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Is Big Brother logging your keystrokes?
http://c0x2.de/lol/lol.html ^

Posted on 06/21/2005 4:36:58 AM PDT by Budgie

Edited on 06/21/2005 5:05:29 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]

chromance.de dell keylogger

Mirrored by iBabes.org - Babevoting

 


I was opening up my almost brand new Dell 600m laptop, to replace a broken PCMCIA slot riser on the motherboard. As soon as I got the keyboard off, I noticed a small cable running from the keyboard connection underneath a piece of metal protecting the motherboard.



I figured "No Big Deal", and continued with the dissasembly. But when I got the metal panels off, I saw a small white heatshink-wrapped package. Being ever-curious, I sliced the heatshrink open. I found a little circuit board inside.



Being an EE by trade, this piqued my curiosity considerably. On one side of the board, one Atmel AT45D041A four megabit Flash memory chip.



On the other side, one Microchip Technology PIC16F876 Programmable Interrupt Controller, along with a little Fairchild Semiconductor CD4066BCM quad bilateral switch.





Looking further, I saw that the other end of the cable was connected to the integrated ethernet board.

What could this mean? I called Dell tech support about it, and they said, and I quote, "The intregrated service tag identifier is there for assisting customers in the event of lost or misplaced personal information." He then hung up.

A little more research, and I found that that board spliced in between the keyboard and the ethernet chip is little more than a Keyghost hardware keylogger.

The reasons Dell would put this in thier laptops can only be left up to your imagination. It would be very impractical to hand-anylze the logs, and very CPU-intensive to do so on a computer for every person that purchased a dell laptop. Why are these keyloggers here? I recently almost found out.

I called the police, as having a keylogger unknown to me in my laptop is a serious offense. They told me to call the Department of Homeland Security. At this point, I am in disbelief. Why would the DHS have a keylogger in my laptop? It was surreal.

So I called them, and they told me to submit a Freedom of Information Act request. This is what I got back:



TOPICS:
KEYWORDS: 4suckers; backdoor; bigbrother; dell; hoax; loggingourpagevisits; lowqualitycrap; microsoft; nevermind; securityflaw; spyware; tinfoil; userfriendly; windows
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1 posted on 06/21/2005 4:36:58 AM PDT by Budgie
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To: Budgie

and does anybody care?


2 posted on 06/21/2005 4:40:07 AM PDT by Beckwith (The liberal press has picked sides ... and they have sided with the Islamofascists)
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To: Budgie

Keep rolling your own I guess. I would be amazed if this is not debunked. Kind of hard to keep this kind of secret in the tech industry.


3 posted on 06/21/2005 4:40:47 AM PDT by listenhillary (Socialists have only killed 100 million. We'll never learn will we?)
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To: Budgie

Ping.


4 posted on 06/21/2005 4:41:53 AM PDT by Calusa (Say Nick, was ya ever stung by a dead bee?)
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To: Beckwith

Uh... yes.


5 posted on 06/21/2005 4:43:03 AM PDT by Sterlis (My brain is full.....)
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To: Budgie
Perhaps you shouldn't have included being a member of the IRA in your resume?

Another idea: Type the word BOMB about 3000 times and wait.

If you a phone company van starts parking out on the street you might be on to something.

6 posted on 06/21/2005 4:43:09 AM PDT by DainBramage
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To: Budgie; ohioWfan; Southack; Travis McGee; Squantos
Un.
Effing.
Believeable.
7 posted on 06/21/2005 4:43:26 AM PDT by Lazamataz (The Republican Party is the France of politics.)
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To: listenhillary
Keep rolling your own I guess. I would be amazed if this is not debunked. Kind of hard to keep this kind of secret in the tech industry.

He's identified chip numbers and types. I'd like to know if there's anything similar in desktops.

8 posted on 06/21/2005 4:44:21 AM PDT by Lazamataz (The Republican Party is the France of politics.)
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To: Beckwith

Just because one is paranoid, that doesn't mean they aren't out to get one.


9 posted on 06/21/2005 4:45:21 AM PDT by Right Angler
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To: All

On further investigation (I know, I should have done it first) I now feel that this is probably a hoax.

Apologies.

Makes you think though.


10 posted on 06/21/2005 4:45:24 AM PDT by Budgie
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To: DainBramage

Bump for future angst.


11 posted on 06/21/2005 4:45:31 AM PDT by JusPasenThru (Ignore alien orders.)
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To: Beckwith

I do.


12 posted on 06/21/2005 4:45:44 AM PDT by jammer
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To: Inspector Harry Callahan

Two years is too long.


13 posted on 06/21/2005 4:46:00 AM PDT by Cagey (These pretzels are making me thirsty.)
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To: Budgie
The only thing that gives me pause, is the name of the directory and the name of the HTML file.

\lol\lol.html ????

He might just be pulling all of our legs.

14 posted on 06/21/2005 4:46:04 AM PDT by Lazamataz (The Republican Party is the France of politics.)
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To: Budgie
Old news. I knew what you were typing before you posted this.

Now, go down to your closest Police station and turn yourself in before we have to come pick you up. I haven't finished my doughnut yet this morning.

15 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:00 AM PDT by Lurking in Kansas (Nothing witty here… move on.)
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To: Budgie; Swordmaker; backhoe

pingaroony!


16 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:11 AM PDT by Jet Jaguar
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To: Budgie

...and why the page counter/tracker, budgie? Hmmmmmmmm?

17 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:15 AM PDT by martin_fierro (< |:)~)
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To: Budgie; ohioWfan; Southack; Travis McGee; Squantos
On further investigation (I know, I should have done it first) I now feel that this is probably a hoax.

Yes, I agree, just based on the file names.

To all I pinged: False alarm.

18 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:16 AM PDT by Lazamataz (The Republican Party is the France of politics.)
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To: Budgie
I called the police

I do that all the time when I find things in my computer I do not understand...they put me on hold for long periods of time...

19 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:42 AM PDT by 2banana (My common ground with terrorists - They want to die for Islam, and we want to kill them.)
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To: JusPasenThru

IBabes?


20 posted on 06/21/2005 4:47:50 AM PDT by JusPasenThru (Ignore alien orders.)
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