When people hear the word cyberattack, they usually imagine someone guessing a password, planting malware, stealing a computer, hacking an organization’s network or exploiting a flaw in software. A side-channel attack works differently. It looks for clues a computer gives away while doing ordinary work.
A simple analogy is a locked safe. A thief may not know the combination and may not be able to break the lock. But if the thief can listen closely as the dial turns, small clicks or churns or pauses might reveal something about what is happening inside. The safe is not meant to share that information, but its physical behavior still leaks clues.
