Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
1–10 of 431 posts
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#2Is there a true app that, preferably open source, that can disable the all microphones, confidently, for all apps, without having to physically disable my microphone as Edward Snowden suggested?
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#3Is there a true app that, preferably open source, that can disable the all microphones, confidently, for all apps, without having to physically disable my microphone as Edward Snowden suggested?
If one app can turn the microphone off, can another app turn it back on?
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#4Is there a true app that, preferably open source, that can disable the all microphones, confidently, for all apps, without having to physically disable my microphone as Edward Snowden suggested?
If one app can turn the microphone off, can another app turn it back on?
Depends on the permissions model of the OS, and if you trust the OS. Hence why Edward Snowden and Bunnie Huang developed the Introspection Engine [1].
It’s reasonable to assume that if you can’t audit and review the code of the app and the OS, you can trust neither and need safeguards at lower levels of the stack.
[1] https://www.tjoe.org/pub/direct-radio-introspection/release/...
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#5Is there a true app that, preferably open source, that can disable the all microphones, confidently, for all apps, without having to physically disable my microphone as Edward Snowden suggested?
How can you trust the hardware is not recording?
I’ve never felt better about connecting “dumb” headphones.
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#6Earlier quoted context omitted.
If one app can turn the microphone off, can another app turn it back on?
Depends on the permissions model of the OS, and if you trust the OS. Hence why Edward Snowden and Bunnie Huang developed the Introspection Engine [1]. It’s reasonable to assume that if you can’t audit and review the code of the app and the OS, you can trust neither and need safeguards at lower levels of the stack. [1] https://www.tjoe.org/pub/direct-radio-introspection/release/...
You forgot the firmware of the headphones!
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#7Earlier quoted context omitted.
Depends on the permissions model of the OS, and if you trust the OS. Hence why Edward Snowden and Bunnie Huang developed the Introspection Engine [1]. It’s reasonable to assume that if you can’t audit and review the code of the app and the OS, you can trust neither and need safeguards at lower levels of the stack. [1] https://www.tjoe.org/pub/direct-radio-introspection/release/...
You forgot the firmware of the headphones!
Corded headphones! :) at least until open firmware exists.
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#8Only a slightly related tangent, but most headphones and other loudspeakers can be very effective microphones when wired into the right circuit.
While speakers are often wired directly to a one-way DAC, that's not always the case. Sometimes the analog lines are all fed into a multiplexer and it can be routed to a ADC. Sometimes it's wired to a general purpose IO pin.
In such cases, reprogramming could turn that speaker into a microphone. I wonder if anyone has exploited this in the wild yet.
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#9An article complaining about the collecting and sharing of users personal data from a blog site that connects to facebook, google analytics and other third-party services to collect and share their users data? Oh the irony...
Re: Headphones are collecting too much personal data (2019)
#10Only a slightly related tangent, but most headphones and other loudspeakers can be very effective microphones when wired into the right circuit. While speakers are often wired directly to a one-way DAC, that's not always the case. Sometimes the analog lines are all fed into a multiplexer and it can be routed to a ADC. Sometimes it's wired to a general purpose IO pin. In such cases, reprogramming could turn that speak…
You can do the opposite of noise cancellation too: determine the back emf from the speaker compared to the audio input, that will give you the audio in the room. So you can use the same circuit both to drive the speaker and use it as a microphone. As good as undetectable until you trace the circuitry of what looks like an ordinary amplifier. The difference is on the order of a few mV but that's more than enough.
My personal favorite is the laser attack that turns any shiny surface into a microphone. When it's not on it literally isn't there.