The Advancement of the Keylogger

 A keylogger is a program that discreetly records all your keystrokes in the background of your computer. Once your keystrokes are logged, the attacker will hide them for later recovery. The attacker then scrutinizes the material carefully in order to locate passwords or other information relevant for the attacker. For instance, a keylogger can readily capture secret emails and communicate them to any interested person willing to pay for the information.

Keyloggers can be based on software or hardware. Software-based keyloggers can be easily distributed and infected, but can be detected at the same time. Hardware-based keyloggers are tougher and more sophisticated to detect. You can add a keylogger chip to your keyboard and record anything you enter into the flash memory of your keyboard. Keyloggers have become one of the most powerful programs used to collect information in an increasingly prevalent environment of encrypted data.

As keyloggers become more complex, they become increasingly difficult to detect. For months, or even years, they may infringe on user privacy without being noticed. During that time interval, a keylogger can acquire a lot of user information. A keylogger may not only gather passwords and login names, but also credit card information, bank account details, contacts, interests, and much more. All the information obtained can be utilized to rob users' personal documents, money or even identity.

A keylogger could be as easy as a.exe and a.dll planted in a machine and enabled by an entry in the registry upon booting. Or the most advanced keyloggers like the Perfect Keylogger or the ProBot Activity Monitor have evolved a complete range of bad skills including:

−Undetectable and invisible in operation in the process list
·A keylogger driver for the kernel that collects keystrokes even when the user logs off >A wizard for remote use
·The ability to create active application text snapshots
·The ability to capture http post data (including log-ins/passwords) ·The ability to record time stamp use
Export HTML and text log file > Automatic distribution of the e-mail log file

Not all keyloggers are used illegally. Various other applications have surfaced. To monitor websites visited as a form of parental control of children, keyloggers were deployed. They have been used aggressively to prevent child pornography and to protect minors from coming into contact with harmful online features. In addition, a federal judge determined in December 2001 that the FBI did not require a special wiretap authorization to put a keystroke logging device on a suspect's computer. 

The judge authorized the FBI to keep secret specifics of their key logging device (citing national security concerns). In this instance, Nicodemo Scarfo Jr., charged with playing games and loan sharking, utilized encryption to secure his computer's file. The FBI used the keystroke logging device to obtain the password of Scarfo and access the required file.