Virus through power supply on a notebook or a mobile device running iOS?

Is it possible to get a virus through a power supply for a notebook? I mean not a battery but really the power supply itself. I heard that there is a chance for iOS.

Barbara

Posted 2014-02-15T23:03:08.020

Reputation: 31

1For iOS, it is possible because the power supply can be a USB host. But laptop power supplies don't have data transfer like that. – Dan D. – 2014-02-15T23:06:16.007

Answers

Short answer: No

Long answer: Yes. If the charging port is the same as a USB/etc connector port, then it can travel over that. However the fact that you're transmitting power isn't why, it's because you're doing the same thing as plugging in a USB to a USB port.

For example, the reason there's a chance for an iPod is because the USB port is the same port as the charging port.

Jon

Posted 2014-02-15T23:03:08.020

Reputation: 8 089

Have laptop power supplies some sort of flash memory that can be modified? – Barbara – 2014-02-15T23:12:37.137

Not many of them. – Jon – 2014-02-15T23:17:25.977

@chipperyman573: Most won't. But unless you open the charger's case, you can't really know what's inside or if it is a charger at all. – Dennis – 2014-02-15T23:54:45.903

Yeah, as chipperyman indicates, there have been cases of attacks against smartphones and tablets where bogus "charging stations" provide a USB port for charging, and those "stations" give you a little free bonus. This is possible because the same USB port that is used for charging is also used for data transfer, and the phone can't tell that it's plugged into a charging station vs the owner's PC, so transfers to/from the phone can be accomplished as if a PC were connected. (Presumably one could guard against this with a special USB cable/adapter that only passed through the power wires.)

Of course, the bad guys must overcome the security measures built into the phones to do this, but they're experts at that, and it's often possible to access personal data on many phones without having to somehow unlock or "jailbreak" the phone.

There is no way that an ordinary laptop that charges through a 2-prong AC plug and "brick" could be attacked this way. There are only two wires (ignoring optional ground) connecting power socket to the "brick", and only two wires connecting the "brick" to the laptop, so there's no real path for sending data. (The same holds for a desktop system.)

(Laptop batteries and/or their associated power controllers do usually have some sort of memory built in, but it's just enough to remember charge state, and it's unlikely (with current technology) that one could, eg, "infect" a battery and have that infection transferred to the PC.)

Daniel R Hicks

Posted 2014-02-15T23:03:08.020

Reputation: 5 783

Just to make few things clear: sending data through only two wires is possible (I2C, power-line communication) but you need a device that will receive and decode the signal, and no power supply will be capable of doing that. Battery infections are real, but AFAIK there's no known method to do anything more painful than permanently prevent them from charging.

– gronostaj – 2014-02-16T00:34:28.230