option to disable microphone inside virtual machine

[bmn]

Feature Request / Summary

Guest can access to the host's built-in microphone. I do not want this, because if the VM gets compromised, someone can listen.

Can you add an option to disable this please? For example with some "VBoxManage setextradata vmname VBoxInternal/Devices/xxx 0" like command?

Justification

Use case

• Using less secure things inside a VM (for example, flash) to prevent the host getting infected by malware if the less secure thing (flash) has a vulnerability.

Non-solutions

• Muting the microphone on the host is no solution, because then Voip/Skype/etc. can no longer be used on the host or inside other VMs.
• Muting the microphone inside the VM is no solution, because this can be reversed, once the guest operating system has been compromised.
• Deactivating the virtual sound card in the VM settings is no solution, because this prevents hearing sound inside the VM. Viewing flash videos and so on is not much fun without sound.

Therefore not making the microphone available to specific VMs would be the best solution.

[Socratis]

This has been addressed with the release of VirtualBox 5.2.0. The ticket can now be closed as "Fixed".

For completeness, the appropriate commands are:

VBoxManage modifyvm <uuid|vmname> --audioin on|off

or when the VM is up and running:

VBoxManage controlvm <uuid|vmname> audioin on|off