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Amazon Echo knows more than it seems.
A new study has found that police can access important data from smart speakers at crime scenes without the owner's permission or the manufacturer's assistance. This information can prove invaluable for solving murders or burglaries.
Scientists from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany, Jonah Crasselt and Gaston Pugliese studied what information can be extracted from these devices. Their study was inspired by news of Amazon's refusal to provide police with data from a smart speaker related to a murder case.
The researchers focused on the Amazon Echo Show 15, a smart assistant with a large display, camera, six microphones, and a light sensor. They managed to gain access to the device's unencrypted file system, where logs of detected movements and recognized faces were stored.
A "refresh token" was also found in the file system, used to access data in the cloud. Although it was encrypted, researchers were able to decrypt it using a key found in an unencrypted file on the device and open-source information. This made it possible to access voice requests, calendars, contacts, conversations, photos, and videos.
Pugliese noted that obtaining local data requires some technical knowledge, but it is surprising that the file system was not encrypted.
An Amazon spokesperson said that the security of devices and customer data is the company's top priority. He stressed that obtaining the data required direct physical access to the Echo device and specialized knowledge to extract information from internal components.
Criminologist David Wilson of Birmingham City University in the UK noted that the use of technology and science in homicide investigations is far less common than television crime dramas suggest. According to him, less than 2% of murder trials rely on DNA evidence.
Wilson believes that while evidence from smart speakers may be useful in a small number of cases, there are concerns about the trade-off between security and privacy. He stressed the importance of taking human rights into account in the implementation of such technological advances.
Source
A new study has found that police can access important data from smart speakers at crime scenes without the owner's permission or the manufacturer's assistance. This information can prove invaluable for solving murders or burglaries.
Scientists from the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany, Jonah Crasselt and Gaston Pugliese studied what information can be extracted from these devices. Their study was inspired by news of Amazon's refusal to provide police with data from a smart speaker related to a murder case.
The researchers focused on the Amazon Echo Show 15, a smart assistant with a large display, camera, six microphones, and a light sensor. They managed to gain access to the device's unencrypted file system, where logs of detected movements and recognized faces were stored.
A "refresh token" was also found in the file system, used to access data in the cloud. Although it was encrypted, researchers were able to decrypt it using a key found in an unencrypted file on the device and open-source information. This made it possible to access voice requests, calendars, contacts, conversations, photos, and videos.
Pugliese noted that obtaining local data requires some technical knowledge, but it is surprising that the file system was not encrypted.
An Amazon spokesperson said that the security of devices and customer data is the company's top priority. He stressed that obtaining the data required direct physical access to the Echo device and specialized knowledge to extract information from internal components.
Criminologist David Wilson of Birmingham City University in the UK noted that the use of technology and science in homicide investigations is far less common than television crime dramas suggest. According to him, less than 2% of murder trials rely on DNA evidence.
Wilson believes that while evidence from smart speakers may be useful in a small number of cases, there are concerns about the trade-off between security and privacy. He stressed the importance of taking human rights into account in the implementation of such technological advances.
Source
