Protect Your Devices from juice jacking

The concept is simple, leading smart phones on the market have been designed to utilize the same port for charging the phone as data transfer. This opens the opportunity to trick a user in need of a charge to expose their phone's data port. The attack encompasses many facets of information security, including security design, user awareness, attacks against system design/code, as well a bit of social engineering.


With juice jacking, the vulnerability or attack vector is the phone's USB port, the exposure factor is dependent on the user's awareness of this possible attack method and their phone's battery life. When these two factors come together, the unsuspecting user plugs their phone into a malicious system, the attack is able to take place. In the age where business executives travel regularly, and depend on access to their phones to respond to emails, check their schedule, etc.. (basic work functionality) this vector may come up more often then people presume.


How do I avoid it?

The most effective precautions center around simply not charging your phone using a third-party system. Here are some tips to help you avoid using public kiosk charger:

    1.Keep your devices topped off: Make it a habit to charge your phone at your home and office when you’re not actively using it or are just sitting at your desk working.

    2.Carry a personal charger: Chargers have become very small and portable, from USB cables to power banks. Get one and throw it in your bag so you can charge your phone anytime you’re at the office or while on-the-go if you use a power bank.

    3.Carry a backup battery: If you’re not keen on bringing a spare charger or power bank, you can opt to carry a full spare battery if your device has a removable battery.

    4.Lock your phone: When your phone is truly locked as in inaccessible without the input of a pin or equivalent passcode, your phone should not be able to be paired with the device it’s connected to.

    5.Power the phone down: This technique only works on phones on a model-by-model basis as some phones will, despite being powered down, still power on the entire USB circuit and allow access to the flash storage in the device.

    6.Use power only USB cables: These cables are missing the two wires necessary for data transmission and have only the two wires for power transmission remaining. They will charge your device, but data transfer is made impossible.