Defeating Optical Tempest will be easy...
Well, from what I'm understanding of so-called optical tempest, I'm not sure most of the usual thinking will apply. First of all, anyone know what the most energetic wavelengths are in the CRT's output? (I have no idea.) Is it in the visible range? It may not be. Thus contrast in the visible range may not equal contrast in the freqency range that 'OT' will be using. Also, and I'm not sure what this implies yet, but the screen-emitted beam has lowest energy after hitting a letter, which is black. Thus this tempest device must be particularly sensitive to the "white" background in order to makeout the letters as the sweep comes through (and is blocked by the letters). And now that I think of it, I'm still not convinced that this does not amount to specular reflection, even though we are now talking about the "ballistic" beam...remember in order to determine what a letter is detecting a -decrease- in the beam's reflected energy will be the key in reading a letter. Oh wait...the answer to defeating optical tempest is simple: have white letters on a black background. And after they've caught up with that trick, alternate the background colors at random intervals (white on black, black on white, etc...). Optical Tempest will only work under VERY ideal circumstances. I wouldn't worry about it. -TD _________________________________________________________________ Protect your PC - get McAfee.com VirusScan Online http://clinic.mcafee.com/clinic/ibuy/campaign.asp?cid=3963
On Sat, 19 Jul 2003, Tyler Durden wrote:
First of all, anyone know what the most energetic wavelengths are in the CRT's output? (I have no idea.) Is it in the visible range? It may not be.
There is some minuscule proportion of X-rays produced by CRT displays. Could be there any (however theoretical) possibility of X-ray tempest? I don't suppose there would be much of practical use of that, though.
participants (2)
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Thomas Shaddack
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Tyler Durden