University researchers tout using smartwatches to steal data from air-gapped systems — SmartAttack paper proposes using wearable as a covert ultrasonic signal receiver

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A new theoretical air-gap attack dubbed SmartAttack has been cooked up by researchers at the Ben-Gurion University of the NegevBeer Sheva, Israel, proposing that smartwatches could be leveraged as receivers for ultra-sonic covert communication in air-gapped systems, highlighting an emerging threat to the networks.

As per the paper, air-gapped systems are generally considered secure due to their physical isolation from external networks, a measure used to prevent unauthorized access and cyberattacks. Air-gapped systems take different forms, including actual physical isolation or 'logical' isolation, where the segregation is implemented using other means such as encryption.