February 21st, 2008

An unknown computer techie is reporting that Dell shipped a keylogger device (
Keyghost) preinstalled in his
laptop
’s Ethernet board. When he called Dell and asked them about the suspicious device, they told him that “The integrated [sic] service tag identifier is there for assisting customers in the event of lost or misplaced personal information.” The man quickly called the police and was connected with Homeland Security. Based on the scanned letter (on the ‘leap’) it doesn’t look like he had much success reporting Dell for spying. Does Dell include these on all laptops? Did Dell succeed AT&T and hence Homeland Security’s lax response?

More info here.
Via Hacknmod
Entry Filed under: Computers, Keyboard, Laptops, Wacky
4 Comments Add your own
1. JohnP@Dell | February 21st, 2008 at 7:34 am
This hoax was exposed some time ago but we still see some bloggers taken in by it now and then. More info at: http://www.homelandstupidity.us/2005/06/17/keylogger-found-in-dell-laptop/
2. anne@dell.com | February 21st, 2008 at 12:14 pm
sometimes a quick check of mythbusting sites like Snopes will help determine if a rumor is true…in this case this is FALSE: http://www.snopes.com/computer/internet/dellbug.asp
3. just a guy | February 21st, 2008 at 4:14 pm
Not quite
http://www.snopes.com/computer/internet/dellbug.asp
4. Jeffrey | February 21st, 2008 at 5:13 pm
Well, there were also told in the web that it was not a keylogger but hoax. So, anyway I think that strong anti-keylogging software like PrivacyKeyboard or any otherm of such quality can come in handy.
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