You Might Get More Than What You Need When You Charge Your Phone in Public

The FBI has warned consumers who use public USB charging stations, such as those found in cafes, malls, or airports, which may be compromised by malware. FBI’s Denver alerted this warning via tweet and advised avoid to using these public charging stations and instead use their own chargers and USB cords plugged into electrical outlets. The advice comes amid longstanding concerns over “juice jacking”.

It occurs when malware is installed on a device through compromised charging stations or cables. It can grant access to attackers to access users' data such as emails, text messages, photos, and contact lists. Security experts have noted that the same cords used for charging can also transmit data, which attackers exploit to steal that information.

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has also recently updated a post in its blog, reinforcing the risk posed by corrupted charging ports. According to the FCC, these ports also can be used by criminals to lock devices or extract sensitive credentials such as passwords or payment information.

The blog post also mentioned incidents where malicious cables were distributed as promotional items, which increases the risk to the public.