[antiRepublicrat]

NSA's TEMPEST. You'd be shocked and amazed what you can tell about what's going on inside a person's home just from the patterns of electromagnetic interference generated.

Even better, some people recently figured out how to tell what you're typing by the sound the keyboard makes. They only need to know who manufactured your keyboard and point a sound-detecting laser at your window.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Not nearly that much is needed.

[NJ_gent]

"Even better, some people recently figured out how to tell what you're typing by the sound the keyboard makes. They only need to know who manufactured your keyboard and point a sound-detecting laser at your window."

TEMPEST's work goes past such limitations. You can reconstruct the image on a monitor by studying the interference pattern it generates. Thus, the words on your screen are reconstructed as you type them regardless of your keyboard and without using a laser which may constitute a nasty 'intrusion of privacy' in a court of law. NSA's been briefing corporations on how to protect and shield themselves from this sort of thing for quite a while. How long before the actual detection technology is shared with the FBI and local law enforcement who can begin using it at will?