Friday, March 29, 2024

Kaspersky warns users on vulnerabilities of connected home devices

Connected home entertainment devices pose a real cyber security threat due to vulnerabilities in their software, and a lack of elementary security measures such as strong default administrator passwords and encryption of Internet connection.

KL_ Hacking IoT

Computer security firm Kaspersky issued the warning after Kaspersky Lab security analyst David Jacoby conducted a research experiment in his own living room to find out how safe his home is in terms of cyber security.

He inspected home entertainment devices such as network-attached storages (NAS), Smart TVs, router, and Blu-ray player, among others, to find out if they are vulnerable to cyber-attacks.

And it turned out they are.

The Kaspersky Lab expert examined two NAS models from different vendors, one Smart TV, a satellite receiver, and a connected printer.

As a result of his research Jacoby managed to find 14 vulnerabilities in the network attached storages, one vulnerability in the Smart TV and several potentially hidden remote control functions in the router.

In line with its responsible disclosure policy, Kaspersky Lab does not disclose the names of the vendors whose products were subject to research until a security patch closing the vulnerabilities is released.

All vendors were informed about the existence of the vulnerabilities. Kaspersky Lab specialists work closely with vendors to eliminate any vulnerabilities they discover.

According to Kaspersky, the most severe vulnerabilities were found in the network-attached storages. Several of them would allow an attacker to remotely execute system commands with the highest administrative privileges.

The tested devices also had weak default passwords, lots of configuration files had the wrong permissions and they also contained passwords in plain text.

In particular, the default administrator password for one of the devices contained just one digit. Another device even shared the entire configuration file with encrypted passwords to everyone on the network.

Using a separate vulnerability the researcher was able to upload a file in an area of the storage memory inaccessible for ordinary user.

Should this file be a malicious one, the compromised device would become a source of infection for other devices connecting to this NAS ? a home PC, for instance ? and even serve as a DDoS bot in a botnet.

Moreover, since the vulnerability allowed the file to be uploaded in a special part of the device?s file system, the only way to delete it was by using the same vulnerability.

While investigating the security level of his own Smart TV, the Kaspersky researcher discovered that no encryption is used in communication between the TV and the TV vendor?s servers.

That potentially opens the way for Man-in-the-Middle attacks that could result in the user transferring money to fraudsters while trying to buy content via the TV.

As a proof of concept, the researcher was able to replace an icon of the Smart TV graphic interface with a picture. Normally the widgets and thumbnails are downloaded from the TV vendor?s servers and due to the lack of encrypted connection the information could be modified by a third party.

The researcher also discovered that the Smart TV is able to execute Java code that, in combination with the ability to intercept the exchange of traffic between the TV and Internet, could result in exploit-driven malicious attacks.

The DSL router used to provide wireless Internet access for all other home devices contained several dangerous features hidden from its owner.

According to the researcher, some of these hidden functions could potentially provide the Internet service provider (ISP) remote access to any device in a private network.

?Individuals and also companies need to understand the security risks around connected devices. We also need to keep in mind that our information is not secure just because we have a strong password, and that there are a lot of things that we cannot control. It took me less than 20 minutes to find and verify extremely serious vulnerabilities in a device which looks like a safe one and even alludes to security in its own name,? said Jacoby.

How to stay safe in the world of connected devices

? Make the hacker?s life harder — All your devices should be updated with all the latest security and firmware updates. This will minimize the risk of exploiting known vulnerabilities.

? Make sure that the default username and password is changed — This is the first thing an attacker will try when attempting to compromise your device.

? Most of the home routers and switches have the option of setting up your own network for each device, and also restrict access to the device ?- with the help of several different DMZs (a separate network segment for systems with a greater risk of compromise) / VLANs (a mechanism for achieving logical separation between different logical networks on the same physical network). For example if you have a TV, you might want to restrict access to that TV and only allow it to access a particular resource within your network. There isn?t much reason for your printer to be connected to your TV.

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