Posted on 04/07/2019 4:39:24 AM PDT by vannrox
Not sure where to put this one, it could go in so many different sub-forums, so I'll just put it here in 'General'.
The other day my laptop crashed and burned. Not sure what happened, but I think the motherboard fried. I managed to get it working enough to attach an external hard drive and mirror off all the data files. Most of it I already had backed up, but I just wanted to get the most recent data. Because many of my keyboard keys were not working I had to use some more global commands to get all the data. Last Sunday I went out and bought a new laptop. I wasn't too mad because my old laptop was 4+ years old and had given me pretty good service. I got the new laptop set up, installed all the software and copied all the data from my old laptop (now on my external HD) over to my new computer. Everything was working great, no problems.
So last night I was busy canning some spicy pickles and eggs and decided to listen to some music from my new machine. I clicked on my normal music directories and all these weird files showed up. At first I just ignored them thinking I would just go back and clean them out later. There were a bunch of them, hundreds even. I was searching for a particular song I wanted to listen to, but all these extraneous files kept getting in the way. What are these files???
The new files were .MP3 files and they had titles like 170901_1554. Always 6 digits with an underscore and then 4 more digits. Okay, so it's an .MP3 file, so let's play it and see what it is, right?
So, I played one of the files. ............ It's a recording of ME, in a conversation I was having with someone else. I hadn't recorded that conversation. So then I listened to a whole bunch of these files, and they were all recordings of conversations. Hundreds of conversations!! Me talking with my wife, me talking with a business colleague...even one of me talking to my dogs! Some of them were just 2-3 minutes long. Some of them were 45 minutes long. Hundreds and hundreds of recorded audio of conversations. WTF??? Like seriously...W...T...F??????
Now, I'm pretty computer saavy (lord knows, I work in the industry) so I'm pretty good about turning stuff off. When I set up a computer I spend hours turning off all the bloatware, all the recording and video. I'm kind of obsessive about turning off all the "big brother" stuff, and I frequently check to make sure updates don't add or turn something back on again. I run pretty damn good security on my machines too. That laptop was tight as a drum...or so I thought. Yet, there are hours and hours of conversations recorded on it. Probably hundreds of hours!!!! Absolutely unbelievable!
I have no idea what software recorded these files. I have no idea what triggered them to be recorded. I equally have no idea what or whom they were sent to. The good news is, there wasn't much of anything particularly notable in the recordings, but the simple fact they exist at all is a SERIOUS WTF moment!!!
Pretty scary!! Pretty scary that something like this could happen to someone like me, and it makes me wonder how much other EVIL-WARE is out there on other people's machines, recording everything they're doing!!
I know companies that monitor employees through such means, remote employees in particular.
Why don’t you uninstall the drivers for the mic & camera
could they be recorded on your phone as “memos” and then backed up to your computer when you sync they data?
what are you doing, Dave?
Windows? If so, who was the maker? Lenovo, Dell..?
My guess is malware. He should stay off sketchy sites
Video recording and microphones are nearly everywhere. Regrettably big brother doesn’t begin to describe what surrounds us. Get used to it because there is no place to hide
Put this on my watch list.
Oh okay sweetheart. You just do whatever your everlovin' heart desires. At FR we will all love you no matter WHAT you do. xxxooo.
Wow. When you heard that first conversation, I’ll bet you got chills - in a bad way. That is scary, though. I’ll keep checking this thread to see if anyone solves your puzzle.
Better half and I sometimes do whoops, hollers and sexual suggestions so as to make ‘em think we have a thriving sex life. All in fun
The filenames are clearly timestamps. i.e.
170901_1554.mp3 would be
Sept 1, 2017 3:54PM
Were you able to confirm that the laptop was on and present during the recorded conversations?
If you can confirm that some of the conversations occurred when the laptop was not on or present, then it would suggest that there is some kind of bug present that was secretly uploading to the laptop, for later retrieval.
Unfortunately, this would probably be government agency surveillance, rather than random malware. Just look at what happened to poor Mr. Kraft.
I don’t think there is any way to track this any further, however.
It might be worth scanning the drives of your desktop PC from a trusted linux boot CD, and see if there are other suspicious files there.
giggity, giggity
Anyone who tapes my computer sounds will have hours and hours of off-key humming, interspersed by cursing out Bill Gates.
------------------------------------
*I'm sorry Dave, I can't let you do that.
Does Mrs. vannrox work for fusion GPS? Are your dogs Siberian Huskies?
Too easily hackable, even “inadvertently”.
https://thehackernews.com/2017/05/browser-camera-microphone.html
How did you know that? It’s like you’ve been listening to ...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.