How often have you come across the Google alert while browsing the internet? Next time when you are online, you might find the following alert:

The keyloggers are of two types: Hardware keyloggers and Inside keyloggers. We are particularly interested here about the hardware keyloggers. The hardware keyloggers are dangerous and are the most difficult of all to trace and eradicate out of your machine. Attaining a better knowledge about the hardware keyloggers will enable a better understanding of your protection measures.

Most anti keyloggers and key scramblers fail to detect a hardware keylogger.  The hardware keyloggers are the keyloggers that are situated deep into the BIOS levels, which necessarily mean the operating system level of a computer. These keyloggers are dangerous as they start functioning the moment from which a machine is turned on. Due to their presence at the OS level, they are able to reveal the BIOS passwords and even the encryption software’s.

The hardware keyloggers essentially comprise a Microcontroller and a Non volatile memory. The micro controller processes all the respective information and relates the keyboard and the computer with the interpretation of the “datastream”. The non volatile memory stores the “datastream” passed by the microcontroller.

The hardware keyloggers occupy only a minimal space in the hard disk which might be few kilo bytes to a few mega bytes. There are few different types of hardware keyloggers such as the regular hardware keylogger, wireless keylogger and firmware and keyboard overlays. Every stroke in the computer or typing a Text editor password for the retrieval of data is recorded by the hardware keylogger and this keylogger presents a typed data format to the computer in return. In order to keep your computer safe you must be well aware of this functional mode of the hardware keylogger and take suitable measures.

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