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Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch

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On 08/22/2017 09:33 AM, Mario Castelán Castro wrote:
> On 21/08/17 23:02, Jape Person wrote:
>> The keyboard communications are encrypted, and both mouse and keyboard
>> are rechargeable. But I at least have to check with Cherry support to
>> learn whether or not my new toys are vulnerable. I suspect that they are.
> 
> The problem is that even if the manufacturer assures you that the
> wireless link is secured cryptographically, all you have is their word
> for it. The implementation is very probably unauduitable (and even if
> would not audit it yourself, somebody among the community of users
> probably would do so and report if he found any vulnerability), as
> almost all firmware is.
> 


Hence, why I suspect that they are vulnerable. I bought these things 
because my wife trips over her cables 3 or 4 times a day, and wireless 
ones are just easier to deal with from a workstation logistics standpoint.

Dummy that I am, I had only considered the issues like password 
interception, and had never considered the possibility that an 
unencrypted mouse connection would be a path for introducing keystrokes 
to the system, though it's a really obvious attack path. Surely proper 
design of the transceiver could keep the mouse input from sending 
keystrokes, but then I suppose some of the "special features" of the 
mouse wouldn't work -- and we couldn't have that, could we?

I'll look into getting the test suite from Bastille to see if I can 
figure out how to do some testing on these things to see if they look 
vulnerable. Do you really think that this is unauditable? Bastille 
claims to have produced Open Source tools for doing just that.

Maybe I'll just use the wireless keyboards and mice to control TVs.

> That is why opaque cryptographic systems can not be trusted. This is
> covered in any practical cryptography book.
> 

Practical cryptography -- isn't that an oxymoron, for most users at 
least? People at my lower level of competence are at least aware that 
cryptography can be used in a variety of ways. I implemented encrypted 
e-mail on my own systems years ago, only to find that I couldn't 
persuade even one other among my acquaintances to use it. Not even if I 
set it up for them. Some of these folks were medical professionals who 
were exchanging the health data of patients among themselves and with 
patients -- by e-mail!

In a day when people post their most personal experiences and thoughts 
on Facebook or Twitter for everyone to read, most people don't seem able 
to comprehend that some of us would prefer not to broadcast our 
underwear preferences to the universe.

Thank you very much for your thoughts. They jerked me a little further 
back into such reality as I can tolerate.

;-)

JP

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Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 04:50 +0200
  Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-22 06:10 +0200
    Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 15:40 +0200
      Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-22 17:30 +0200
        Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Zoltán Herman <zoltanhbz@gmail.com> - 2017-08-22 18:20 +0200
          Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Zoltán Herman <zoltanhbz@gmail.com> - 2017-08-22 21:10 +0200
        Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 19:20 +0200
          Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 19:40 +0200
            Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 19:50 +0200
              Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Nicolas George <george@nsup.org> - 2017-08-22 20:10 +0200
            Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Nicolas George <george@nsup.org> - 2017-08-22 20:00 +0200
          Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Nicolas George <george@nsup.org> - 2017-08-22 20:00 +0200
          Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-22 20:10 +0200
            Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 20:50 +0200
              Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-22 22:20 +0200
                Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 23:20 +0200
                Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-23 00:10 +0200
                Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless  keyboard in stretch) Jape Person <japers@comcast.net> - 2017-08-23 00:10 +0200
          Re: Wireless devices and cryptography in practice (Was: USB wireless keyboard in stretch) Fungi4All <fungilife@protonmail.com> - 2017-08-22 23:40 +0200
  Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Darac Marjal <mailinglist@darac.org.uk> - 2017-08-22 11:20 +0200
    Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Mario Castelán Castro <marioxcc.MT@yandex.com> - 2017-08-22 15:50 +0200
  Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Dominic Knight <dominicknight@gmx.com> - 2017-08-22 12:30 +0200
    Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2017-08-22 12:30 +0200
      Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Zoltán Herman <zoltanhbz@gmail.com> - 2017-08-22 14:40 +0200
    Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz> - 2017-08-23 00:40 +0200
      Re: USB wireless keyboard in stretch Ben Caradoc-Davies <ben@transient.nz> - 2017-08-23 00:40 +0200

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