Researchers have previously shown that acoustic and ultrasonic signals ( inaudible to the human ear ) can be used to damage hard drives if played at close range . Similar research was conducted last year by a team of researchers who demonstrated that a DoS ( denial - of - service ) attack can be achieved using a phenomenon called acoustic resonance .
Since electromagnetic HDDs are susceptible to external vibrations , the researchers showed that with this specific technique ( acoustic resonance ) , specially shaped sound waves can produce intense vibrations inside the hard drives and potentially lead initially to a " freeze " and then to a system collapse .
By exploiting this vulnerability , the research showed that an attack of this type is feasible in a real-world environment against the hard drives of a closed -circuit surveillance system or a business .
These attacks can be carried out using an external speaker or even through the system itself . In their experiments , testing hard drives from different companies such as Seagate , Toshiba and Western Digital , they discovered that ultrasonic waves cause hard drives to “ freeze ” in less than 9 seconds .
We also tested a high- end laptop (Dell XPS 15 9550) by playing the sound through the built-in speaker , simulating the case where the user received a malicious email with the sound as an attachment . The test caused the laptop to “ freeze ” 45 seconds after starting to play the sound , and to “ crash ” 80 seconds later .
You can read more about the research at the following link titled : “Note: How Intentional Acoustic Interference Damages Availability and Integrity in Hard Disk Drives and Operating Systems.” Blue
