Wireless security
Our age of social networking, text and instant messaging depends initially on machines talking to each other, and the increasing use of wireless networks means we need better security. This is why Rene Mayrhofer and Hansd Gellerson at Lancaster University have been researching and developing software that allows mobile phones to connect with each other, by shaking them together at the same time.

Mayrhofer, a Marie Curie Fellow at the university, applies what’s called ‘accelerometer technology’ to networking. ‘Two, or multiple small, mobile devices often need to interact with each other spontaneously,’ explains Mayrhofer. ‘One example is to borrow a wireless headset to make a hands-free call with your mobile phone. Another could be the direct transfer of money from one chip card to another. For such interaction, security is highly important, because any headset can completely control a mobile phone it has been paired with.’

Malicious attacker
The problem for the user is that the mobile phone cannot distinguish between a headset it needs to connect with and a malicious attacker nearby whose laptop could be disguising itself as a headset. Normally you might input the 4-digit PIN number to ensure the connection is safe.

But Mayrhofer’s method is more user-friendly and, he argues, more secure. ‘The user only needs to take the mobile phone and the headset (or two chip cards for the second example) into one hand and shake them for a few seconds. By doing so,’ Mayrhofer continues, ‘the user tells the devices to start an interaction with each other – to pair – and gives them a criterion by which they now can recognise each other uniquely, preventing attackers from masquerading as the other device.’

Pervasive technology
Some phones already come with built-in accelerometer technology, but Mayrhofer aims to get in touch with mobile phone manufacturers to make this technology more widespread. This is only the beginning. Mayrhofer believes that in the near future where computing ‘devices and information services are embedded into our daily environment, we will need many different methods of securing interaction.’ They are developing a toolkit ‘to make it easy for device and application developers to make use of user-friendly and secure authentication.’