eavesdrop
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Amazon fixed an exploit that allowed Alexa to listen all the time
Amazon's Alexa is good at listening, since it has to be ready when you say its wake word, like "Alexa," "Echo" or "Computer." That very same feature, though, has people worried about their own privacy. Researchers from security firm Checkmarx have found a way to get Alexa to listen in and send a transcript of any conversations that it records while eavesdropping.
New Android trojan can record phone calls, expose your embarrassing fantasy baseball talk
Mobile malware is nothing new, especially for Android users who have trained themselves to navigate the sometimes shady back alleys of the Market. The fine folks at CA Technologies came across an interesting new trojan though, that does something slightly more unnerving than max out your credit cards -- it records your conversations. There's no evidence that this has actually found its way into the wild yet, but it's entirely possible that some nefarious developer could capture your calls and upload them to a remote server. Obviously, this wouldn't hold much interest for your traditional cyber crook, but suspicious significant others and corporate spies could have a field day with such capabilities. All we can do is suggest you remain vigilant and maintain a healthy dose of paranoia about any apps on your phone.
Hacker intercepts phone calls with homebuilt $1,500 IMSI catcher, claims GSM is beyond repair
In 2009, Chris Paget showed the world the vulnerabilities of RFID by downloading the contents of US passports from the safety of his automobile. This year, he's doing the same for mobile phones. Demonstrating at DefCon 2010, the white hat hacker fooled 17 nearby GSM phones into believing his $1,500 kit (including a laptop and two RF antennas) was a legitimate cell phone base station, and proceeded to intercept and record audience calls. "As far as your cell phones are concerned, I'm now indistinguishable from AT&T," he told the crowd. The purpose of the demonstration was highlight a major flaw in the 2G GSM system, which directs phones to connect to the tower with the strongest signal regardless of origin -- in this case, Paget's phony tower. The hacker did caveat that his system could only intercept outbound calls, and that caller ID could tip off the owner of a handset to what's what, but he says professional IMSI catchers used by law enforcement don't suffer from such flaws and amateur parity would only be a matter of time. "GSM is broken," Paget said, "The primary solution is to turn it off altogether." That's a tall order for a world still very dependent on the technology for mobile connectivity, but we suppose AT&T and T-Mobile could show the way. Then again, we imagine much of that same world is still using WEP and WPA1 to "secure" their WiFi.
Spy Ear power strip lets you listen from the floor
Yeah, it's not the wildest power strip design we've ever seen, but the Spy Ear has a secret: a hidden SIM card slot and cell radio that allows you to monitor what's happening in your absence. Just dial in and listen away -- we're not sure how much you'll hear from the usual places a power strip is hidden, but it'll be better than nothing, nosy.[Via Red Ferret]
Essential addons for Patch 3.0.2 [Updated x6]
Let's take a look at what addons are working for patch 3.0.2. First a simple rule taken from the UI forums post done by Kaydeethree: "Any 'Wrath beta' compatible mod will work in 3.0.2." With that said, there is a long and comprehensive listing of 3.0.2 compatible addons over on WoWWiki. But the fun doesn't end there. The next step is obtaining all those new addons. I've compiled a large set of the essential addons and linked to at least one direct download source after the break. Each download source is either trusted beyond doubt – or tested and confirmed to be virus free. Finally, you'll want to combine the addons into a nice looking UI. Check out our special edition of Reader UI of the Week for a look at five complete 3.0.2 compatible UIs. We're posting this list now, and will continue to update it throughout the day. Begin your addon downloads as quickly as possible to avoid hangups later in the day when download servers become overloaded.
Vortex's wall climbing robot peeks in windows
While not the first wall climbing machine we've come across, Vortex's VRAM Mobile Robot Platform (VMRP) machine weds ascension and undercover surveillance in fine fashion. Aimed at law enforcement tasks, military missions, and fanatical hobbyists, this clinger is remotely controlled with the capacity to add "onboard intelligence and sensors to monitor VMRP status and health." It utilizes a vortex vacuum to suction itself to vertical surfaces, and then relies on the wheels to get it movin'. Moreover, this bot was built to withstand mild weather hazards and communicate wirelessly back to the user, and its ability to wield microphones, video cameras, and proximity sensors make this the ultimate eavesdropping tool. Sadly, we've no idea how much it'd take to get one of these in your needy palms, but free free to indulge in the video waiting after the break.[Via OhGizmo]
QSTARZ BT-Q1000 GPS data logger syncs with Google Earth
QSTARZ is taking its familiarity with GPS receivers and integrating a data logger to form the newfangled BT-Q1000. This two-faced device doubles as a Bluetooth GPS receiver to navigate your course and allows you to "record your routes" in order to plot points on Google Earth and disseminate the map to your envious pals. Moreover, you can use the device to more accurately tag where your travel photos were snapped along the way, and if you're in the fleet management biz, this here tool can keep your motorists from straying too far off the beaten path. Designed to last a whopping 32-hours without a recharge, the BT-Q1000 can make your next journey a whole lot more memorable for $119 when it lands later this month.
Logitec intros digital recorder for consumer telephones
Personal voice recorders simply aren't likely to start up any serious controversy anytime soon, but Logitec's latest spin on taping audio just might raise a few hairs. The LIC-TRA056SD is a "private telephone recorder" that plugs right into your home phone and captures conversations conveniently on the built-in 128MB of storage. If those 50 hours of capacity aren't enough to catch someone red handed, you can also throw in a spare SD card and create an audio archive of every phone call you'll ever make. Additionally, the USB connectivity ensures that extracting dubious MP3 / WAV files won't be a chore, and considering that everything looks to be password protected, the digital eavesdropping crowd will be out of luck. Unfortunately, there's no word just yet on how much this dodgy device will run you, but it should hit the shelves of Japan before the month's end.[Via AkihabaraNews]
KTF's surveillance canine beams snapshots via HSDPA
It just makes sense that the same Korean provider that offered up a pet translator service would attempt to give back to the owners, as KTF has launched a robotic puppy that just melts the hearts of gizmo-lovin' gals abroad. Specifically, it garners a crowd of individuals wherever it's at, and then pulls double duty as an undercover surveillance agent, snapping mobile images and channeling them straight to your cellphone via HSDPA. For the paranoid 'rents in the crowd, this here ought to be a perfect way to monitor what really goes down in the house while you're away for the weekend, and while it's no guard dog per se, the evidence this bad boy captures could indeed be quite frightening. [Warning: Read link requires subscription]
Laptops and flat panels also vulnerable to Van Eck eavesdropping
Those who wander into the realms of spying, phreaking, and dubious eavesdropping are likely familiar with Wim Van Eck, but for those new to remote screen-grabbing scene, you should probably take note. Back in the day, Mr. Eck "proved it was possible to tune into the radio emissions produced by electromagnetic coils in a CRT display and then reconstruct the image," effectively rending the images on a distant monitor without the user knowing. Now, however, a modern day guru in his own right has found that the methodology used in 1985 can still be potent today, albeit on laptops and flat panel LCDs. Markus Kuhn has since discovered that by tuning into the radio emissions produced by the cables running into a monitor, hackers can garner the pixels one at a time, and carefully stack them together to form a picture of someone else's screen. Reportedly, Markus was able to "see a PowerPoint presentation from a stand 25 meters away (pictured)," and he also noted that laptops with metal hinges were particularly good targets as they tended to broadcast the necessary signals quite well. Of course, we aren't encouraging the act of on-screen voyeurism without appropriate consent, but if you're interested in seeing what's behind the (faraway) LCD, be sure to hit the read link and push aside those morals for a moment. [Warning: PDF read link][Via Slashdot]
This Nokia N95 is listening
So we get the Big Brother / CIA / James Bond appeal of a phone that sends all ambient audio, phone calls, and text messages to a third party; we really do. What we can't fathom, though, is what circumstance would lead to you giving a frickin' N95 to someone you're trying to spy on. If you're trying to spy on them, that presumably means that you're not on the best of terms -- and frankly, if we got a $1,000 handset from an enemy of ours with no strings attached, we'd be just a tad suspect of the device. Anyhoo, if you've got money to burn and privacy to violate, this Nokia N95 specially equipped with "Interceptor Software" will keep you in the loop on any form of communication its user engages in. Oh, and at £2,300 (about $4,560), you'd better really need to eavesdrop.[Via SCI FI Tech]
FBI taps cellphone mics to eavesdrop on criminals
While we figured the NYPD could just install Magic Message Mirrors in every mafia hotspot in the Manhattan area, the Genovese family has proven quite the eagle-eyed bunch when it comes to spotting wiretaps, tailing, and other (failed) attempts of bugging their conversations. In order to tap into critical conversations by known mafioso and other, less glamorous criminals, police are utilizing a "roving bug" technique which remotely activates the microphone of a crime lord's cellie, giving the boys in blue convenient access to their secret agenda(s). The presumably controversial tapping was recently approved by top US DoJ officials "for use against members of a New York organized crime family who were wary of conventional surveillance techniques." Software hacks (and actual phones, too) have previously allowed such dodgy eavesdropping to occur, with "Nextel, Samsung, and Motorola" handsets proving particularly vulnerable, but this widespread approach in tracking down criminal conversations could hopefully pinpoint future targets where prior attempts failed. Of course, if mafia members hit the internet every now and then, they're probably removing those batteries right about now anyway.
