Hacking fingerprint readers is easy and cheap. Anyone can do it

Case specialists cybersecurity They have been convincing us for years that there are few methods of confirming identity that can win with fingerprint readers – there is a reason why most smartphones and laptops are equipped with such, right? Kraken Security Labs suggests that it is not entirely and breaking such security is not as difficult as it might seem.

A report has appeared on the company’s blog, which provides information on how such hacking is performed using commonly available materials. Apparently they are enough wood glue, laser printer and acetate film sheetand the task is so easy that virtually anyone can get it done if they want to.

This is a very disturbing vision, but there is also better news, as a potential hacker will need it first our fingerprint, and more specifically his photos. Only that he will not try to obtain our items for this purpose, but rather will look at the surfaces we touch, e.g. a laptop screen at work, tables in the library or machines in the gym – so we are probably talking about someone from our environment.

And when you manage to get a fingerprint photo, you should change them to negative in your graphics processing program – The Kraken team says it can create a decent print in about an hour. Later, we print an imprint on an acetate sheet, using a typical laser printer for this purpose, because the toner is said to perfectly copy the 3D structure of a real fingerprint. Now there is only the last step, which is pouring the wood glue on the printed imprint and waiting for it to dry.

After peeling off the foil, we have it at our disposal fingerprint ready for action, which, according to Kraken Security Labs, proved successful in “conducting a known form of attack on most of the devices available in the company.” People who carried out this mock attack argue that if it had been carried out “for real”, the effects would be devastating, because we use this form of protection for example in banking applications to protect your finances.

Therefore, they argue that fingerprint readers should be just one of the elements of protection for us and it is worth considering a multi-stage identity verification wherever possible, e.g. together with a strong password protecting the email account, to which we send an additional confirmation code.

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