Intercepting signals: new technologies for making wireless devices more secure.

• Author: Christensen, Lisa
• Position: Technology

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When was the last time you used a smart phone, tablet or a laptop? Has it been 30 seconds? Five minutes? Ten? Are you using one now? Odds are, you've got at least one within reach. Wireless devices have enmeshed themselves into our daily lives with their convenience and varied capabilities to the point that for many people, their phones are more vital than their wallets.

But that effortless incorporation of real life and the cyber world can spell trouble. With wireless devices being the receptacles for so much of what's important to us, they make easy targets for high-tech thieves. Some Utahns, however, are developing means of foiling those current and looming threats.

More secure than Bluetooth

Orem-based Freelinc has developed a technology for use in many of the same applications Bluetooth would be used in, but does so in a more secure manner, according to Freelinc CEO Dr. Michael Abrams. "It's almost the opposite of Bluetooth to solve the same problem," he says.

Rather than using radio waves to transmit information, Freelinc's near-field magnetic induction communication, or NFMI, system uses the attractive forces in magnets--for example, if you were to imagine a cartoon of a magnet, the information would travel along the wavy lines surrounding it. Because those attractive forces separate quickly, the waves don't travel as far as Bluetooth's radio waves, he says.

This means for anyone to try to skim information from those waves, they'd have to be close enough for someone to notice, Abrams says, whereas someone trying to steal information from Bluetooth waves has enough room to be a little more stealthy. On the other hand, others with that technology within two or three meters of each other can share information much more quickly than with Bluetooth.

The technology is gaining huge strides within the military and law enforcement due to its inherent security, says Abrams. "What it really creates is a sort of bubble around the user, and inside the devices are connected much more powerfully than with Bluetooth," he says. "From a security standpoint, what NFMI adds to connectivity is a new physical layer. NFMI is hugely secure without encryption."

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Those fields and the often classified nature of their information opened the gateway for NFMI to succeed, Abrams says, in that Bluetooth essentially had to prove inadequate for their needs in such a way that they were willing to adopt new technology. NFMI...