Your Phone Can be Hacked Even When it’s Offline

It’s not always easy to tell if hackers have gotten ahold of your personal information, but you probably don’t think much about safety if your phone isn’t connected to the internet. Unfortunately, you better think again. There are some clever ways hackers can gain security access to your information even if your phone isn’t online. Here are just a few examples.

Electromagnetic Radiation

Beware of plugging in your phone to charge it. When plugged in, your phone lets off electromagnetic radiation that can be tracked. Although a hacker has to be relatively close to your phone — within 67 feet — to gain information, he or she can use a device that detects your phone’s radio spectrum and tracks your keystrokes. As you can imagine, your keystrokes could give away highly-classified personal information.

Read More: How to Tell if Your Android Has Been Hacked

Accelerometers

Your accelerometer — the sensor in your phone to track tilt and motion — can be used to detect typing. When used close to a computer, the accelerometer has a nearly 80-percent accuracy of keystroke detection.

That’s not the only type of hacking the accelerometer is used for, either. This kind of data might not be the typical data hackers want, but did you know that your smartphone, even when it’s disconnected, can give away your location? Hackers can follow your movements if you’re traveling on an underground train. Each bump and the duration between each stops can be monitored by an accelerometer to give away your location.

Lasers

Another way hackers read your keystrokes is by aiming a laser at a smartphone keyboard to track its vibrations. While this method is technically more accurate than using the accelerometer, the laser has to be directed towards the part of the phone that reflects light.

Power Consumption

Load Monitoring is a way to watch voltage and current changes to figure out a person’s connected activity. The technique is typically used by electricity companies to monitor electricity usage in specific places. However, it has also been used as a way to determine which device is running at each time. It also has the potential to be used by hackers to see which devices they have successfully infected with malware.

These are crafty, spy-level hacks to think about, and they might not happen to you personally. But common hacks do happen all the time. Make sure you keep your phone safe with PSafe Total. PSafe Total’s Antivirus works 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to keep your phone safe from security breaches.