Hackers Can Remotely Steal Fingerprints From Android Phones by Wang Wei.
From the post:
FireEye researchers Tao Wei and Yulong Zhang presented their research in a talk titled, Fingerprints on Mobile Devices: Abusing and Leaking, at the Black Hat conference in Las Vegas on Wednesday, where they outlined new ways to attack Android devices in an effort to extract user fingerprints.
The new attack is limited mostly to Android devices with Fingerprint Sensors that helps the user to authenticate their identity by simply touching their phone’s screen, instead of by entering a passcode.
Researchers confirmed the attack on the HTC One Max and Samsung’s Galaxy S5, which allowed them to stealthily obtain a fingerprint image from the device because vendors don’t lock down fingerprint sensors well enough.
The attack affects mobile phones by major manufacturers including handsets delivered by Samsung, HTC, and Huawei.
For some reason the link to the paper isn’t working so try:
Fingerprints on Mobile Devices: Abusing and Leaking.
Competent hackers don’t have to cut off your finger(s) to bypass fingerprint based biometric security precautions.
At least on cellphones. Other devices in the works.
Does that make you (and your fingers) feel more or less secure?