The fish tank became a medium for hacker attacks

Ddos April 18, 2018 2 minutes read

According to Nicole Eagan, chief executive of Darktrace, a cybersecurity company (focusing on artificial intelligence), the company has investigated the invasion of an unnamed casino damaged by a thermometer in a fish tank in the lobby. Eagan pointed out that hackers used thermostat loopholes to enter the casino network, managed to access large amounts of gambling data, and then brought the data back to the network, exiting to the cloud via a thermostat, and similar incidents occurred once in July 2017.

With the rapid development of Internet technology, the Internet of Things has become part of human daily life. Smart assistants such as Siri, Alexa, and Tmall will provide support for automobiles, refrigerators, thermostats, air conditioners, and electric lights. But what is even more worrying is that companies may not be able to protect every device on their networks, so that cybercriminals can retain hostages with only one device that is not well-presented.

By User Aleš Tošovský [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons

While bringing more convenience than ever before, the adoption of Internet of Things technology has raised concerns about new cybersecurity threats. This incident has persuasively reminded people that IoT devices are theoretically vulnerable to hacking or intrusion. Manufacturers mainly focus on the performance and practicality of IoT devices but ignore security measures and encryption mechanisms. This is why their devices are often attacked by hackers.

Therefore, in order to prevent equipment from being hacked to the maximum extent, IoT device manufacturers need to timely protect and repair security vulnerabilities in devices. Device users should connect only the necessary devices to the network, and always turn on firewall protection to make the operating system. Software updates are kept as current as possible.

Source: businessinsider