![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I'd been swapping my wired keyboard and wireless mouse (one of the older ones with a wired transceiver, not the nano USB adapters they have now) between my personal laptop and my work laptop at the start and end of each work day.
One of the laptop's USB ports started getting loose, such that the mouse connection would drop & reconnect every once in a while. I used a toothpick to pull up on the prongs inside the port. That is a possible fix for a loose port problem, but it didn't make much difference in my case.
That made me realize that plugging & unplugging items into the USB ports multiple times a day isn't a good idea.
Not only was I swapping the keyboard & mouse; I was also swapping the position of the laptops on my desk. Therefore using a separate wired keyboard & mouse for each laptop wasn't ideal either. It's hard to move laptops around with peripherals plugged into them. It's also not practical to keep peripherals plugged in when carrying the laptops back and forth between Qiao's place and mine.
Using the laptops' built-in keyboard and trackpad isn't good either. I can't type nearly as fast on them, and it's quite frustrating.
I thought a good solution would be to get a separate wireless keyboard/mouse combo using a single nano USB adapter for each laptop. It is a good solution. (Except for the minor problem that I might need a bigger laptop bag now for my personal laptop, as having a nano USB adapter plugged into the side makes it not fit into the bag. Which is hard to believe as it's less than a centimeter difference, but yeah. Or I could simply unplug the nano adapter for that; that's not something I need to do every day.)
Today after eating lunch I noticed some grease spots on the wireless keyboard I'd been using. This keyboard doesn't have an on/off switch; it goes to sleep automatically when not in use. So I carried the keyboard all the way into the bathroom to wipe it off, thinking that was surely far enough away that any keys I pressed while cleaning it wouldn't be recognized on the laptop.
Much to my surprise, when I carried the keyboard back to the laptop, I saw that the keypresses had still registered on the laptop! The bathroom is about 35 feet away, with 2 walls in between. I had no idea the wireless signals being used were strong enough to travel that far!
Later I tested the other wireless keyboard and mouse, which are made by a different company. They also work from far away. I tested the mouse outside the house from the porch, with the front door and storm door closed, about 20 feet from my laptop. The mouse's scroll wheel still was able to scroll the browser page open on my laptop.
That got me to wondering whether using a wireless keyboard can be a security risk. Suppose someone planted a device outside your home to record the signals from your keyboard, thereby capturing all your key presses, including any user IDs and passwords you type. Maybe a malicious app on your phone could even listen for wireless keyboard signals, and secretly record your keystrokes.
From what I've read now, wireless keyboards & mice may use encryption to prevent that kind of thing. But how can you know if yours are using encryption or not? I don't recall reading that in the specs of the ones I have. I will have to look up more on that.
The first thing I found when searching on it was not about the keyboard signals being captured, but rather hackers transmitting their own signals to control your mouse, "mousejacking".
I wonder if having my hands on these wireless-transmitting devices all day (as well as being within a few feet of the laptop's wi-fi signals) is deleterious to my health. The cell phones and iPad are also usually not far away. The wifi router is a bit further away, but still not that far. And there are several other devices in the house that send out wireless signals. I know they say it's nothing to be concerned about. But maybe it all adds up. I wonder.
And then there's the physical problems one can get simply from typing a lot and using a mouse. My right wrist has been achy today.
One of the laptop's USB ports started getting loose, such that the mouse connection would drop & reconnect every once in a while. I used a toothpick to pull up on the prongs inside the port. That is a possible fix for a loose port problem, but it didn't make much difference in my case.
That made me realize that plugging & unplugging items into the USB ports multiple times a day isn't a good idea.
Not only was I swapping the keyboard & mouse; I was also swapping the position of the laptops on my desk. Therefore using a separate wired keyboard & mouse for each laptop wasn't ideal either. It's hard to move laptops around with peripherals plugged into them. It's also not practical to keep peripherals plugged in when carrying the laptops back and forth between Qiao's place and mine.
Using the laptops' built-in keyboard and trackpad isn't good either. I can't type nearly as fast on them, and it's quite frustrating.
I thought a good solution would be to get a separate wireless keyboard/mouse combo using a single nano USB adapter for each laptop. It is a good solution. (Except for the minor problem that I might need a bigger laptop bag now for my personal laptop, as having a nano USB adapter plugged into the side makes it not fit into the bag. Which is hard to believe as it's less than a centimeter difference, but yeah. Or I could simply unplug the nano adapter for that; that's not something I need to do every day.)
Today after eating lunch I noticed some grease spots on the wireless keyboard I'd been using. This keyboard doesn't have an on/off switch; it goes to sleep automatically when not in use. So I carried the keyboard all the way into the bathroom to wipe it off, thinking that was surely far enough away that any keys I pressed while cleaning it wouldn't be recognized on the laptop.
Much to my surprise, when I carried the keyboard back to the laptop, I saw that the keypresses had still registered on the laptop! The bathroom is about 35 feet away, with 2 walls in between. I had no idea the wireless signals being used were strong enough to travel that far!
Later I tested the other wireless keyboard and mouse, which are made by a different company. They also work from far away. I tested the mouse outside the house from the porch, with the front door and storm door closed, about 20 feet from my laptop. The mouse's scroll wheel still was able to scroll the browser page open on my laptop.
That got me to wondering whether using a wireless keyboard can be a security risk. Suppose someone planted a device outside your home to record the signals from your keyboard, thereby capturing all your key presses, including any user IDs and passwords you type. Maybe a malicious app on your phone could even listen for wireless keyboard signals, and secretly record your keystrokes.
From what I've read now, wireless keyboards & mice may use encryption to prevent that kind of thing. But how can you know if yours are using encryption or not? I don't recall reading that in the specs of the ones I have. I will have to look up more on that.
The first thing I found when searching on it was not about the keyboard signals being captured, but rather hackers transmitting their own signals to control your mouse, "mousejacking".
I wonder if having my hands on these wireless-transmitting devices all day (as well as being within a few feet of the laptop's wi-fi signals) is deleterious to my health. The cell phones and iPad are also usually not far away. The wifi router is a bit further away, but still not that far. And there are several other devices in the house that send out wireless signals. I know they say it's nothing to be concerned about. But maybe it all adds up. I wonder.
And then there's the physical problems one can get simply from typing a lot and using a mouse. My right wrist has been achy today.