Spy Stuff: Double ought agents pay attention!

[gunug]

I have seen lasers used in several recent television shows (like Midsomer Murders) to remotely listen to conversations; this is one step further for this subject!

In one of the cooler hacks we’ve seen recently, a bunch of hacking academics at the University of Michigan researched the ability to flicker a laser at audible sound frequencies to see if they could remotely operate microphones simply by shining a light on them. The results are outstanding.

While most Hackers will have heard about ‘The Thing’ – a famous hack where Russian KGB agents would aim a radio transmitter at the great seal in the US embassy,  almost none of us will have thought of using lasers shined in from distant locations to hack modern audio devices such as Alexa or Google Assistant. In the name of due diligence, we checked it out on Wikipedia: ‘The Photoacoustic Effect’ , and indeed it is real – first discovered in 1880 by Alexander Bell! The pulsing light is heating the microphone element and causing it to vibrate along with the beam’s intensity. Getting long range out of such a system is a non-trivial product of telescopes, lasers, and careful alignment, but it can be made to work.

https://hackaday.com/2019/11/06/laser-based-audio-injection-on-voice-controllable-systems/

Nice video about hacking Alexa and similar devices using a laser: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=29&v=ORji7Tz5GiI&disable_polymer=true

[Xairbusdriver]

What is "Alexa"?

Lasers were invented by cats to keep their human servants occupied! It's nice to know some of those servants have become educated about physics. These humans have yet to figure out useful physics rules like managing to always land on your feet after a fall...