This is the use case cybersecurity professionals typically refer to. Unlike the previously mentioned, illegal keylogger use entirely disregards consent, laws, and product ownership. Monitoring productivity: keeping tabs on how workers use their time on the clock.Marital surveillance: collecting data on a partner’s online behavior using a device that belongs to the user to prove that the partner is cheating.Parental monitoring: a measure to ensure a child’s safety in virtual and interpersonal interactions.This is the grey area of keylogger usage. But they can’t monitor devices that don’t belong to them. They can even legally check on the devices their kids use. Law enforcement investigation – when investigating criminal conduct, law enforcement agencies may use keyloggers if they have the warrant to do so.Ī person who uses a keylogger can check on computers they own or made.Employee surveillance – to monitor the safe usage of corporate property at all times.IT assessment – to acquire information about user issues and effectively address them.Product development – to collect user feedback to enhance the computer’s performance.Monitoring business server – to keep an eye out for unapproved user activity on web applications.Therefore, here are some examples of keyloggers that can be used legitimately: It is important to mention that ‘consent’ is not mandatory. The keylogger also must be used according to the laws of their location. Legitimate Keyloggersįor a keylogger to be used legally, the person or organization using it must follow a few rules, such as: not use the data in an illegal way, be the owner of the product, its manufacturer, or the legal guardian of a child who owns the product. However, from an ethical point of view, keyloggers can be split into three main categories: legitimate, illegitimate, and ‘grey area’. The legality of using a keylogger also depends in part on local regulations. The morality, legality, and consequences of using a keylogger are determined by different factors such as consent, goals, intent, and possession of the monitored product. Since then, the number of commercial keyloggers has exploded, which brings us to the present, with a huge variety of products, target groups, and languages in which they are available. During that time, a lot of different products came out quickly on the market. The middle to late 1990s represents another turning point in the history of keyloggers because that is when a lot of people started producing and using commercial keyloggers. In the meantime, Soviet embassies chose to type classified information on manual typewriters instead of electric ones. Once they were in place, the keyloggers measured the slight changes in each typewriter’s magnetic field that could barely be seen as the print head turned and moved to type each letter. One of the most famous early events happened in the middle of the 1970s when Soviet spies made a very smart hardware keylogger that they used to spy on IBM Selectric typewriters in the US Embassy and Consulate buildings in Moscow and St. According to Wikipedia, keyloggers were used for many different purposes in the 1970s and early 1980s, including secret government operations. It may come as no surprise that keyloggers have been used for spying on people since the beginning of computers. It can be downloaded on purpose by someone who wants to monitor a computer, or it can be downloaded without the user’s knowledge and run as part of a rootkit or a remote administration Trojan (RAT). Software-based KeyloggersĪ software-based keylogger is a computer program that can be installed without having direct access to the user’s computer. The device usually looks like a standard keyboard PS/2 connector, computer cabling, or a USB adaptor, making it relatively simple to conceal the device for someone who wants to keep an eye on a user’s behavior. Keylogger Types: Hardware vs Software-based Hardware-based KeyloggersĪ hardware-based keylogger is a tiny device, a physical component that connects to the computer via the keyboard. But first, let’s dive into the difference between hardware-based and software-based keyloggers. The term ‘keylogger’ comes from ‘keystroke logging’, the act of recording (logging) the keys that are pressed on a keyboard, usually without the user knowing that their actions are being watched. A keylogger is a software or hardware component that records everything typed on your computer’s keyboard.
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