Cybersecurity has been a major topic in the news lately after the wave of ransomware attacks that have been taking down the computer systems of multinational companies all over the world.
Think you don’t have to worry about that vape that you’ve been charging in your computer’s USB port?
Think again.
Security researcher Ross Bevington gave a demonstration showing how your innocent little e-cig could be used to upload malicious code to your computer.
If you think that charging your vape on a locked computer will eliminate the risk, you’re wrong.
Bevington made it clear that this can work even on a locked computer:
“PoisonTap is a very similar style of attack that will even work on locked machines.”
Another hacker released a video where he was able to upload code to his computer by plugging in his vape. The code created a message which said “Do you even vape bro!!!”
The good news is that, since e-cigs have limited storage capacity, there isn’t a ton of room to hold complex code. So we most likely won’t be seeing any corporation-destroying ransomware attacks executed from a charging vaporizer.
Bevington claims that the best way to prevent a vape attack on your system is to make sure that you always have the latest security patches installed on your machine, have a good password, and lock your machine when not using it.
For businesses, he has the following advice:
“If you run a business you should invest in some kind of monitoring solution that can alerted your security team when something like this attack occurs.”
Of course the only foolproof way to prevent your vape from fucking your shit up is to never plug it in to your computer in the first place.
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