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Malicious app developers can secretly abuse a macOS API function to take screenshots of the user’s screen and then use OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to programmatically read the text found in the image.
The function is CGWindowListCreateImage, often utilized by Mac apps that take screenshots or live stream a user’s desktop.
API function can be abused to read sensitive user data
According to Fastlane Tools founder Felix Krause, any Mac app, sandboxed or not, can access this function and secretly take screenshots of the user’s screen.
Krause argues that miscreants can abuse this privacy loophole and utilize CGWindowListCreateImage to take screenshots of the screen without the user’s permission.
In experiments he carried out, Krause says he was able to use an OCR library to read various types of information captured using CGWindowListCreateImage. He argues that an attacker can:
⌔ Read sensitive source code, API keys, or similar data
⌔ Read emails and messages users open on their Mac
⌔ Detect what web services users employ (e.g. email providers, password manager, app lists, etc.)
⌔ Learn personal information about the user, like their bank details, salary, address, etc.
The researcher filed a bug with Apple yesterday, letting the company know of the issue he found. Krause also went public with his findings on his blog, which is a strange move as most researchers give companies time to fix reported issues. It may be that the feature has already been abused for such attacks. Bleeping Computer has reached out to the researcher for comment on his motives.
Researcher proposes possible mitigations
Krause also proposed some mitigations that Apple could take into consideration to prevent abuse of the CGWindowListCreateImage function.
The easiest one to implement would be to put the user in charge by adding a permission dialog for apps that use this function to take screenshots of the user’s screen.
Another one would be to have macOS to notify users when an app is taking screenshots of his screen, a notification system that Mac security software can tap into and block such attempts.
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