing security breaches caused by "acoustic snooping," University of California, Berkeley researchers said on Wednesday.

The researchers said they were able to feed sound recordings of typing on keyboards into a computer and use an algorithm to recover up to 96 percent of the keyboard characters entered by typists.

"It's a form of acoustical spying that should raise red flags among computer security and privacy experts," said Doug Tygar, a Berkeley professor of computer science and information management."

5 comments:

Ezzie said...

Only Berkeley can be this paranoid. Ugh. I still can't believe my cousin went there... Actually, we always thought he was (is?) gay, so I take that back.

Anonymous said...

We'll all have to get rubber keyboards!

Jack Steiner said...

Ezzie,

We need people to consider all the angles.

JG,

Those keyboards are kind of cool.

Bill said...

combine this with a lazer mic that reads the vibrations off an office window and bam, you can read this comment from the road out front of my office. As I look out the window..

Jack Steiner said...

Bill,

Sounds like you are onto something. ;)

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