Besides, if researchers can do this successfully, you would imagine three-letter agencies around the world could do it even better.
You can’t just listen to a random fiber on the switch. You’d have to prepare a piece carefully and add the measuring system, by which point a micro is easier and smaller.
Yeah, it basically says, “researchers could potentially measure vibrations in the air to detect speech.”
I know. That’s how speech works.
There was a demonstration of this where they had loops set up around a building simulating a network distance. They put music on a phone and walked to a distance they said was some kilometers away and were able to pick up the music without issue.
Honestly, why not investigate the utility of this? Could one develop a fiber optic coil based microphone? It would probably result in a microphone immune to RF and magnetic interference.
There are problems with the material components used. Fiber optics are used in places where they will be stationary for a long time, not have excessive bends that exceed their bend radius, and where there is a requirement for environmental/weather proofing. Drops, bumps, or other stressors that a regular microphone would survive don’t necessarily work for fiber optics because when you get right down to it they’re fragile.
They’re also more expensive than regular copper or aluminum wiring, and in this case I suspect that their required proximity would be a downside.
They’re also more expensive than regular copper or aluminum wiring, and in this case I suspect that their required proximity would be a downside.
I think I’m going to have to say “citation needed” here.
There are different grades of fiber optic cable, but for short distances you can generally use the lowest grade, so that’s probably what would be used if they were just components in a device, and that stuff is dirt cheap.
On the other hand, currently audio equipment tends to need higher end copper wiring, shielded cables, gold plated connectors, etc. digital interfaces are much less demanding of course, s/pdif or HDMI for example.
As for your comment about being vulnerable to drops and bumps, yeah I think you’re certainly right about that. And honestly, there are some other potential issues with the idea too. Foremost, a microphone like this would probably require a whole lot more analysis and signal processing than you really want for a simple audio input.
The cost isn’t just in the actual fiber cable here but in the connection end points and their termination, plus the device you’d be hooking it up to and the size of said device to decode whatever you needed decoded into actual sound you can hear. The optics device adds cost (which I probably should have mentioned). Repair is also more expensive which is why generally we cap and install along side instead of attempting repair. When you add in the cost of manufacturing or installing it, comparitively copper isn’t just cheaper by raw material (that cheapness depends on the scale), but also because of everything that goes into installing and using it.
This is why there is a cost trade off where you get benefits: Less Weight, Immunity to Electronic Noise, Stronger Signal, Electrical Isolation, Environmental Protection, Improved Safety, Overall System Economy, Long Term Cost Benefits.
But a device the size of a regular covert microphone would still need other components. I may have made the mistake of comparing this to like a button hole mic or something similar rather than a professional microphone (which is also expensive as hell).
Besides, how much more copper do you think you’d be using in a traditional mic than in a fiber optic equivalent?
I mean we’re talking flockweights not dollars so tomato tomato
Could that make a mic with no feedback? Might make me replace my SM-58
Yeah but it only really works in the spherical cowndstage
Well I suspect that most feedback would still occur, because that’s largely an effect of sound from a speaker being picked up through the mic, then played back again through the speaker, over and over…
So you’ll run into feedback issues whenever you have a mic playing back to a speaker in the same place. (Any amplification scenario)
/boggle
And in other news, water makes things wet.
I love you
Well, it’s more novel than that…
A coil of fiber is not meant to be a listening device, so they almost certainly exist in places where it wasn’t previously deemed a risk.
That said, exploiting this in the wild seems like a pretty difficult job, I can’t imagine how to do it without already having access to a target computer.
It’s the kind of spy movie shit where they need to listen to a confidential conversation in a room they can’t bug, but someone wildly hacks about on a keyboard, randomly pulls up schematics of the building showing all the fiber lines, immediately spots that there’s one near that room, conveniently has a gadget at hand or can quickly assemble it that they just need to attach somewhere and make every nerd cringe.
And I… am that nerd!
The chances are the places that would be most at risk (and have a risk profile that would warrant that kind of paranoia) are already taking measures to circumvent this.
