Tuesday, August 22, 2017

Smartphone Replacement Parts as Spies

If cracking your smartphone’s touchscreen wasn’t bad enough, researchers have found out a new security threat that might emerge out following the replacement of your touch screen as it has been found out that the replaced units might contain hardware that could hijack a device. 

A paper presented by researchers at Ben-Gurion University of Negev, Israel, at the 2017 Usenix Workshop on Offensive Technologies, shows how smartphone replacement units can be a security risk for the user.

Click to enlarge.
According to the researchers, devices with cracked touchscreens or even other damaged components are prone to security risks as the replaced parts installed by a repair shop might contain additional hardware that can hijack the device and track usage, log keystrokes, install other malicious apps, access files and more. more