On 10/03/2017 12:59, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
Just been listening to a radio piece about those Samsung smart TVs the CIA
etc have apparently hacked so they can listen to what's going on in the
room. So wondered if any of the computer savvy types could explain a few
things I've observed with my voice activated Samsung TV.

I don't have any details of how their hack works, but I presume it
starts with a compromised app install, or possibly a trojan update of
some form.

1) If it is in standby, it no longer appears on my LAN.

If I were writing covert software that was going to phone home from
time to time, I might only activate the lan port for a very brief period
intermittently. I would also cache and DHCP allocated IP address so I
did not leave requests visible to the router at unexpected times.

2) I'm not aware of a method of bringing it out of standby over the
internet. (it can be set to look for software updates etc overnight,
though)

There may or may not be - but once compromised by whatever means (e.g.
that may even include someone gaining physical access to it to load
something from a USB stick) then it can do what ever is required.

3) The LED on the front of the set changes colour between standby and on.
Think most would notice if it was on when meant to be off.

Chances are the LED is controlled by software.

4) Can the really very cheap microphone fitted to such things
differentiate between the speech or music etc from the TV's own speakers
just a few inches from it and pick up intelligible speech from the other
side of the room?

Yes easily - especially if you know what is being played on the speaker
at the time - its a basic digital echo cancellation technique to excise
the transmitted signal from the received one.

Perhaps spies always have their TV switched on with the sound turned down.
Despite things like bugs having been around for many a year. Obviously,
their spy degree didn't include having a radio etc on loud when discussing
something naughty.

Most domestic situations will leak information in all kinds of ways...

How effective any security measure is will vary enormously depending on
who your adversary is. If you are up against nation state funded spooks,
then you are going to lose pretty much every time unless you *really*
know what you are doing.



--
Cheers,

John.

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