This article examines the evolution of security threats in the cryptocurrency storage space, focusing on modern methods for compromising private keys and seed phrases, which secure digital wallets. The modern cryptocurrency ecosystem faces a growing threat of cyberattacks aimed at compromising private keys and seed phrases, which are the foundation of digital wallet security. The complexity and sophistication of attacks, exploiting not only the software but also the hardware of modern mobile devices, is increasing every year. Along with traditional threats such as clipboard hijacking, keylogging, QR code spoofing, and exploiting vulnerabilities in BIP32/BIP39 wallet implementations, researchers are increasingly identifying new ways to compromise cryptographic data stored on smartphones.
In early October 2025, researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and several American universities presented the results of a study that caused a stir in the scientific and cryptographic communities. They discovered a critical vulnerability in the Android operating system, dubbed “Pixnapping” and registered under the identifier CVE-2025-48561. This vulnerability allows attackers to reconstruct the screen content of Android devices step by step, thereby extracting sensitive visual information, including private keys, seed phrases , and one-time 2FA authentication codes from apps like Google Authenticator.
The threat identified by researchers relies on the deep interaction between Android’s software and hardware layers—from system APIs to the GPU’s graphics compression engine. Pixnapping combines GPU.zip side-channel techniques with legitimate use of Android Intents and the window blur API, enabling covert pixel-by-pixel reconstruction of the screen. This approach turns a standard smartphone into a source of potential leakage of key information used to manage digital assets, including Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Litecoin (LTC), XRP, and other cryptocurrencies.
The danger lies in the fact that the user doesn’t need to grant the attacker any permissions—the malicious app can run in the background, remaining invisible to the Android security system. As a result, the attacker can gain visual access to seed phrases during wallet backups or withdrawals, effectively equating to complete control over the victim’s crypto assets.
The combination of such threats—from Pixnapping attacks to hardware leaks via Rowhammer, Spectre, Meltdown, and related side-channel methods—highlights the need to rethink security strategies at the intersection of mobile operating systems and financial technologies. Each new vulnerability like CVE-2025-48561 demonstrates how fragile the balance can be between the convenience of mobile access to cryptocurrencies and ensuring fundamental cryptographic security.
Decoded transaction 816760531f334651d711909a93a5959e74b3dbe126f50dbb6efb3e7d61f224ba represents documented evidence of research work, recorded in the immutable ledger of the Bitcoin blockchain. A structural analysis of RawTX reveals the classic architecture of a Bitcoin version 1 transaction, containing a critical element—the OP_RETURN field with an embedded URL pointing to research into the Pixnapping attack.
https://github.com/zoeir/Bitcoin-Message-Transaction
Decomposition of the transaction structure:
The transaction uses a single input (UTXO) from the previous transaction and creates three outputs: the first output, with a value of zero, contains the OP_RETURN message (77 bytes of data), the second output transfers 1000 satoshi (0.00001 BTC) to the recipient address 12ib7dApVFvg82TXKycWBNpN8kFyiAN1dr , and the third output returns change of 22,500 satoshi to the sender address 1G84gkhBsBM9B5Xsqw2s9b6H1oqg4nPEiW . The transaction fee is 1000 satoshi, which ensures priority processing by network miners.
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
Cryptographic signature and authentication:
The 138-byte ScriptSig field contains an ECDSA signature based on the secp256k1 curve, confirming possession of the sender’s private key. This verifies the transaction’s legitimacy and prevents unauthorized spending. The decoded message in OP_RETURN: ” www.bitcoinmessage.ru/Source_Code/Pixnapping_Attack_to_Extract_Private_Keys “ serves as a permanent marker on the blockchain, linking the transaction to the scientific research into the critical vulnerability.
CVE-2025-48561 is a high-severity, critical vulnerability discovered by a research team from the University of California Berkeley, UC San Diego, the University of Washington, and Carnegie Mellon University in February 2025. The Pixnapping attack demonstrates a fundamental breach of the Android security model, allowing an arbitrary app, without any special permissions, to perform bitwise reconstruction of the visual content of other apps.
A diagram of the three stages of a Pixnapping attack on Android devices.Pixnapping uses a combination of Android APIs and hardware side-channel GPU (zip) to extract visual information from device screens. The attack exploits three key Android mechanisms: the ability to send other apps’ activities to the rendering pipeline via Android Intents, performing graphical operations (blur) on other apps’ pixels, and measuring the side effects of these operations, which depend on the pixel color. cylab.cmu+ 2
Pixnapping is based on the GPU.zip vulnerability, discovered by the same research group in 2023. This attack exploits hardware-based graphics data compression in modern GPUs, which is data-dependent, software-transparent, and present in nearly all modern GPUs. cylab.cmu+ 2
Graphics data compression is an optimization in integrated GPUs (iGPUs) that saves memory bandwidth and improves frame rendering performance. The GPU.zip attack allows a malicious website to extract pixels from iframes in the latest version of Google Chrome, violating the browser’s security model. hertzbleed+ 1
Pixnapping exploits SurfaceFlinger, an Android system process responsible for displaying and arranging graphical elements. The malicious app uses Android Intents to launch targeted apps, causing them to display sensitive information on the screen. A “masking activity” is then created—a translucent overlay that hides the targeted app, leaving only a single, selected pixel transparent. bleepingcomputer+ 1
The Pixnapping attack is performed in three main stages, each of which uses specific Android APIs and system calls: pixnapping+ 1
Stage 1: Invoking the Target App:
The malicious app uses Android Intents to invoke exported activities of target apps, such as Google Authenticator or Signal. This process causes sensitive information (2FA codes, seeds) to be displayed on the screen and passed to the SurfaceFlinger rendering pipeline. bleepingcomputer+ 1
Stage 2: Induction of Graphics Operations
: This stage creates a stack of translucent Android Activities that use masking, augmentation, and encoding techniques to manipulate individual pixels of the victim. The attack utilizes the Android window blur API to perform graphics operations on pixels and VSync callbacks to measure rendering times with sufficient precision to extract individual pixel values. theregister+ 2
Stage 3: Side Channel Extraction.
The final stage uses the GPU.zip side channel to steal pixels processed in stage 2, one pixel at a time. By measuring differences in rendering times caused by pattern-dependent GPU optimizations, such as image data compression, the attack can determine pixel color information. gbhackers+ 1
The Android window blur API, available since Android 12, provides capabilities for implementing window blur effects. There are two types of window blur: background blur (creates a frosted-glass effect) and blur behind (blurs the entire screen behind the window). source.android
Pixnapping abuses these APIs in the following ways:
// Example code used in the attack (conceptual)
window.setBackgroundBlurRadius(blurRadius);
window.addFlags(WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_BLUR_BEHIND);
WindowManager.LayoutParams.setBlurBehindRadius(blurRadius);
The attack creates translucent activities using windowIsTranslucent and manipulates the alpha channel of a background drawable to isolate individual pixels. source.android
To accurately measure rendering times, Pixnapping uses VSync callbacks. VSync (vertical sync) is a signal that synchronizes the frame rate with the display’s refresh rate. On Android, this is implemented via Choreographer.VsyncCallback. blurbusters+ 1
// Conceptual example of using VSync callbacks
Choreographer.getInstance().postVsyncCallback(new Choreographer.VsyncCallback() {
@Override
public void onVsync(long frameTimeNanos) {
// Measuring time to extract pixel color
measureRenderingTime(frameTimeNanos);
}
});
Researchers tested Pixnapping on five devices running Android versions 13-16: cylab.cmu+ 1
Pixnapping vulnerability testing results on various Android devices
The attack was most effective on the Google Pixel 6, with a 73% success rate for recovering 2FA codes. The Samsung Galaxy S25 demonstrated resistance to the attack due to “significant noise” in the signal. bleepingcomputer+ 1
An optimized version of the attack is capable of extracting 6-digit 2FA codes from Google Authenticator in less than 30 seconds. This timeframe fits within the standard 30-second validity period of TOTP codes, making the attack practical. cylab.cmu+ 2
More complex data takes longer to extract:
- Google Maps Timeline : 20-27 hours for ~54,264-60,060 pixels bleepingcomputer
- Venmo account balance : 3-5 hours for ~7,473-11,352 pixels bleepingcomputer
- Google Messages SMS : 11-20 hours for ~35,500-44,574 pixels bleepingcomputer
- Signal private messages : 25-42 hours for ~95,760-100,320 pixels bleepingcomputer
Pixnapping poses a particular threat to cryptocurrency users. Wallet seeds remain visible on the screen longer than temporary 2FA codes, making them vulnerable to pixel swiping. While recovering the full 12-word seed phrase would take considerable time, the attack remains viable if the user leaves the seed phrase visible when writing it down. currently.att.yahoo+3
The researchers provided several videos demonstrating the Pixnapping attack:
<iframe loading="lazy" width="560" height="315" src="./Pixnapping-Attack-on-Android_files/USZ54X6Qw5E.html" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
1. Pixnapping Basic Demo
- URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=USZ54X6Qw5E
- Description: Official attack demo showing the process of extracting 2FA codes from Google Authenticator in real time. The video illustrates the three stages of the attack and demonstrates recovery of a 6-digit code in less than 30 seconds.
2. Tech demo from Tweakers
- URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YKeIVqUuik
- Description: A detailed technical demonstration of the Pixnapping attack in Dutch. The video demonstrates the practical aspects of implementing the attack and explains the technical details of interacting with the Android API.
The research results were formally presented at the 32nd ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (ACM CCS 2025) in Taipei, Taiwan, October 13-17, 2025. The presentation included a detailed analysis of the technical aspects of the attack and a demonstration of practical examples. cylab.cmu+ 2
As of October 2025, Google and researchers have found no evidence of the Pixnapping vulnerability being exploited in the wild. Google stated, “We have not seen any evidence of exploitation in the wild.” However, this does not rule out the possibility of covert use by attackers. bleepingcomputer+ 1
The researchers identified several potential scenarios for exploiting the vulnerability:
1. Stealing 2FA Codes.
The most common scenario involves stealing temporary authentication codes from Google Authenticator, Authy, and other 2FA apps. An attacker can use the stolen codes to bypass two-factor authentication and gain unauthorized access to the victim’s accounts. cylab.cmu+ 1
2. Compromising Cryptocurrency Wallets.
A particularly dangerous scenario is the theft of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrency wallet seed phrases. If a user displays their seed phrase on the screen for recording or verification, a malicious application can gradually extract the entire phrase, gaining complete control of the wallet. currently.att.yahoo+ 2
3. Interception of private correspondence.
The attack can be used to extract messages from encrypted messaging apps like Signal, even with Screen Security enabled. This poses a serious threat to users who rely on end-to-end encryption security. bleepingcomputer+ 1
Although specific malware samples using Pixnapping have not been detected, the technique could be integrated into existing Android Trojan families. For example, the SpyAgent family of malware already uses image recognition to steal mnemonic keys, and adding Pixnapping capabilities could significantly expand its capabilities. currently.att.yahoo+ 1
A malicious app performing Pixnapping doesn’t require any permissions to be declared in its Android manifest file. This makes it indistinguishable from benign apps during app store security checks. pixnapping+ 1
Basic structure of the manifesto:
xml:
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android">
<application>
<activity android:name=".MaliciousActivity">
<!-- Without declaring any permissions -->
</activity>
</application>
</manifest>
A key component of the attack is the use of Android Intents to launch target applications:
java:
// Conceptual example of target application activation code
Intent intent = new Intent();
intent.setAction("com.google.android.apps.authenticator2.AUTHENTICATE");
intent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK);
startActivity(intent);
Researchers analyzed nearly 100,000 apps in the Google Play Store and found hundreds of thousands of actions invoked via Android Intents, indicating the widespread applicability of the attack. bleepingcomputer
The process of extracting individual pixels involves creating translucent activities with a specific configuration:
java:
// Conceptual example of creating a masking activity
Window window = getWindow();
WindowManager.LayoutParams params = window.getAttributes();
params.alpha = 0.99f; // Almost fully transparent
params.flags |= WindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_NOT_TOUCHABLE;
window.setAttributes(params);
// Setting blur to induce graphical operations
window.setBackgroundBlurRadius(20);
After pixel extraction, a technique similar to optical character recognition (OCR) is used to reconstruct the original content. The algorithm analyzes the patterns of the extracted pixels and reconstructs the characters and numbers. pixnapping+ 1
Google first attempted to fix the vulnerability in the September 2025 Android security update by limiting the number of activities an app could trigger a blur. The company noted in a security bulletin: “An app requesting multiple blurs: (1) allows pixel theft by measuring the blur time between windows, and (2) is likely invalid.” bleepingcomputer+ 2
Researchers quickly discovered a workaround that restored the attack’s effectiveness by altering the timing characteristics. This workaround is still under embargo and has not been publicly disclosed. pixnapping+ 2
Google is developing a more comprehensive patch, which will be released in the December 2025 Android Security Bulletin. However, the researchers note that an effective fix for Pixnapping will require changes to core Android mechanisms, such as allowing apps to prevent other apps from overlaying their sensitive content. cylab.cmu+ 2
The fundamental problem is that the underlying side channel GPU.zip remains unpatched. As of October 2025, no GPU manufacturer has committed to patching GPU.zip. This means that even with Android patches, the hardware vulnerability remains vulnerable to new attack methods. pixnapping+ 1
Samsung was notified of the vulnerability and warned that Google’s patch was insufficient to protect Samsung devices. The company acknowledged the issue but rated it “low severity” due to hardware complexity. currently.att.yahoo+ 2
1. Timely Updates:
The researchers’ primary recommendation is to install Android patches as soon as possible after they are released. Users should enable automatic security updates and regularly check for new patches. cylab.cmu+ 1
2. Using hardware wallets.
For cryptocurrency users, the most effective protection is using hardware wallets. Hardware wallets store private keys and seed phrases offline, eliminating the possibility of their compromise through screen-screen attacks. tradingview+ 1
3. Avoid displaying sensitive information.
Users are advised to avoid displaying seed phrases or other highly sensitive data on internet-connected devices. If storing seed phrases is necessary, use offline devices. currently.att.yahoo+1
1. Overlay Protection:
Developers can implement overlay protection by detecting when other applications attempt to create translucent layers on top of theirs. This can be done using bitdefenderWindowManager.LayoutParams.FLAG_SECURE .
2. Minimize display time.
Critical information should be displayed on the screen for the shortest amount of time. For example, 2FA codes can be automatically hidden after short intervals. bitdefender
3. Anomalous Activity Detection:
Applications can monitor for anomalous activity patterns, such as frequent blur API calls or unusual overlay behavior. bitdefender
1. Android permission enhancement may require special permissions to access the blur API and other graphics operations that can be exploited in attacks. cylab.cmu
2. Application Isolation
Strengthening isolation between applications can prevent other applications from accessing pixels through graphics operations. bitdefender
3. Hardware Solutions
A long-term solution may require changes at the GPU level to eliminate side channel GPU.zip. pixnapping+1
In the context of the Pixnapping attack (CVE-2025-48561), which exploits Android hardware and software mechanisms to visually intercept seed phrases and private keys, it is critical to consider an additional attack vector operating at a more fundamental hardware level. The Phoenix Rowhammer attack (CVE-2025-6202) represents a new generation of exploitation of the physical properties of DRAM memory, allowing attackers to manipulate individual data bits in DDR5 RAM, including critical cryptographic data structures of Bitcoin wallets. github+ 4
A joint study by the Computer Security Group (COMSEC) at ETH Zürich and Google, published in September 2025, demonstrated that DDR5 memory from SK Hynix—the world’s largest DRAM manufacturer—remains vulnerable to Rowhammer attacks despite the implementation of advanced Target Row Refresh (TRR) protection mechanisms. Phoenix represents the first system-level Rowhammer attack capable of bypassing all modern TRR schemes deployed in DDR5 devices using a revolutionary self- correcting synchronization technique . linkedin+ 7
Rowhammer is a hardware vulnerability in Dynamic Random-Access Memory (DRAM) that arises due to the physical limitations of modern memory chip manufacturing technology. As DRAM manufacturing standards decrease (to 10 nm, 7 nm, and below), the physical distance between individual memory cells decreases significantly, leading to increased electromagnetic interference between adjacent memory rows. kaspersky+ 6
Bit flip induction mechanism:
Each DRAM cell is a capacitor storing an electrical charge corresponding to a logical value of 0 or 1. To read or write data to a specific memory row, an ACTIVATE operation is performed, which raises the voltage level of the target row (aggressor row/target row) to a high level while neighboring rows (victim rows) remain at a low voltage level. Repeatedly activating the same memory row in rapid succession creates electromagnetic interference, which accelerates the discharge of capacitors in neighboring rows, potentially leading to spontaneous changes in bit values (bit flips) before the next refresh cycle. tomshardware+ 6
Mathematical model of charge degradation:
Research shows that the probability of a bit flip PflipP_{flip}Pflip in a victim row depends on the number of activations of the aggressor row NactN_{act}Nact, the time between refresh operations tREFt_{REF}tREF, and the distance between cells dcelld_{cell}dcell:
where VaggrV_{aggr}Vaggr is the aggressor row activation voltage. Modern DDR5 modules require refresh commands every 3.9 µs on average by default, which is twice as often as DDR4, precisely to counteract the increasing Rowhammer effect. arxiv+ 4
DDR4 TRR: First Generation Protection
Starting with DDR4, DRAM manufacturers implemented the Target Row Refresh (TRR) mechanism—a set of hardware counters and logic integrated directly into DRAM chips to detect suspicious memory access patterns. TRR operates based on two key parameters: the Maximum Activate Count (MAC)—the maximum number of row activations—and the Maximum Activate Window (t~MAW~)—the time window during which activations are counted. csdn+4 youtube
When the number of activations of a particular row reaches the MAC threshold within a time window t~MAW~, TRR automatically initiates a refresh operation for adjacent victim rows, preventing bit flips. However, the TRRespass study (2020) demonstrated a critical vulnerability of this scheme: the TRR mechanism uses sampling —monitoring only a limited subset of memory rows, rather than all rows simultaneously. The Many-Sided Rowhammer attack exploits this limitation by simultaneously activating multiple aggressor rows (up to 19 in some cases), which overloads the TRR sampling mechanism and allows “unnoticed” rows to continue hammering without being countered by refresh operations. usenix+4 youtube
DDR5 Enhanced TRR: Enhanced Second-Generation Protection
DDR5 introduced significantly improved in-DRAM TRR circuits with more sophisticated detection and countermeasure algorithms. Manufacturers implemented more frequent refresh commands (every 3.9 µs versus 7.8 µs in DDR4), integrated on-die Error Correction Code (ECC), and more advanced activation tracking mechanisms. Prior to the publication of Phoenix in September 2025, DDR5 was believed to demonstrate increased resistance to Rowhammer attacks in production environments, and “unexpectedly, DDR5 achieves this without additional refresh control commands.” comsec-files.ethz+5
The problem of synchronization and the self-correcting mechanism
A key discovery by ETH Zürich researchers is that current state-of-the-art synchronization methods regularly miss refresh commands, making them unsuitable for effective Rowhammer attacks on DDR5. Phoenix addresses this problem with two revolutionary techniques: securityweek+ 2.
The first technique: thread splitting. Hammering and synchronization accesses are split into different execution threads to improve refresh detection. While an improvement over the state-of-the-art, this approach still cannot maintain synchronization over a sufficiently large number of refresh intervals, preventing the induction of bit flips. github+ 1
The second technique is self-correcting synchronization. Instead of trying to prevent missed refresh commands, Phoenix detects a missed refresh and resynchronizes pattern execution accordingly. This technique allows Phoenix to remain synchronized with refresh commands for entire refresh windows, which is sufficient to induce bit flips with new patterns. security.googleblog+ 4
Mathematical model of self-correcting synchronization:
Bypassing TRR by exploiting blind spots
Phoenix exploits blind spots in the TRR mechanism—temporal and spatial windows where row activation monitoring is weakened. Researchers discovered that the TRR sampler must consistently sample accesses to the same set of rows, allowing (non-sampled) accesses to other rows to continue hammering without the intervention of TRR refresh operations. Phoenix synchronizes access patterns with refresh commands so that victim rows are outside the active TRR monitoring zone at critical points in time. vusec+ 7
Test configuration and affected devices
ETH Zurich researchers tested Phoenix on 15 DDR5 UDIMM modules manufactured by SK Hynix, manufactured between 2021 and 2024. All tested devices demonstrated vulnerability to Phoenix, successfully inducing bit flips within seconds on each module. Testing was conducted on a platform with an AMD Zen 4 processor and specialized FPGA-based Rowhammer test platforms developed jointly with Antmicro. theregister+ 8
Уязвимость CVE-2025-6202 зарегистрирована с базовым CVSS-скором 7.1 (High severity). Vulnerability description: «Vulnerability in SK Hynix DDR5 on x86 allows a local attacker to trigger Rowhammer bit flips impacting the Hardware Integrity and the system’s security. This issue affects DDR5: DIMMs produced from 2021-1 until 2024-12».thehackernews+5
List of affected AMD processors with DDR5 support: amd
AMD EPYC 8004, 9004, 9005 Series Processors; AMD EPYC 9004, 9005 Embedded Series; AMD Ryzen 6000, 7000, 7035, 7040, 7045, 8000, 8040, 9000 Series; AMD Ryzen 9000HX Series; AMD Ryzen AI 300, AI Max 300 Series; AMD Ryzen Threadripper 7000, 9000; AMD Ryzen Embedded 7000, 8000, 9000 Series.amd
Practical attack scenarios and timing characteristics
Researchers demonstrated three end-to-end exploitation scenarios for Phoenix: techradar+ 5
1. Page Table Entries (PTE) Manipulation for Privilege Escalation: Phoenix successfully performs bit flips on Page Table Entries with 100% success rate , gaining unauthorized access to restricted memory areas. This allows a local, unprivileged attacker to modify their own page table, gaining read-write access to all physical memory in the system. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih+ 4
2. Extracting SSH keys from virtual machines: Phoenix demonstrates a 73% success rate in extracting RSA-2048 private SSH keys from a co-located virtual machine on the same physical server. This is a critical threat for cloud computing environments where multiple VMs share the same physical memory. kaspersky+ 5
3. Privilege escalation to root via sudo binary manipulation: Phoenix achieves a 33% chance of gaining root access via sudo’s in-memory binary manipulation. Full privilege escalation to root on a commodity system with default settings is achieved in approximately 109 seconds (less than 2 minutes). linkedin+5
Theoretical Foundations of an ECDSA Fault Injection Attack
The Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm (ECDSA) is a fundamental cryptographic primitive in Bitcoin, providing transaction authentication and proof of ownership of digital assets. The private key in ECDSA is a scalar value ddd (256 bits for secp256k1), from which the public key is calculated: Q = d⋅GQ = d \cdot GQ = d⋅G, where GGG is the base point of the elliptic curve. digital.wpi+ 7
ECDSA signature structure:
For a message mmm with hash h=H(m)h = H(m)h=H(m), the signature consists of the pair (r,s)(r, s)(r,s), where:
where kkk is a random nonce, nnn is the order of the group of points on the secp256k1 curve. securityboulevard+ 4
Fault injection attack via Rowhammer-induced bit flips
Rubber Mallet’s research (arXiv:2505.01518, May 2025) demonstrated that advanced Rowhammer techniques can induce multiple adjacent bit flips at a significantly higher rate than previously documented. Critically, these correlated flips enable effective cryptographic signature correction attacks, demonstrating how such flips can enable recovery of ECDSA private keys from OpenSSL implementations where single-bit approaches would be infeasible. arxiv+ 2
Bit-flipping attack mechanism on a private key:
Suppose an attacker can induce a bit flip in the least significant bit (LSB) of private key ddd stored in RAM before the signature operation. A bit flip in the LSB will lead to one of two outcomes: trailofbits+ 2
Case 1: Bit 0 → 1, which is equivalent to d′=d+1d’ = d + 1d′=d+1
Case 2: Bit 1 → 0, which is equivalent to d′=d−1d’ = d − 1d′=d−1
A signature created with modified key d′d’d′ can be verified using the modified public key:
An attacker generates a signature with a flipped private key, then verifies the signature verification using Q + GQ + GQ + G and Q − GQ − GQ − GQ − G. If the signature verifies with Q + GQ + GQ + G, the original bit was 0; if with Q − GQ − GQ − G, the bit was 1. By repeating this process for other bit positions (flipping bits at positions 20, 21, 22, …, 2255 2^0, 2^1, 2^2, …, 2^{255} 20, 21, 22, …, 2255 and verifying with Q ±2i⋅GQ \pm 2^i \cdot GQ ±2i⋅G), the attacker can bitwise reconstruct the entire private key ddd. arxiv+ 5
Experimental demonstration on OpenSSL ECDSA
In Kwong et al.’s paper (arXiv:2505.01518), the researchers successfully demonstrated end-to-end ECDSA private key extraction from an OpenSSL implementation via Rowhammer bit-flipping. The experiments were conducted on several DDR4 DRAM configurations (Corsair Vengeance, G.SKILL Ripjaws) using TRRespass and BlackSmith Rowhammer tools. A critical discovery is the high frequency of localized bit flips —multiple bit flips clustered within the same DRAM row. arxiv+ 2
A study by Rahman et al. (2023) (digital.wpi.edu) demonstrated an attack on ECDSA secret key recovery in Samsung M378B5773DH0-2GB DRAM via fault injection into a TLS server. The researchers initiated 29,918 connections to the server by injecting faults into server memory and successfully collected faulty signatures to recover the private key. Even though the 256-bit ECDSA key size is significantly smaller than the 32,768-bit memory page size (most of the flipped bits are outside the key), the attack is still successful with a sufficient number of attempts. digital.wpi
Storing private keys in RAM and attack vectors
Bitcoin wallets, both software and some hardware, inevitably load private keys into RAM when performing critical operations: signing transactions, wallet initialization, key derivation from seed phrases, and decrypting wallet.dat files. Even when using AES-256-CBC encryption to protect wallet.dat (as in Bitcoin Core), the private key must be temporarily decrypted and stored in RAM to sign a transaction. cryptodeeptech+ 6
Threat model for Rowhammer attacks on Bitcoin wallets:
Scenario 1: Local attacker on a desktop system. The attacker runs a malicious application on the same computer as the victim’s Bitcoin wallet. The malicious process induces Rowhammer bit flips in memory regions where Bitcoin Core or another wallet stores decrypted private keys during signing operations. Phoenix demonstrated the ability to read and write arbitrary data from high-precision memory on DDR5 systems. github+ 9
Scenario 2: Cloud/VPS co-location attack. Many Bitcoin node and wallet users host their services on virtual private servers (VPS) on cloud platforms. Phoenix demonstrated a 73% success rate of extracting RSA-2048 SSH keys from a co-located VM. A similar attack could target Bitcoin private keys stored in the memory of a VM running Bitcoin Core node or other wallet services. tomshardware+ 5
Scenario 3: Rowhammer on Android devices for Bitcoin mobile wallets. The combination of Pixnapping (CVE-2025-48561) and potential Rowhammer variants for mobile LPDDR4/LPDDR5 creates a multi-layered threat. Although Phoenix is specific to desktop DDR5, research shows that LPDDR4 also includes TRR mechanisms and is potentially vulnerable to adapted Rowhammer attacks. wikipedia+ 1
Mathematical model for extracting a Bitcoin private key via bit flips:
Suppose a 256-bit Bitcoin private key ddd is stored in memory at address AkeyA_{key}Akey. A rowhammer attacker can induce a bit flip in bit iii (where 0≤i≤2550 \le i \le 2550≤i≤255), modifying the key to d′=d⊕2id’ = d \oplus 2^id′=d⊕2i (XOR with 2i2^i2i). To recover the original key, the attacker collects many faulty signatures {(rj,sj)}\{(r_j, s_j)\}{(rj,sj)}, each created with a different bit-flipped version of the key dj′d_j’dj′.
Using lattice attack methods (e.g. Hidden Number Problem solver), an attacker can recover ddd with success probability:
where PflipP_{flip}Pflip is the probability of successfully flipping the desired bit, NsamplesN_{samples}Nsamples is the number of collected faulty signatures. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih+ 3
ATTACKSAFE SOFTWARE и rowhammer_attack tool
The cryptocurrency security ecosystem includes specialized programs for analyzing Rowhammer-related vulnerabilities. The GitHub repository demining/Rowhammer-Attack demonstrates the practical application of Signature Fault Differential Analysis for ECDSA to derive private keys from transactions in five different Bitcoin wallets .
Practical example of use:
./attacksafe -tool rowhammer_attack -open RawTX.txt -save SecretKey.txtThe tool analyzes RawTX Bitcoin transactions and extracts ECDSA signature parameters (r,s)(r,s)(r,s). If a pattern indicating a faulty signature or nonce reuse is detected, the tool applies cryptanalytic techniques to recover the KKK secret key (nonce) or the ddd private key. github
Example of a successful extraction: github
Deployments ECDSA:
SecretKey = 0xe5fa9dccef88781e25e77bd1ea7830c0b33c57481b79007cda117da8139ea7c3
RawTX = 010000000104118e34a0d3c06c842d14707ed5f333d3ba1d35240086a4b5738a2fa810abec1d0000006a473044022004b1d0c7d278439811c27d9ff06b3bb0fd20d5cc90d97083266bdba7d0693bb20220282c6cea6b9ad6f4633596204ebad4716e2a086090faf62a6908bf63a1724ad501210335a395eca8191c43ccee4d91e98b9baef39476d7482cf636e5b71975c69feebdffffffff014e020000000000001976a914154813f71552c59487efa3b16d62bfb009dc5f1e88ac00000000The “Deployments ECDSA” label indicates a critical vulnerability in the Bitcoin blockchain transaction. The secret key “K” in HEX format represents the nonce used to generate the signature. github
Open-source FPGA-based Rowhammer test platforms
Google and ETH Zürich have developed specialized open-source FPGA-based test platforms for analyzing DDR5 Rowhammer vulnerabilities. In partnership with Antmicro, two platforms were created: security.googleblog
DDR5 RDIMM Platform: New DDR5 Tester board for testing Registered DIMM (RDIMM) memory, commonly found in server computers. security.googleblog
SO-DIMM Platform: A version supporting standard SO-DIMM pinouts, compatible with off-the-shelf DDR5 SO-DIMM memory sticks common in workstations and end-user devices. security.googleblog
These platforms are available on GitHub (comsec.ethz.ch/phoenix) and allow security researchers to conduct detailed analysis of the Rowhammer-susceptibility of various DRAM configurations. comsec.ethz+1
Increasing the refresh rate: a tradeoff between security and performance
Phoenix researchers recommend increasing the refresh rate by a factor of 3 (from 3.9 µs to ~1.3 µs) as an effective countermeasure. However, this results in an 8.4% performance drop , representing a significant tradeoff for production systems. Critically, DRAM devices cannot be patched via firmware updates—the hardware nature of the vulnerability means affected modules will remain vulnerable throughout their entire lifecycle. techradar+ 5
Limited effectiveness of ECC and on-die ECC
Phoenix proved that the on-die Error Correction Code (ECC) built into DDR5 doesn’t stop Rowhammer . On-die ECC is designed to correct single-bit errors and some multi-bit errors arising from the natural degradation of DRAM cells. However, Rowhammer can induce multiple correlated bit flips in the same memory region, exceeding the corrective capacity of ECC. reddit+ 7
Impossibility of retrospective hardware fixes
Unlike software vulnerabilities that can be patched with security patches, Rowhammer represents a fundamental physical problem with DRAM architecture. As of October 2025, no GPU or DRAM manufacturer has committed to fixing the hardware vulnerability at the chip design level. This means that billions of devices using the affected memory will remain potentially vulnerable for years to come. pixnapping+12
Multi-layered security strategy for cryptocurrency holders:
1. Hardware wallets with isolated memory. Use hardware wallets (Ledger, Trezor, BC Vault One) with ferroelectric RAM (FeRAM) or secure elements that isolate private keys from the main system DRAM. BC Vault One uses FeRAM to store the private key, providing physical isolation from Rowhammer attacks on system memory. youtube itnext+ 3
2. Avoid storing large amounts in hot wallets on DDR5 systems. Users running Bitcoin Core or other software wallets on SK Hynix DDR5 systems (2021-2024) should minimize exposure by moving their primary assets to cold storage. github+ 3
3. Isolate signing operations in air-gapped environments. For high-value transactions, use offline signing on isolated systems that never connect to the network and don’t run untrusted code. itnext+ 2
4. Regular memory auditing and anomaly detection. Monitoring system memory for suspicious access patterns characteristic of Rowhammer attacks (high-frequency row activations, anomalous refresh patterns). pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih+ 3
5. Upgrade to patched systems when available. While a hardware fix is not possible, future DDR5 chips (post-2024) may include improved TRR mechanisms. Users should monitor security bulletins from DRAM manufacturers and update their hardware when more secure modules are released. github+4
Conclusion: The convergence of Pixnapping and Phoenix as a systemic threat to cryptographic infrastructure
The combination of Pixnapping (CVE-2025-48561) and Phoenix Rowhammer (CVE-2025-6202) attacks demonstrates a critical evolution in the cryptocurrency security threat landscape. Pixnapping attacks the Android hardware and software layer via GPU.zip side-channels and the window blur API to visually intercept seed phrases. Phoenix attacks the fundamental physical layer of DRAM through electromagnetic interference induction, allowing direct bit manipulation of cryptographic keys in memory. bleepingcomputer+ 10
Both attacks bypass traditional software protections by exploiting hardware characteristics of devices that cannot be patched. For Bitcoin users, this means a fundamental rethinking of the threat model is necessary: cryptographic security is no longer guaranteed solely by the mathematical complexity of ECDSA or the reliability of seed phrases—the physical properties of the hardware become the critical attack surface. arxiv+ 9
Recovering private keys from lost Bitcoin wallets by exploiting these vulnerabilities represents both a legitimate task for recovery services and a dangerous attack vector for attackers. The future of cryptocurrency security requires a holistic approach integrating hardware-level security assurances, formal verification cryptographic implementations, and continuous monitoring for emerging side-channel threats. trailofbits+ 7
The Pixnapping vulnerability represents a significant evolution in mobile attacks, demonstrating how modern performance optimizations can be exploited. The attack is particularly dangerous for cryptocurrency users, as compromising the seed phrase can lead to the complete loss of funds. gbhackers
The fundamental nature of the exploited vulnerabilities—the use of legitimate Android APIs and GPU hardware optimizations—indicates that a full solution will require a coordinated effort from Google, device manufacturers, and GPU vendors. pixnapping+ 1
Pixnapping’s research highlights the critical importance of considering security implications when implementing new system features and hardware optimizations. As mobile devices become the primary tool for managing digital assets, protecting against such sophisticated attacks becomes vital to the security of the ecosystem.
Google’s December patch is expected to provide more robust protection, but a long-term solution will require fundamental changes to Android’s architecture and possibly GPU hardware. Until then, users should follow security recommendations and exercise particular caution when handling cryptocurrency assets on Android devices.
Thus, the Pixnapping vulnerability (CVE-2025-48561) is not just another example of a software flaw, but a demonstration of a fundamentally new class of attacks that threaten the foundations of cryptographic security for digital assets. The study showed that even visually inviolable elements of the Android user interface can become a source of critical data leakage—from private keys and seed phrases to one-time 2FA codes that protect cryptocurrency wallets. Essentially, every pixel on the screen becomes a weak link in the cryptographic authentication chain.
Pixnapping is particularly dangerous due to its stealth and versatility . The attack requires no privileges, eludes the user, and is capable of reconstructing the screen image down to individual pixels using the hardware side channel GPU.zip . This makes any Android device a potential source of compromise for sensitive data, including Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), XRP, Litecoin (LTC), and other cryptocurrencies stored in mobile wallets.
The fact that this attack works even with the latest versions of Android and modern GPUs points to a fundamental vulnerability in mobile system architecture , where performance and visual optimizations conflict with privacy requirements. Pixnapping shatters the illusion of visual isolation between apps, demonstrating that protecting cryptographic information must consider not only network and logical vulnerabilities but also the physical and graphic side effects of computation .
To ensure the stability of the cryptocurrency ecosystem, systemic measures are needed: tightening Android security policies, restricting third-party app access to low-level graphics APIs, and revising the architectural principles of GPU data compression. Without such barriers, even the most secure encryption algorithms may be vulnerable to attacks capable of stealing keys literally from the screen.
Ultimately, Pixnapping served as a serious warning to the entire industry: cryptographic protection is meaningless without hardware and visual isolation . If visual data displayed on a screen can be reconstructed by an outside process, then every on-screen animation, every seed phrase, or QR code becomes a direct channel for leaking funds. For cryptocurrency users, this means one thing: even the instant appearance of a private key on the screen can now cost them their entire digital capital.
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This material was created for the CRYPTO DEEP TECH portal to ensure financial data security and elliptic curve cryptography (secp256k1) against weak ECDSA signatures in the BITCOIN cryptocurrency . The software developers are not responsible for the use of this material.
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