After two Israeli researchers published a paper earlier this month explaining how security mechanisms in short-range wireless Bluetooth technology could be quickly undermined, members of the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) are now urging users to take several precautions.
Bluetooth, a radio technology that allows users to exchange data over the airwaves at a distance of around 10 yards, has been a target of intrusion attacks in the past. Bluetooth security is essentially based on devices generating a secure connection through a pairing process. During this process, a user of one of the devices needs to enter a PIN code, which is used by internal algorithms to generate a secure key. This key is then used to authenticate the devices whenever they connect in the future.