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arXiv · 1808.10250

SonarSnoop: Active Acoustic Side-Channel Attacks

Peng Cheng·Ibrahim Ethem Bagci·Utz Roedig·Jeff Yan
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Abstract

We report the first active acoustic side-channel attack. Speakers are used to emit human inaudible acoustic signals and the echo is recorded via microphones, turning the acoustic system of a smart phone into a sonar system. The echo signal can be used to profile user interaction with the device. For example, a victim's finger movements can be inferred to steal Android phone unlock patterns. In our empirical study, the number of candidate unlock patterns that an attacker must try to authenticate herself to a Samsung S4 Android phone can be reduced by up to 70% using this novel acoustic side-channel. Our approach can be easily applied to other application scenarios and device types. Overall, our work highlights a new family of security threats.

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Peng Cheng, Ibrahim Ethem Bagci, Utz Roedig, Jeff Yan. 2018-08-30. SonarSnoop: Active Acoustic Side-Channel Attacks. https://arxiv.org/abs/1808.10250

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