Using wireless keyboards even made by companies like General Electric, Toshiba and hp can expose you to the risk of compromising your passwords and other sensitive information to the malicious hackers nearby.
According to a cybersecurity company Bastille, a new flaw called ‘KeySniffer’ can allow a hacker sitting as far as 75 metres away to read, decipher and decode everything you type on your wireless keyboard. This could range from your credit card number to your email passwords and security questions etc.
These vulnerable and hack prone keyboards are easy to detect and monitor for the hackers, as they use non-encrypted radio communication protocols which are always transmitting signals irrespective of whether the user is typing or not.
After testing wireless keyboards from 12 manufacturers, Bastille, found that 8 of them susceptible to the hack attack. Big guns in the business such as Hewlett-Packard, Toshiba, Kensington, Insignia, Radio Shack, Anker, General Electric and EagleTech were named in the list. These are one of the most trusted and relied upon computer companies, and this exposing of the security flaw has certainly put a dent in their reputations. The complete list of affected keyboards issued by the security company can be found here.
According to Bastille, most of the affected keyboards, if not all, cannot be upgraded and will need to be replaced. It also recommends using sticking either wired or Bluetooth keyboards in its place as they aren’t susceptible to the flaw.
The same company also exposed similar flaw a few months ago with wireless mice. In that revelation, Mousejack was shown to allow access to your computer via the USB dongle used to communicate with a wireless mouse.
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