The Samsung Galaxy S5 was the first S-series device to feature a fingerprint scanner, and of course, all the company's fans were very excited about it. As it turns out, the fingerprint scanner on Samsung's previous flagship carries a very dangerous flaw.
Hopefully, you've never used the fingerprint scanner and are still using some traditional password to access the device.
Why;
A Forbes article reports that security researchers at FireEye have discovered a serious security flaw in the Galaxy S5's fingerprint scanner. The flaw allows hackers to copy your fingerprints and use them for their own malicious purposes.
Researchers have discovered that if the Android kernel is cracked, hackers can directly read the fingerprint sensor information.
There is already malware that requires root access on the Galaxy S5 to work. This can then retrieve highly confidential data.
Fingerprints are usually stored in a so-called "trusted zone" on the smartphone, but using the technique mentioned above, a hacker can gain access to this specific area and retrieve whatever information it contains.
So, every time the user simply touches the fingerprint scanner, the attacker can access their fingerprint. Once the hackers have the data, they can use it to reproduce new fingerprints from them.
FireEye researchers explain that the flaw in the Galaxy S5 is only found in older versions of Android, up to Android 4.4.
So, users running Android 5.0 or above shouldn't worry.
Researchers have not yet discovered whether the vulnerability affects other devices with a built-in fingerprint scanner, but the problem is believed to be quite widespread.
Samsung is already aware of the issue after it was immediately notified by FireEye, and should probably prepare a patch to eliminate the vulnerability.
Source: secnews.gr
