Those of you who own a Philips smart Hue lamp should read this article to protect yourself from being attacked by hackers.
With the smart ones Appliances have entered our daily lives for good, the risks of data breaches have skyrocketed. Hackers are no longer trying to break into your computer but are finding new avenues through smart devices. Such an example was pointed out to us by researchers who this time found vulnerabilities in Philips' Hue Smart Light Bulbs.
Her researchers Check Point revealed today a new, high-vulnerability that affects Philips Hue Smart Light bulbs. This vulnerability, codenamed CVE-2020-6007, could allow hackers to access a targeted WiFi network from a distance of 100 meters.
The underlying vulnerability lies in the way Philips implemented the Zigbee communication protocol in its smart light bulb. ZigBee is a widely used wireless τεχνολογία, που έχει σχεδιαστεί για να επιτρέπει σε κάθε συσκευή να επικοινωνεί με οποιαδήποτε άλλη συσκευή στο δίκτυο. Το πρωτόκολλο έχει ενσωματωθεί σε δεκάδες εκατομμύρια συσκευές σε όλο τον κόσμο, συμπεριλαμβανομένων των Amazon Echo, Samsung SmartThings, Belkin Emo και πολλά άλλα.
The researchers did not disclose the full technical details of the vulnerability in order to give reasonable time to the affected manufacturers to apply the fixes. However, they shared a video showing the attack.
As seen in the video, in the attack scenario the hackers use a known bug (which has been detected in the past) to take control of the Hue lamp. This makes the device 'unreachable' to the users control application, forcing them to delete the lamp and then try to connect to it again.
The application in mobile τηλέφωνο σκανάρει την περιοχή ελέγχοντας για την ύπαρξη έξυπνων συσκευών και έτσι ανακαλύπτει την ελεγχόμενη από τον hacker smart bulb with updated firmware. The user adds her back to their network.
Hackers then exploit vulnerabilities in the ZigBee protocol to overload the temporary μνήμη of the Hue bulb – mobile phone – network connection, allowing them to install malware on that interface. From there, hackers can use the malware to infiltrate the network.
Check Point reported these vulnerabilities to Philips and Signify, owner of the Philips Hue brand, in November 2019, which just last month released an updated, patched firmware for the device.
If you do not have the firmware update feature enabled, we recommend that you install it manually immediately, and at the same time change the settings to refresh future updates.