<
https://www.techdirt.com/2024/03/06/retailers-selling-thousands-of-identical-easily-hacked-smart-doorbells/>
"As we’ve noted for a very long time, sometimes “dumb” tech is often the
smarter option. In the rush to connect every conceivable technology and device
to the internet (while seeing ever-improving revenues), “smart technology”
companies routinely cut corners. And the first sacrifice usually made (behind
customer service) tends to be consumer privacy and device security.
A new investigation by
Consumer Reports found that major retailers like
Amazon, Sears, Temu, and Walmart are selling thousands of different types of
video doorbells that all have the flimsiest security imaginable. As a result,
many of the devices can be hacked — sometimes from thousands of miles away —
providing intruders access to your home video feeds.
Simply knowing a device’s serial number in some instances provided easy access
to user video. Many doorbells failed to even encrypt the public IP addresses
and Wi-Fi SSIDs sent over the internet. And in some instances, all it took was
an attacker walking up to the physical device and putting it into pairing mode
to gain access to live and recorded video streams.
The thousands of cheap, usually Chinese-made, video doorbells are sold under
different brand names (like Eken and Tuck), but are otherwise virtually
identical — down to the painful lack of security:
“The two devices stood out not just because of the security problems but
also because they appeared to be identical, right down to the plain white
box they came in, despite having different brand names. Online searches
quickly revealed at least 10 more seemingly identical video doorbells being
sold under a range of brand names, all controlled through the same mobile
app, called Aiwit, which is owned by Eken.”
Consumer Reports contacted the companies involved and received no response
whatsoever. Past studies by the organization have shown that even more
reputable brands in the smart doorbell space don’t have particularly robust
security. Brands like Amazon’s Ring and Google’s Nest have also had plenty of
problems, including companies’ more-than cordial relationship with law
enforcement.
But as Consumer Reports notes, retailers also have some responsibility to not
sell absolute garbage that not only doesn’t work, but puts potentially
vulnerable people (like victims of stalkers) at additional risk. And by selling
so many terrible products under
so many different brand names even tracking
the scope of the problem becomes an uphill climb for researchers."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
