New TrojPix Attack Leaks Data From Air-Gapped Systems via Video Cable Emissions
New TrojPix Attack Leaks Data From Air-Gapped Systems via Video Cable Emissions
https://thehackernews.com/2026/07/new-trojpix-attack-leaks-data-from-air.html
Publish Date: 2026-07-06 04:50:00
Source Domain: thehackernews.com
Researchers at Shandong University have shown a fast new way to pull data off computers that are cut off from every network. The technique, called TrojPix, tweaks on-screen pixels in ways the eye cannot see, so that the video cable carrying them radiates a faint radio signal a nearby receiver can decode.
But TrojPix works only once malware is already on the target machine, so it is a way for stolen data to get out, not a way in. In the researchers’ tests, TrojPix hit a peak throughput of 8.1 Mbps and reached as far as 208 meters, the two measured separately rather than together.
Most air-gap covert channels crawl along at bits or kilobits per second; at 8.1 megabits, roughly a megabyte a second, TrojPix could move a 100 MB file in under two minutes. That turns the threat from leaking a password into moving whole files while the monitor looks switched off.
Real-world range is another matter: a receiver still has to fight through walls, shielding, and noise.
The method, which the researchers call imperceptible pixel modulation, needs no administrator rights and no hardware changes, they say; user-level malware that can draw to the screen is enough.
They describe two ways to hide the traffic. One fakes a powered-off display, keeping the screen dark while it transmits. The other buries the signal in whatever is already on screen, so ordinary-looking content carries the payload.
The team reports it is working across nine monitor brands and fifteen video cables, so the result is not tied to one setup.
Turning a video cable into a covert transmitter is not new. It traces back to the decades-old study of compromising emanations, known as TEMPEST, and more recently to work like TEMPEST-LoRa (CCS 2025), which used the same trick to reach off-the-shelf LoRa radios, a common long-range wireless standard.
That one topped out at 87.5 meters, or 21.6 kbps. TrojPix’s peak throughput is hundreds…
