Code that hijacks USB device firmware is out in the wild
 

USB devices appear to have a serious security flaw that allows malicious code to be inserted into their firmware. The flaw was first revealed by Karsten Nohl and Jakob Lell at the Black Hat security conference a couple months ago. The two researchers were able to reverse engineer USB firmware, infect it with their own code, and essentially hijack the associated device.

Nohl told Wired that the flaw behind this so-called BadUSB attack "can't be patched" because it exploits "the very way that USB is designed." With the right code, it's reportedly possible to reprogram USB devices simply by plugging them into an infected machine. The malicious code is injected into the USB firmware, making ...

http://techreport.com/news/27152/cod...ut-in-the-wild