How safe it is to have Siri and / or active Google Now on your phone? – TECHcetera

Within the personal assistants are “three heavyweights” who are the most recognized in the market, due to its ability to reduce and streamline tasks to run on mobile devices. They are “Cortana” in Lumia (Windows Phone), Siri in iOS (iPhone and / or iPad) and Google Now (Android), respectively, which through their skills and, above all, by the grace marketing (we do not say lies) has established itself in the collective imagination of users of so-called smartphones.

Now, it is no surprise to learn that many people do not often use such personal assistants well either by ignorance or learning curve usually require the user to interact with the wizard each time the response is accurate and, above all, more fluid.

To make matters worse, recently some researchers French reported having found a way to “manipulate at will” to Siri and Google Now, through a procedure that seems straight out of a science fiction movie, as is to use radio waves to transmit silent commands from a distance equivalent to 16 feet.

So an unsuspecting user could be attacked even if you have your smartphone pocket apparently “obsolete” with the headset connected. As they say, “the devil is in the details”! And precisely, hackers can use cable as an antenna hands-free device for converting electromagnetic waves into electrical signals that the operating system of the terminal interpreted as audio coming from the user’s microphone.

That Thus, through this procedure (mentioned above), the researchers got SmartPhones do things like sending SMS messages type, make calls, surf the sites where they can easily infect the terminal via malware and even manipulate networking profiles social, all without having to say a word to Siri and / or Google Now.

The most chilling is that the equipment used to carry out tests very difficult not to get components or too cumbersome to load (can be easily carried in a suitcase or trunk of a car). Therefore, it is advisable to check the settings of Siri and Google Now for the lock screen and connect the headphones at the time of use! Because in crowded places, more than a hacker could go fishing prey.