iPhone hack lets you eavesdrop on PC typing
Researchers at the George Institute of Technology have turned an iPhone into a spy tool with a hack that allows the phone to determine what is being typed on keyboards nearby.
The typing detection works by “using a smartphone accelerometer – the internal device that detects when and how the phone is tilted – to sense keyboard vibrations as you type to decipher complete sentences with up to 80% accuracy,” according to the Institute.
Researchers initially started the experiment with an Apple iPhone 3GS, however it proved too difficult to decipher the typing results. “But then we tried an iPhone 4, which has an added gyroscope to clean up the accelerometer noise, and the results were much better. We believe that most smartphones made in the past two years are sophisticated enough to launch this attack,” said Patrick Traynor, assistant professor in Georgia Tech’s school of computer science.
Read the full story over at Computer World.
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