The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

Is Samsung imitating Sony?

Researcher's claim: 'I logged your logger'
Updated: denied by Samsung

Customer Success Testimonial: Recovery is Everything

If this is true, it could be the stupidest thing any laptop manufacturer has ever done: NetworkWorld is reporting the discovery of keyloggers on brand-new Samsung laptops.

In an incident that holds echos of Sony’s famous rootkit embarrassment, a NetSec Consulting researcher says he spotted the StarLogger installed on two new devices, and has reported this to Samsung (now reportedly investigating the claims).

NetSec's founder Mohamed Hassan says StarLogger – a commercial keylogger – was found when he scanned new, freshly-configured Samsung laptops (first a model R25; the installation of the keylogger was then replicated on a model R540).

StarLogger is removable, with plenty of sites offering instructions, but its installation without user permission was described by Hassan as possibly illegal and at least raising troubling ethical and privacy issues. ®

Update Samsung has issued a brief denial, in which it said the researcher has identified an innocuous directory as the keylogger in error. Its statement says that the researcher's security program "mistook a folder created by Microsoft Live Application for a key logging software, during a virus scan.". Looks like a game of claim and counter-claim is on the cards. ®

Final Update As we report here, it was a false positive. The Slovenian language is not a keylogger.

Ensure Ease of Recovery with Asigra’s Agentless Software

More Likely

I'd say either

a) someone has managed to infect their image source (noice exploit!)

b) the local reseller / PC shop has some idiot working for them that is infecting machines

I seriously doubt samsung would deliberately install a very easy to detect key logger!

6
0

Possibly illegal?

I'd posit that it's definitely illegal. Surely it comes under either interception of communications - if you log every keystroke you have the contents of emails etc. - or computer misuse i.e. fucking with someone's machine without consent, or perhaps a double-whammy of both. I'd say they're screwed.

5
0

If True.

Thats if its true, which it isn't.

2
0

More from The Register

 breaking news
NSA PRISM-gate: Relax, GCHQ spooks 'keep us safe', says Cameron
Whatever they are up to, it's all above board, we're told
PRISM snitch claims NSA hacked Chinese targets since 2009
Snowden suddenly looks safer in Hong Kong after revelations
 breaking news
US chief spook: Look, we only want to spy on 6.66 BEELLLION of you
Americans assured they are not in the NSA's sights
Speech-to-text drives motorists to distraction
Will talking to you mean I crash into that car up ahead, Siri?
DHS warns of vulns in hospital medical equipment
Has your doctor's anasthesia machine been hacked?
 breaking news
Yes, maybe we should keep hackers in the clink for YEARS, mulls EU
Watch out black hats, they just might throw away the key
Microsoft borks botnet takedown in Citadel snafu
Stupid Redmond kicked over our honeypots, wail white hats
Critical Java SE update due Tuesday fixes 40 flaws
And yes, most are remotely exploitable
NSA accused of new crimes ... against slideware
They may take our information but they cannot take our REFINED AESTHETICS