Giving AI a Headache: Acoustic Adversarial Attacks to Computer Vision Applications

Cameras aren't just optical devices — they're mechanical ones too, and sound can make them vibrate. This paper demonstrates that audible sound frequencies can resonate commercially available cameras, introducing artifacts that fool AI vision systems like YOLO into misclassifying objects, missing targets, or hallucinating things that aren't there. Unlike prior ultrasonic attacks limited to short range, audible frequencies travel farther and are harder to shield against. The implications are significant for any AI system relying on cameras in the physical world: autonomous vehicles, security surveillance, warehouse robots, and facial recognition systems could all be vulnerable. This work helps inform future hardening and mitigation strategies. Authors: Nicole Villavicencio-Garduño, Maksim Ekin Eren, Milo Prisbrey, Ben Migliori, Michael Teti Paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/2606.14658v1