It
turns out that even something as seemingly benign as your mouse can put your
personal information at risk. That’s according to a report by security firm Bastille, which says that hackers
could in theory take control of your computer through its wireless peripherals.
The hack, which the company calls MouseJack, affects
nearly every wireless mouse and keyboard on the market and could give a hacker
complete access to your personal computer or to the network at your office.
The hack isn’t exactly sophisticated either. According to
Bastille, all a would-be hacker needs is about $15 worth of computer hardware,
which he could then use to send commands from his computer to yours.
The hack works because while your wireless keyboard sends
information in encrypted form to your computer’s wireless dongle (so hackers
can’t see what you’re typing), your mouse doesn’t.
As a result, hackers can send signals designed to perform
keyboard commands to your dongle. Those signals can then be used to hijack your
system.
“Wireless mice and keyboards are the most common
accessories for PCs today, and we have found a way to take over billions of
them,” said Marc Newlin, Bastille’s engineer responsible for the MouseJack
discovery, in a statement.
So how to protect yourself? Well, some wireless mouse and
keyboard manufacturers developed their devices so they can be patched via
firmware updates. Other companies’ offerings, however, can’t be updated and
will simply have to be replaced.
Fortunately, Bastille has published a list of the
impacted hardware, as well as information about how some peripherals
companies have responded to the hack.
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