September 11, 2024 at 09:06AM
Researcher Mordechai Guri introduced the PIXHELL data exfiltration method, exploiting monitor noise to bypass air-gapped computers. This approach, along with other air gap-jumping techniques, poses security threats. Malware manipulates LCD screen pixels to emit sound waves encoding sensitive information. The attack can transmit data at a rate of 5-20 bits per second up to 2.5 meters. Technical details and countermeasures are available in a published paper.
The meeting notes provide a detailed overview of the new data exfiltration method called PIXHELL, which involves using the noise generated by pixels on a screen to transmit sensitive information from air-gapped computers. This method was discovered by Mordechai Guri of Ben-Gurion University in Israel. The attacker needs to plant malware on the air-gapped computer, and the malware manipulates the pixel patterns displayed on the screen to generate acoustic waves at specific frequencies controlled by the malware. The acoustic signals are captured by nearby devices and converted into ‘0’ and ‘1’ bits that are transmitted through the noise.
The PIXHELL attack can transmit data at a rate of 5-20 bits per second over distances ranging between 0 and 2.5 meters. Technical details and countermeasures for this attack have been provided in a paper published on September 7, and a video demonstrating the PIXHELL attack is available.
The meeting notes also mention related research on other methods for jumping air gaps, such as RAM-generated Wi-Fi signals, ultrasonic tones, fan vibrations, and more. Additionally, other related articles and research papers focused on the security implications of air-gapped systems and various methods of exfiltrating data from them are listed.
Please let me know if there are any specific action items or further analyses needed based on these meeting notes.