If you own a number of devices in your household, the chances are that you may use some type of ‘fast charging‘ product to help get all the batteries topped up as quickly as possible. Following a report via TechSpot, however, a disturbing new security flaw has been found in a number of devices that could, potentially, cause your tech products to burst into flames!
Fast Charging Security Flaw!
Known as ‘BadPower’, the flaw has been discovered by the security research company Xuanwu Lab. So, what exactly is it? Well, it has been discovered that it’s possible to alter the chargers firmware allowing for it to provide voltages to the device well outside of safe remits.
In other words, hooking up your smartphone to such a compromised charger could see the battery literally bombarded with more power than it can handle. And, as you might be aware, lithium-ion batteries (which are within the vast majority of modern electrical/mobile products) generally tend to explode rather than pop.
Should I Be Worried?
Testing 34 individual ‘fast charger’ models, the security researchers found that the in-built security (designed to prevent this from happening) was (relatively easily) compromised on at least 18 of them. While this issue likely won’t be a widespread problem, the biggest concern is that such an attack is possible on public charging devices that are easily accessible and widely used.
So, I suppose the short version is, you probably don’t need to worry just as long as your ‘fast charging’ device comes from a reputable source/manufacturer. More so, that you don’t irresponsibly decide to share your charger, or worse, ‘borrow’ one you find lying around in a public place!
What do you think? – Let us know in the comments!
