Scan of Internet Uncovers Thousands of Vulnerable Embedded Devices

Description

Researchers scanning the internet for vulnerable embedded devices have found nearly 21,000 routers, webcams and VoIP products open to remote attack, due to the fact that their administrative interfaces are publicly viewable from anywhere on the internet and their owners have failed to change the manufacturer’s default password.

Linksys routers had the highest percent of vulnerable devices found in the U.S. — 45 percent of 2,729 routers that were publicly accessible still had a default password in place. Polycom VoIP units came in second, with default passwords lingering on about 29 percent of 585 devices accessible over the internet.

“You can reflash the firmware or install any software you wish on vulnerable devices,” said Salvatore Stolfo, a Columbia University computer science professor who is overseeing the research project aimed at uncovering vulnerable appliances on the internet. “These devices will be owned and used by bot herders and other miscreants.”

Vulnerable routers can be used by hackers to conduct click fraud or DNS cache poisoning attacks or to launch attacks on other systems, as a recent Threat Level story about vulnerable routers used by Time Warner customers pointed out. Someone with remote access to the administrative interface of a VoIP system would also be able to install firmware to record conversations.

The research project, devised by Columbia University grad student Ang Cui at the university’s Intrusion Detection Systems Laboratory , involves scanning networks belonging to ...

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