The next time you think you aren’t being spied on at your workplace, its time you think again. At a recently held CanSecWest security conference, it was clearly demonstrated on how using significantly cheap gadgets could accurately track keystrokes typed in by a user 50- 100 feet away. Using just an infrared beam pointed at the user the demonstrators were able to determine the keystrokes and even use a dictionary tool to approximate words being typed. The technology uses line of sight even through windows to determine the words. The second method is a rather primitive one; it involves attaching a node to the PS/2 terminals on keyboards and tracking every key being typed, via power terminals even if these were 50-feet away.

Such techniques could easily trace confidential information from users on computers or even from ATM machines.

[Cnet]