Hackers turned toothbrushes into cyber weapons

Stefan Mileschin · 8th February 2024, 08:14

Brush with disaster

A recent report from the Aargauer Zeitung has revealed that around three million smart toothbrushes have been hacked and turned into botnets.

The report says this massive mob of connected tooth cleaners was used in a DDoS attack on a Swiss company's website. The firm's site crashed under the pressure of the attack, costing them millions of Euros in business.

In this case, the toothbrush botnet was easy to hack because of its Java-based OS. The report didn't name any toothbrush brands. Usually, the toothbrushes would have used their connection for keeping track of and improving your teeth brushing, but after a malware infection, these toothbrushes were forced into a botnet.

Stefan Zuger from the Swiss branch of the global cyber security firm Fortinet gave the paper some tips on how people could protect their toothbrushes - or other connected gadgets like routers, set-top boxes, spy cameras, doorbells, baby monitors, washing machines, and so on.

https://fudzilla.com/news/58401-hack...-cyber-weapons

8th February 2024, 08:14	#1
Stefan Mileschin [M] Reviewer Join Date: May 2010 Location: Romania Posts: 153,575	Hackers turned toothbrushes into cyber weapons Brush with disaster A recent report from the Aargauer Zeitung has revealed that around three million smart toothbrushes have been hacked and turned into botnets. The report says this massive mob of connected tooth cleaners was used in a DDoS attack on a Swiss company's website. The firm's site crashed under the pressure of the attack, costing them millions of Euros in business. In this case, the toothbrush botnet was easy to hack because of its Java-based OS. The report didn't name any toothbrush brands. Usually, the toothbrushes would have used their connection for keeping track of and improving your teeth brushing, but after a malware infection, these toothbrushes were forced into a botnet. Stefan Zuger from the Swiss branch of the global cyber security firm Fortinet gave the paper some tips on how people could protect their toothbrushes - or other connected gadgets like routers, set-top boxes, spy cameras, doorbells, baby monitors, washing machines, and so on. https://fudzilla.com/news/58401-hack...-cyber-weapons

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