Vulnerability for Andoid wallets (physical access)

[NeuroticFish]

I've just read a post telling that because a vulnerability in MediaTek processors, pretty much all Android wallets can be exploited / hacked.

an attacker with physical access to a phone can connect it via USB before the operating system loads, extract the cryptographic keys protecting Android's full-disk encryption, and then decrypt the storage offline

If one has physical access, then he can read and decrypt all the data, including PIN, passwords, private keys or whatever is stored by the wallets.
For me the part with retrieval of all data via physical access is not a surprise, but I've expected in 2026 that data is properly encrypted.


Full story: https://www.theblock.co/post/393154/ledger-researchers-expose-android-flaw-enabling-theft

[Charles-Tim]

If one has physical access, then he can read and decrypt all the data, including PIN, passwords, private keys or whatever is stored by the wallets.
For me the part with retrieval of all data via physical access is not a surprise, but I've expected in 2026 that data is properly encrypted.

It is not surprising to me because just last year, we read about vulnerabilities like this on both Android and iOS. Even if something like this happened in the next 5 years, it should not be a surprise at all. There has always been vulnerabilities like this.

Another thing about this is that airgapped devices can be affected. We saw something like this last year also that made me doubt airgapped devices at the time but the chance it can be affected is low. And as people know about it already, that can also reduce the chance that another person steal data from the device as the person will be careful about it.

[DYING_S0UL]

If my memory serves me right, this vulnerability was discovered last year. As scary as it might sound, not all MediaTek chips are affected by this. In those reports, it was said that ONLY devices with MediaTek Dimensity 7300 chips were exposed to this hardware attack. Unfortunately, this was a hardware level chip flaw, so it couldn't be patched using a software update. Apart from this particular chip, all the other chips were safe (so far).

My current device has a Dimensity 9500 chipset, and fortunately no vulnerabilities were reported for this one.

https://www.binance.com/en/square/post/12-04-2025-security-vulnerability-found-in-mediatek-smartphone-chip-33262811184809

[Mia Chloe]

~snip

Well all systems have bugs that can be exploited and that's why androids get constant security updates even if they don't get software updates. From my experiences with mobile devices, MediaTek is a cheaper chip than other flagship chips like Snapdragon. Luckily you can get a midrange device with a snapdragon processor but it's rare.

When you boot your device you can make sure you're not connected to an external hardware. That aside iOS users aren't safe either.

[promise444c5]

I also remembered something like this was discussed last year  although this seem to be having a recent timestamp, could be a repost .. yet, I don’t want to assume that it’s all about pushing for ledger HW wallets again , not sure if I recall saying same too then because the source claimed it was I identified by ledger team.

Hence, if encrypted properly or not won’t really matter so far the hacker can get his hands on the encryption key.. how’s this key handled by the device/chip matters, I think that’s what’s being exploited.

[BitMaxz]

I think that's true; those phones with Mediatek CPUs seem prone to vulnerability or hacked attacks. I am trying to use the phone of my son and it seems it has lots of ads and malware, even though it is not rooted. How can these ads randomly pop up without opening any apps that have ads?
It actually makes the phone laggy and very slow; even if the RAM and space are high, it is still laggy and slow.

That's why I don't use those MediaTek phones. I know most of them can be easily rooted, unlike authentic phones from Samsung that use Qualcomm. That's why I stay using the S series of Samsung because it uses Exynos or Qualcomm; they are better based on my experience and have a hidden folder or can also hide apps without installing 3rd party.

I only use the older one, the S9 Plus, as an offline wallet hidden beyond a secure folder protected by Knox. When I need to sign a transaction, I just scan the QR code from another phone. All data are encrypted; if someone connected it via USB, they wouldn't be able to just decrypt it easily because it was encrypted with hardware-based encryption. It is not the same as Mediatek, which can be easily cracked when decrypting using some JTAG tools.

[DireWolfM14]

As much as this sucks, it's still preferrable to having your thumb cut off and stolen along with your phone.

For me the part with retrieval of all data via physical access is not a surprise, but I've expected in 2026 that data is properly encrypted.

Things are always getting better, but there are always those whose mission is the find the vulnerabilities.  Let's hope their intentions for doing so are good.  It seems like the phone manufacturers can learn a thing or two from the hardware wallet manufacturers, and implement a secure element just to prevent this particular vulnerability.

And honestly, none of us should be running around with more than a few hundred dollars worth of bitcoin in a phone wallet.  I won't even load hardware-signed watch-only wallets on my phone unless their the transitionary type where funds only live temporarily.  And even then, only those I know I'll want to pick an address from while I'm on the go because a payment I'm expecting is more than I want in my hot wallet.

The best protection from digital vulnerabilities is to be very weary of them from the start.