In computer security, shoulder surfing is a type of social engineering technique used to obtain information such as personal identification numbers (PINs), passwords and other confidential data by looking over the victim's shoulder. This attack can be performed either at close range (by directly looking over the victim's shoulder) or from a longer range, for example by using a pair of binoculars or similar hardware. To implement this technique attackers do not require any technical skills; keen observation of victims' surroundings and the typing pattern is sufficient. Crowded places are the more likely areas for an attacker to shoulder surf the victim. In the early 1980s, shoulder surfing was practiced near public pay phones to steal calling card digits and make long distance calls or sell them in the market for the cheaper prices. However, the advent of modern-day technologies like hidden cameras and secret microphones makes shoulder surfing easier and gives more scope for the attacker to perform long range shoulder surfing. A hidden camera allows the attacker to capture whole login process and other confidential data of the victim, which ultimately could lead to financial loss or identity theft. Shoulder surfing is more likely to occur in crowded places because it is easier to observe the information without getting the victim's attention.
Apart from threats to password or PIN entry, shoulder surfing also occurs in daily situations to uncover private content on handheld mobile devices; shoulder surfing visual content was found to leak sensitive information and even private information about third-parties.
Video Shoulder surfing (computer security)
Methodologies
Gaze-based password entry
The basic procedure for gaze-based password entry is similar to normal password entry, except that in place of typing a key or touching the screen, the user looks at each desired character or trigger region in sequence (same as eye typing). The approach can, therefore, be used both with character-based passwords by using an on-screen keyboard and with graphical password schemes as surveyed in. A variety of considerations is important for ensuring usability and security. Eye tracking technology has come a long way since its origins in the early 1900s. State of the art eye trackers offers non-encumbering, remote video-based eye tracking with an accuracy of 1? of visual angle. Eye trackers are a specialized application of computer vision. A camera is used to monitor the user's eyes. One or more infrared light sources illuminate the user's face and produce a glint - a reflection of the light source on the cornea. As the user looks in different directions the pupil moves but the location of the glint on the cornea remains fixed. The relative motion and position of the center of the pupil and the glint are used to estimate the gaze vector, which is then mapped to coordinates on the screen plane.
Researchers proposed ways to counter shoulder surfing on mobile devices by leveraging the front-facing camera for gaze-based password entry. For example, GazeTouchPIN and GazeTouchPass combine gaze input in the form of eye movements to the left/right, and touch input by tapping on-screen buttons. These methods are more secure than traditional touch-based input (e.g., PIN and Lock Patterns) because they require shoulder surfers to (1) observe the user's eyes, (2) observe the user's touch input, and (3) combine the observations.
Painting album mechanism
Painting Album Mechanism is an anti-shoulder surfing mechanism, which has characteristics of both recall and recognition graphical techniques. Thus, this mechanism is also a hybrid graphical password anti-shoulder surfing mechanism. It was developed based on results of user's affinity of choices, and through observation on the way kids are behave, while they paint the picture. When this mechanism was developed, results from user's affinity of choice survey had become the mechanism's architecture. Meantime, outcome of the observation have created this mechanism three input schemes, where we named it Swipe Scheme, Color Scheme, and Scot Scheme. In Painting Album Mechanism, Swipe Scheme, Color Scheme, and Scot Scheme are the methods for password creation. Each input scheme is non-identical, and it is user's options to choose the input scheme they prefer.
Graphical password schemes
To overcome the drawbacks of text-based authentication, researchers have been developed new password scheme which uses images, pictures as a password known as graphical password scheme. This scheme is used as an alternative to the alphanumeric password. Current authentication methods are categorized into three main areas: Token based authentication, Biometric based authentication, Knowledge-based authentication. In addition to this, a comparison of current graphical password techniques classified graphical password schemes into two categories viz. recognition-based and recall based approaches. Results answer the questions like "Is a graphical password as secure as a text-based password?" It also strives to find the answer to the question: "What are the major design and implementation issues for graphical passwords?" This study is useful in graphical password methods and wants to find the alternatives to overcome the susceptibility of it.
Secret tap method
Because of the important to take measures against covert observation in order to prevent authentication information from being stolen, Secret tap method proposes a technique that do not expose the authentication information during entry, even if other individuals try to view the input process. Additionally, it should be noted that the risk of covert observation is not restricted to direct observation by other individuals, camera recordings also pose a threat. Therefore, it is necessary to make the authentication process more complex in order to prevent authentication information from being stolen even if cameras and/or other individuals observe the information input process numerous times. There are two types of shoulder-surfing attack: direct observation attacks, in which authentication information is obtained by a person who is directly monitoring the authentication sequence, and recording attacks, in which the authentication information is obtained by recording the authentication sequence for later analysis.
Secret tap authentication method uses icons and a touch panel liquid crystal display. The goals and design policy used are,
- Covert observation resistance Maintain the resistance strength at a level that prevents the authentication information from being revealed to other individuals, even if the authentication operation is performed numerous times.
- Recording attack resistance Maintain the resistance strength at a level that prevents the authentication information from being analyzed by other individuals even if the authentication operation is fully recorded.
- Brute-force attack resistance Maintain the resistance strength at a level that prevents the authentication process from broken more easily than by a brute-force attack on a four digit PIN. This policy follows the standard put forth in ISO 9564-1.
- Usability Maintain a level of usability that permits operators to perform the authentication operation with ease.
Comparison of risks between alphanumeric and graphical passwords
The primary benefit of graphical passwords compared to alphanumeric passwords is the improved memorability. However, the potential detriment of this advantage is the increased risk of shoulder-surfing. Graphical passwords that use graphics or pictures such as PassFaces, Jiminy, VIP, Passpoints or a combination of graphics and audio such as AVAP are likely all subject to this increased risk unless somehow mitigated in implementation. The results indicate the fact that both alphanumeric and graphical password-based authentication mechanisms may have a significant vulnerability to shoulder-surfing unless certain precautions are taken. Despite the common belief that nondictionary passwords are the most secure type of password-based authentication, our results demonstrate that it is, in fact, the most vulnerable configuration to shoulder-surfing.
PIN entry
Personal identification number is used to authenticate oneself in various situations, while withdrawing or depositing the money from automatic teller machine, unlock a phone, door, laptop or PDA. Though this method of authentication is a two step verification process in some situations, it is vulnerable to shoulder surfing attack. An attacker can obtain the PIN either by directly looking over the victim's shoulder or by recording the whole login process. So, various shoulder surfing resistant PIN entry methodologies are proposed to make the authentication process secure.
Cognitive trapdoor game
The cognitive trapdoor game has three groups involved in it: a machine verifier, a human prover, and a human observer. The goal of each group is, human prover has to input the PIN by answering the questions posed by the machine verifier while the observer tries to observe the interaction between the machine verifier and the human prover to know the PIN. A token is assigned to the prover as a unique identification by an authentic channel to prove his/her own identity. As the prover needs to authenticate themself in it is not easy for the observer to remember the whole login process unless the observer had a recording device. The cognitive trapdoor mechanism is resistant to direct shoulder surfing but not against the recording shoulder surfing.
Maps Shoulder surfing (computer security)
See also
- Social engineering (security)
- Information diving
- Credit card fraud
- Phishing
References
Source of article : Wikipedia
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