This maybe a dumb question but i became paranoid all of a sudden and wanted some answers because i can’t find it anywhere else nor can i sleep without it. Like even if i did flash linux on a lets say amd laptop couldn’t the chip itself be spying on me ? Also i understand bootloaders are stored or rom is there a way to know what else is stored on it are roms open source ? Are cpu’s open source and companies like asus store their logos and shit on their mother boards so what else could they be storing ? Are there open source alternatives for these parts ? Are we all being privacy cautios for nothing ? I know we can use firewall but wouldn’t the chip integrated have the ability to bye pass it ?
I know there are linux laptops but having a pre installed linux and some switches isn’t gonna solve the problem do they use open source roms and motherboard ? Are there any fully open source chipsets ? I want to know the same about smartphones too ?
You have made me paranoid now, well more paranoid someone need to answer this asap.
You can use Wireshark to monitor all network traffic. It’s not a simple task though. But if you take the time to set it up and learn how to use it, you can know everything that leaves your computer.
It should be clarified that using Wireshark on the hardware in question is still subject to what the operating system is allowing your security context to see - meaning a rootkit or hardware level compromise could hide its traffic in that case.
Intercepting all traffic coming from the machine using another network node is a good idea though. Wireshark or an IDS like Snort would both work for that.
Yeah, you want a switch with port mirroring. That way you can send everything that hits your router to a separate device to monitor.
Still doesn’t help with phones though. I don’t think there is any way to truly verify the cellular modem’s connections.
System76, Tuxedo computers and Framework may be close to what you are looking for.
But you need to think about your threat model and decide how much work/study you need to consider yourself “safe”, because the only way to be absolutely sure that your hardware is trustworthy, is too build it from the scratch.
“I’M NOT INTERNET SHOUTING”, he internet shouted.
Bro lost his shit in the edits section
I am also quite interested in this. It is not something that keeps me awake at night, and I am not particularly paranoid about it. But I find that working towards answering this question is a fun frame from which to learn about electronics, radio communications, and networking.
Since this appears to be something that is causing you some anxiety, I think it is better if I start by giving you some reassurance in that I have not yet managed to prove that any electronic device is spying on me via a hidden chip. I don’t think it is worth being paranoid about this.
I can explain some things that could be done to test whether a Linux computer spying. I am not suggesting that you try any of this. I am explaining this to you so that you can get some reassurance in the fact that, if devices were spying on us in this manner, it is likely that someone would have noticed by now.
The “spy” chip needs some way to communicate. One way a chip might communicate is via radio waves. So, the first step would be to remove the WiFi and Bluetooth dongles and any other pieces of hardware that may emit radio waves during normal operation. There is a tool called a “Spectrum Analyzer” that can be used to capture the presence of specific radio frequencies. These devices are now relatively affordable, like the tinySA, which can measure the presence of radio frequencies of up to 6 GHz.
One can make a Faraday cage, for example, by wrapping the PC with a copper-nickel coated polyester fabric to isolate the PC from the radio waves that are coming from the environment. The spectrum analyzer antennas can be placed right next to the PC and the device is left to measure continuously over several days. A script can monitor the output and keep a record of any RF signals.
Since phones are small, it is even easier to wrap them in the copper-nickel polyester fabric alongside with the spectrum analyzer antenna to check whether they emit any RF when they are off or in airplane mode with the WiFi and Bluetooth turned off.
What this experiment may allow you to conclude is that the spy chip is not communicating frequently with the external world via radio frequencies, at least not with frequencies <= 6 GHz.
Using frequencies higher 6 GHz for a low-power chip is not going be an effective method of transmitting a signal very far away. The chip could remain hidden and only emit the signal under certain rare conditions, or in response to a trigger. We can’t rule that out with this experiment, but it is unlikely.
A next step would be to test a wired connection. It could be that the spy chip can transmit the data over the internet. One can place a VPN Gateway in between their PC and the router, and use that gateway to route all the traffic to their own server using WireGuard. All network packets that leave through the PC’s ethernet connection can be captured and examined this way using Wireshark or tcpdump.
If one can show that the device is not secretly communicating via RF nor via the internet, I think it is unlikely that the device is spying on them.
If one can show that the device is not secretly communicating via RF nor via the internet, I think it is unlikely that the device is spying on them.
The best you can learn is that you didn’t detect communication while you were listening.
Security researchers typically assume that attackers know the systems that will be used against them.
An attacker could evade this trap by waiting to phone home.
Or the hardware could encode information in timing by subtly delaying data leaving the device.
Or it could sneak information out in the pseudorandom data that it uses to set up secure connections.
Or it could use stenography to encode data in your photos.
What’s with the unhinged edits
OP has gone batty. I get it. I’m nuts too, just in a different way. Hope OP figures out what he wants to know.
Paranoid episode
Yea I was recently diagnosed bipolar and this is alarming.
Short answer. Do you have a computer or smartphone? If yes, it is spying on you.
If you want to be absolutely sure, the only way is to unplug all the network cables and physically break or disconnect all the wireless equipment. If you have a SIM card, the carrier can automatically install spyware. On the computer you can get malware or the bootloader/UEFI can be compromised. There are many other ways to spy as well, especially if it’s a targeted attack (done by the local law enforcement or your own enemy). The Internet was never meant to be private. It’s really hard to keep any data secure on a machine that has access to it. You can minimize the risk and decrease it by 1000000% but you can’t completely mitigate it unfortunately
Well here is my take: there are only like, 35 personalities that exist in the world with slight individual variations. You posting this tells any data scraper which one you fall under. People are in general extremely predictable. So once the algo has sorted you, they dont have to actively listen to you at all. The algo already knows what choices you perceive yourself as having in your life and when you are likely to make those decisions
Heck, the utility company knows if your going through a divorce based on changes in when and how the bill is paid.
Google knows if your getting laid based off location data
If you dont want to be spied on there is only one way my friend. Only lurk the web from one place, never post, only lurk. And just leave your phone in the closet or wherever when your not using it, turned off. The algo’s et al will still draw conclusions from this, but at least they will be incorrect
You conpletely avoided my question i don’t care about algorithms i just wanna know about the hardware
Bypass*
If you filtered your data through enough servers, or even better, split your outgoing data through multiple servers, encrypting and bouncing each of the packets multiple times, maybe have a couple filters… Your shit could still be spying on you because you are attracted to the network, and you need to talk out somehow, and unless you watched the chips be manufactured put together yourself you can’t be sure they aren’t corrupted.
That said, are you a foreign dignitary? Are you someone worth investing millions into taking down? Any minute a ninja could take you down in your day to day life, there just aren’t that many ninjas, and you aren’t worth taking down.
I can’t find the article because Google is the enshittiest now, but a couple years ago a tech journalist paid 2 different hackers to infiltrate his home system (him taking slightly more precaution than he normally would), he had no chance in keeping them out, he closed the article with a quote similar to the warning above.
V2.0: if you don’t want your hardware spying on you, get a device that has fully FOSS drivers and an open architecture (neither AMD nor Intel have that cuz they use x86_64 which is proprietary). I think Raspberry Pi and PinePhone have that. Not sure though. And if you meant microphone and camera spying on you then apps, ISP and everything else do matter. Just unplug that devices when you want to stay private and that’s it
ARM isn’t any better than x86, and can actually be more restrictive at times (secure boot keys baked onto the CPU, and not being able to disable it). RISC-V is promising, but just because the ISA is open source doesn’t necessarilly mean the implementation is, and I’m not aware of any 100% open source implementation being sold.
Why did you suddenly become paranoid about specifically your hardware chips spying on you?
Mania? Bipolar?
Or took the wrong substance…
Anyways, the “spying” is probably not OP’s most pressing issue.
Throw it on pihole, you can see all traffic coming and going through your house. Also a great anti-advertise option.
In my experience, theres a lot less spying and a lot more BS/bad scripts checking in, but you do you.
One thing to note, pihole also blocks ads in you’re using wifi from your phone. If I’m playing a game or whatever that has “watch this ad for…” half the time I have to switch off wifi or else it’ll claim the ad failed and won’t give the item.
Being privacy-conscious can protect your information from being passively collected by mainly corporate entities that track your buying habits, life events, and health.
If you think you’re being actively targeted for surveillance, then you need security that is proportional to the resources that the people who are spying on you have. In the case of say, the NSA, they could have a backdoor in a various location in your hardware or software stack. If you have privacy tools like tor, they’re liable to target you and collect your data just for that. Most android/IOS phones are thoroughly bugged and tracked, to the point where if the battery is still attached and the phone is switched off you can still be tracked. If the NSA does collect your data, there’s a 99% chance no human will look at your data unless they have a reason to search for you.
If you are being spied on, odds are you won’t catch it. You might be able to isolate abnormal outbound network traffic if you’re really good about tracking that kind of thing on your network. Your phone could connect to a fake Stingray cell station and you wouldn’t know.
If you’re being stalked by a person with less resources than the NSA, it becomes a lot easier and common-sense privacy protections can help you keep a low enough profile.
It’s also worth noting that if private companies get a hold of your data, they’ll sell it to any government or private organization who’ll pay them. There’s scant regulation about what they can’t collect and what they can’t do with it.
I think the simplest rule of thumb is if you have something sensitive, don’t say it near an android or ios phone and don’t put it on a computer that’s plugged into the internet. Criminals have their own OPSEC, as do people in the intelligence industry, and usually the answer is an “air gap”.
