[arch-general] [OffTopic] Wireless keyboard Security

[Mauro Santos]

On 09/06/2010 07:48 AM, Partha Chowdhury wrote:
> Recently I am looking for an ergonomic keyboard to replace my old
> samsung pleomax keyboard. I wanted to buy microsoft natural ergonomic
> keyboard 4000 but that is not in the market and the only other keyboard
> I find is logitech ergonomic keyboard K350.The keyboard is very
> comfortable to type and works out-of-the box with linux. But the thing
> is that it is wireless and after a search of "wireless keyboard
> security" on google i am a bit paranoid about using any wireless
> keyboard.Also I did not find any encryption option if used by the
> keyboard while using the logitech provided setpoint software on windows
> XP and logitech site does not mention if the keyboard uses
> encryption.Does this keyboard uses some hardware in-built encryption
> that logitech does not divulge ? 
> 
> If others on the list are using wireless keyboard, what are your
> experiences and recommendations ?
> 

Google searches do return some interesting results [2]. Although a
keyboard/receiver pair can claim to use encryption it may be poorly
implemented [1]. Logitech seems to use a proper encryption scheme [2]
but who knows if it has some flaw that makes it easy to break.

[1]
http://arstechnica.com/hardware/news/2007/12/wireless-keyboard-encryption-easily-broken-say-researchers.ars
[2]
http://www.logitech.com/images/pdf/roem/Logitech_Adv_24_Ghz_Whitepaper_BPG2009.pdf

-- 
Mauro Santos