Key-Stroke Recorders

Iantha · Post by **Iantha** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 1:53 am

My friend Kristie is going through a nasty divorce - he hacked her facebook and several other social networking sites. As such, she's closed these and changed her passwords on her hotmail and gmail accounts.

However, within hours (about 3) of her changing her passwords to random numbers and letters, he sent her phone texts complaining about stuff that she had JUST EMAILED from the accounts after she had changed the passwords. She's now deactivated her gmail and as far as I know, her hotmail. She is relying solely on her work email address, but for because of work policy she cannot do a lot of personal stuff with this account.

Now, my Q to all of you is this - how easy is it to install a keystroke recorder, and is it possible for him to access and install something like this remotely, or are there other options I'm just not seeing here? And are there secure email servers she can use?

Thanks in advance.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:18 am

Yeah, he could totally have installed keyloggers on her machine that will report to him remotely. My recommendation would be that she have the computer wiped and set back up - any of her computers that he could have had access to for even a couple of minutes, actually; to answer your question, installing them can be very easy indeed, and can even be done remotely - and that she get an all new Gmail [etc] account after she's done so.

There are secure mail servers and the like - Gmail could really be considered one - but the security of the server won't help her until she's got a secure local machine. That's going to be the trick in this case.

Iantha · Post by **Iantha** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:24 am

Thanks. I will be recommending this to her. Is a wipe something she can do, or would someone have to do it for her? For example, when we wipe our machines here, we often use your computer (or you ours) to store stuff, back things up, etc. If she didn't have anything to store or back up, nothing that she really NEEDED to save anyway, could she do this on her own at home?

Bonefish · Post by **Bonefish** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:30 am

It shouldn't be that hard to format and reinstall. I haven't the foggiest clue how, but that's because I'm really not savvy on my computer know-how. Windows should have a help file that would explain it.

Iantha · Post by **Iantha** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:30 am

Hmmm. Strange. Now, when I send email to her work account, I get a "message could not be delivered" message because it says it still tried to send it to her gmail account, although I am looking at the email I sent it to and it clearly is her work address. Am I being paranoid, or could he have somehow forwarded her work stuff to her old personal accounts? I don't know - sometimes I wish I were more technically proficient with computers. They mystify me sometimes.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 2:40 am

Iantha wrote:Is a wipe something she can do, or would someone have to do it for her?

I wouldn't recommend having her do it herself unless she's, say, installed Windows before, and doesn't mind the possibility of losing her currently saved data. No, on second thought, I wouldn't recommend it even then, because someone should look through her personal data - and probably scan her email, as well - to make sure the keylogger isn't hidden in an EXE file somewhere. There are programs and such that do this, but again, you really have to know how to use them.

Iantha wrote:Now, when I send email to her work account, I get a "message could not be delivered" message because it says it still tried to send it to her gmail account, although I am looking at the email I sent it to and it clearly is her work address. Am I being paranoid, or could he have somehow forwarded her work stuff to her old personal accounts?

If he is technologically proficient, there's no reason to think he couldn't have, but she also might have done so herself at some point. She'd probably want to discuss the situation with her network admins at work to make sure there aren't any such problems with her work mailbox, though. Her work computer should be scanned by their tech support staff, as well, as her husband could certainly have emailed the keylogger essentially buried in some otherwise innocuous file: a virus, whose payload is the keylogger.

Serious Paul · Post by **Serious Paul** » Wed Apr 13, 2011 8:51 am

Also it may be worth getting on this sooner rather than later-if this guy is particularly vindictive, and since I believe him to be a tech guy by trade it's not too far off to think he could use her email/personal information/whatever to create trouble for her.

Iantha · Post by **Iantha** » Thu Apr 14, 2011 2:37 am

Yeah - talked to her about it today and she says she has someone who can work on Macs for her that she trusts. It's turned off and unplugged for now, until she has it worked on.