Keylogger Found on Hundreds of HP Laptops What to Do
0Keylogger Found on Hundreds of HP Laptops What to Do.
A keylogging tool found on hundreds of HP notebooks is getting a lot of tech sites riled up, but it doesn't appear to be the privacy nightmare that some may have you believe. Yes, there is a tool lurking inside of more than 460 models of HP laptops (some of which date back to 2012), but it's easy to eradicate, is deactivated by default and likely hasn't been used against you.
The HP Spectre is one of the affected laptops. Credit: Shaun Lucas/Laptop Mag
The activity-tracking tool, which is actually made by touchpad-maker Synaptics and appears to be developer software, was discovered by a tech sleuth named "ZwClose" who was trying to find out how the backlighting worked in HP laptop keyboards. In a detailed explanation he posted on Dec. 7 to GitHub, this mysterious expert said he noticed that the SynTP.sys keyboard driver contained code that would save and transmit user activity.
Fortunately for owners of the affected laptops -- which include models from nearly every HP line, such as Pavillion, Envy and Spectre -- ZwClose noted that the technology needs to be enabled by editing the Windows Registry, and could be erased by simply updating Windows. To run Windows Update, click the Start button, click the settings gear, hit Windows Update and tap Check for Update.