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I can see why some people might be concerned about the camera, but I'm far more concerned by the microphone. There's far more sensitive and actionable informati
by epistasis 2y ago
I can see why some people might be concerned about the camera, but I'm far more concerned by the microphone. There's far more sensitive and actionable information that can be gathered from me that way! I'm glad that macOS started putting a light in the menubar when the microphone is in use, but I'd prefer to have unhackable hardware for that instead.
- chgs 2y agoHardware switch in line with the microphone. Can’t be turned on behind my back.
- ASalazarMX 2y agoWireless noise-cancelling headphones. Oh no, the microphone is back through bluetooth.
- kibwen 2y agoIf you're half-serious about this sort of opsec, you already have bluetooth disabled. Ideally your hardware wouldn't have support for it at all. Same for wifi.
- catlikesshrimp 2y agoSoldering iron to the rescue. Locate the microphone and unsolder it. I haven't seen any microphone integrated in the processor. Yet
- ansgri 2y agoWell it doesn’t need to be visible to work in contrast to camera. Seriously though, no technological and almost no economic barrier preventing embedding a mic into every wireless communication chip.
- yjftsjthsd-h 2y agoSure, but that requires the manufacturer to be intending to spy, in contrast to someone compromising after the fact.
- fph 2y agoGoing into full paranoid mode, I wonder if some other sensors / components can be used as a makeshift microphone. For instance, a sufficiently accurate accelerometer can pick up vibrations, right? Maybe even the laser in a CD drive? Anything else?
- meindnoch 2y agoCamera + bag of chips: https://people.csail.mit.edu/mrub/VisualMic/ https://people.csail.mit.edu/mrub/VisualMic/
- goodpoint 2y agoImpossible with normal cameras.
- meindnoch 2y ago"We also explore how to leverage the rolling shutter in regular consumer cameras to recover audio from standard frame-rate videos, and use the spatial resolution of our method to visualize how sound-related vibrations vary over an object’s surface, which we can use to recover the vibration modes of an object."
- bluGill 2y agoA condenser microphone is just a capacitor. Your computer is full of them. They are very low level input and generally need a pre-amp just to get the signal outside the microphone. However conceptually at least they are there and so maybe someone can get it to work.
- ferbivore 2y agoM2 and newer MacBooks have an IMU on-board, which is just a funny way of spelling microphone. Admittedly a very low quality one; I'm not sure if you could pick up understandable speech at the 1.6kHz sample rate Bosch's IMUs seem to support.
- internetter 2y ago> M2 and newer MacBooks have an IMU on-board Why?
- nullhole 2y ago> M2 and newer MacBooks have an IMU on-board, which is just a funny way of spelling microphone. Admittedly a very low quality one; I'm not sure if you could pick up understandable speech at the 1.6kHz sample rate Bosch's IMUs seem to support. Are there examples of using IMUs to get audio data you could point to? A quick search didn't reveal anything.
- ferbivore 2y agoThere's this paper, which made the news at the time I think: https://crypto.stanford.edu/gyrophone/files/gyromic.pdf https://crypto.stanford.edu/gyrophone/files/gyromic.pdf And there's this post, which includes an audio clip: https://goughlui.com/2019/02/02/weekend-project-mma8451q-accelerometer-as-a-microphone/ https://goughlui.com/2019/02/02/weekend-project-mma8451q-acc...
- rudy6912 2y agomacOS is a proprietary binary blob, remotely controlled by Apple. So, the light in the menu bar is not a reliable indicator of anything. There is no privacy on macOS, nor any other proprietary system. You can never be 100% sure what the system is doing right now, as can be anything it is capable of. Apple is putting a lot of money to "teach people" otherwise, but that is marketing, not truth.
- TZubiri 2y agoI get it, free software take, nothing new. But this is a pretty extremist take. Just because a company doesn't push source code and you can't deterministically have 100% certainty, doesn't mean you can't make any assertions about the software. To refuse to make any claims about software without source is as principled as it is lazy. Imagine an engineer brought to a worksite, and they don't have blueprints, can he do no work at all? Ok, good for you, but there's engineers that can.
- kasey_junk 2y agoIt’s even dumber than that because the people that do assurance work don’t rely solely on source even when it’s available. Reversing the software is table stakes for assurance work already so suggesting source is a requirement just doesn’t match reality.
- rudy6912 2y agoYes, I think all devices packed with sensors that live in our homes should be transparent in what they do, that is their code should be available for everyone to see. And yes, it is extremist take, given where we ended up today.
- perching_aix 2y ago> There is no privacy on macOS, nor any other proprietary system. Which is to say, every system in actual widespread use. All such CPUs, GPUs, storage devices, displays, etc. run closed microcode and firmware. It'd be funny if it wasn't so profoundly sad. And even if they didn't, the silicon design is again, closed. And even if it wasn't closed, it's some fab out somewhere that manufactures it into a product for you. What are you gonna do, buy an electron microscope, etch/blast it layer by layer, and inspect it all the way through? You'll have nothing by the end. The synchrotron option isn't exactly compelling either.
- 542458 2y agoFWIW, modern Macbooks also hardware disable the mic when the lid is closed. https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/security/secbbd20b00b/web https://support.apple.com/en-ca/guide/security/secbbd20b00b/...
- ryanisnan 2y agoHow is that true? I use my macbook mic occasionally with the lid closed, and an external monitor.
- bennyg 2y agoPlus one-ing this - I think the external monitor may be the kicker to keeping the mic active. This drives me up the wall when Google Meet decides to just default to the closed Macbook next to me instead of my already connected Air Pods when joining work meetings.
- Gigachad 2y agoThe closed macbook next to you has infinitely better sound quality than the airpods mic which will sound like you are underwater.
- dagmx 2y agoAre you sure it’s the MacBook (T2 or Arm) mic? I imagine you’d sound super muffled if you were trying to use it while closed anyway, so I can’t imagine it’s very usable to yourself?
- bluSCALE4 2y agoI just tested this with Voice Memo and can confirm it works at least in that scenario. The recording didn't stop, the mic was just disconnected then reconnected when lid was opened. Using Amphetamine w/ script installed on M1.
- pjot 2y agoJust to point it out, but there’s a native terminal command `caffeinate` that does the same as Amphetamine. I use the -disu flags
- curun1r 2y agoThe microphone also can't be covered with a $1 plastic camera cover off Amazon. It's so easy to solve the camera issue if you care about it, but there's really nothing you can do about the mic.
- 71bw 2y agoI went the "batshit insane" route and my microphone hole is plugged in with some clay. It did most likely physically damage it forever, but at least I now know it's OFF for good.
- mass_and_energy 2y agoWhy not shut it off in the bios?
- 4k93n2 2y agoi tried that with some sugru on an old phone (samsung s10e) and it does a really good job of blocking the microphone. if you have a case on your phone its a lot less destructive too since you can just stuff the sugru into the microphone hole in the case. the case i was using was soft rubber so it was easy enough to pop out the corner of the case to be able to use the microphone for a call. that wasnt my daily phone at the time though so im not sure how well it would work in reality. i could see myself forgetting to pop out the case when i get a call and the other person just handing up before i realised what was going on. it also doesnt work on every phone. i tried the same thing on a pixel 5 but blocking the mic hole did nothing, but that phone uses an under screen speaker so maybe there is something similar going on with the mic
- 3eb7988a1663 2y agoI believe it is possible to turn a speaker into a microphone. Found a paper which claims to do just that[0]. So, there is no safety anywhere? SPEAKE(a)R: Turn Speakers to Microphones for Fun and Profit It is possible to manipulate the headphones (or earphones) connected to a computer, silently turning them into a pair of eavesdropping microphones - with software alone. The same is also true for some types of loudspeakers. This paper focuses on this threat in a cyber-security context. We present SPEAKE(a)R, a software that can covertly turn the headphones connected to a PC into a microphone. We present technical background and explain why most of PCs and laptops are susceptible to this type of attack. We examine an attack scenario in which malware can use a computer as an eavesdropping device, even when a microphone is not present, muted, taped, or turned off. We measure the signal quality and the effective distance, and survey the defensive countermeasures. [0] https://arxiv.org/abs/1611.07350 https://arxiv.org/abs/1611.07350
- orbital-decay 2y agoThis only works on audio chipsets that allow pin retasking. Which is, coincidentally, all Realtek chipsets that are present in every PC... (you also need to plug the speaker directly, mostly limiting it to headphones and laptop speakers)
- bluGill 2y agoEven where it works, speakers are much worse microphones that dedicated microphones, and so the amount of data that can be gathered is low. Why bother when you probably have a microphone on the same PC that can capture far more sound?
- bobthebutcher 2y agoI think there was a long period where a proper PC would frequently have only the cheap stereo speakers which are small enough to far outperform raw microphone leads. But I'm not sure this works that well in >=HDMI even if some monitor speakers might otherwise be ideal.
- 2y ago
- wutwutwat 2y agoMiclocks are a thing, or any chopped 3.5mm 3 prong plug should do the trick https://mic-lock.com/products/copy-of-mic-lock-3-5mm-metallic-black https://mic-lock.com/products/copy-of-mic-lock-3-5mm-metalli... This still doesn't stop a program from switching the input from external back to the internal mics though afaik
- andix 2y agoI'm not sure if an attacker could get some additional sensitive information from me with access to the microphone or the camera, if they already have full access to my PC (files, screen captures, keylogger). Most things they would be interested in is already there.
- ohhnoodont 2y agoYup it's wild to me how much anxiety there is about cameras while no mind is given to microphones. Conversations are much more privileged than potentially seeing me in my underwear. That said the most sensitive information is what we already willingly transmit: search queries, interactions, etc. We feed these systems with so much data that they arguably learn things about us that we're not even consciously aware of. Covering your camera with tape seems like a totally backwards assessment of privacy risk.
- LadyCailin 2y agoI’m just going to assume you’re a man, and don’t generally worry about things like revenge porn. Because that is a bigger concern to me than you, it seems. Sure, I don’t want my sound to be recorded either, but that’s why I put a cover on the webcam AND turn off the physical switch on my (external) microphone. They are both easy things to do.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- JCharante 2y ago> Yup it's wild to me how much anxiety there is about cameras while no mind is given to microphones. Conversations are much more privileged than potentially seeing me in my underwear. It depends on the person, I don't think you could gain much from me? I don't say credit card numbers out loud, I don't talk about hypothetical crimes out loud. I don't say my wallet seed phrases out loud. I also don't type in my passwords. Yes you could probably find out what restaurant I'm ordering delivery for, but other than that I suppose my conversations are really boring.
- hackernewds 2y agoThe cost of feeding your entire years speech to an LLM will be $0.5/person. I'm sure summarized and searchable your conversation will be very very valuable.
- 2y ago
- rocqua 2y agoHow will microphone access be monetized? For video, it is extortion. For microphone, it's much harder.
- sunsetonsaturn 2y agoRecord, produce transcript, look for keywords, alert the puppeteer when something interesting is picked up - trade secrets, pre-shared keys, defense sector intelligence, etc.
- goodpoint 2y agoAnd even record keystroke sound to extract passwords.
- hackernewds 2y agoOnly works if there's labeled data for your prior keystrokes as training data. Unless, there's some uniform manufacturing defect per key in a widely available keyboard like Macbook Air
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- fsflover 2y agoMy Librem 14 has a microphon+camera kill switch. Also, on Qubes OS, everything runs in VMs and you choose explicitly which one has the access to microphone and camera (non by default). Admin VM has no network.