Vulnerability · Published Aug 11, 2021 · Assigned by mitre
CVE-2021-38545
Medium 5.9
In plain English
A medium-severity security flaw in the affected software. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 1.3% (higher than 70% of all known vulnerabilities).
Official description
Raspberry Pi 3 B+ and 4 B devices through 2021-08-09, in certain specific use cases in which the device supplies power to audio-output equipment, allow remote attackers to recover speech signals from an LED on the device, via a telescope and an electro-optical sensor, aka a "Glowworm" attack. We assume that the Raspberry Pi supplies power to some speakers. The power indicator LED of the Raspberry Pi is connected directly to the power line, as a result, the intensity of a device's power indicator LED is correlative to the power consumption. The sound played by the speakers affects the Raspberry Pi's power consumption and as a result is also correlative to the light intensity of the LED. By analyzing measurements obtained from an electro-optical sensor directed at the power indicator LED of the Raspberry Pi, we can recover the sound played by the speakers.
Affected products (as reported)
References
- https://www.nassiben.com/glowworm-attack x_refsource_MISC