Watch Out When You Put Your Key in A Lock … Someone May Be Creating A Copy Of Your Key

I love side channels … leaking information through non-obvious sources such as from sound, electromagnetic signals and electrical noise. Now, researchers have should how it is possible to print a 3D for a lock based on listening to the pins falling within a lock [here]:

With this, the microphone picks up the click of the key going into the lock and listens to the pins falling for the ridges in the key, and then predicting the shape of the key:

An example of an amplified sound wave is here:

New video by Bill Buchanan OBE

In the end, the analysis software (SpiKey) creates a shortlist of just three keys, and which can then be created as physical keys. Here is a live demo: