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A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

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Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#101
post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no way to be "safe". You might be safer if you disable UPnP, it certainly decreases the attack surface.

> There's no way to be "safe". You're implying that all routers are vulnerable?

No routers are invulnerable.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I have UPnP disabled, am I safe?

There's no way to be "safe". You might be safer if you disable UPnP, it certainly decreases the attack surface.

I'm sorry, I didn't intend to start a nit-pick on whether or not all software contains bugs. My response was too glib.

The GP asked:

> If I have UPnP disabled, am I safe?

The answer is yes: If you can disable UPnP, your router will be safe from this particular exploit. Which is, I think, what he was asking.

Everyone should disable UPnP in their routers. It won't make your router "safe" from all exploits, but it will make it safe from this one, and you can do it now, immediately, without replacing hardware or firmware.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#104

Is there any easy way to check if your router is vulnerable/compromised? Or instructions for disinfecting it as well as patching it? Like, based on actually being exploitable or compromised, not firmware versions or whatever. I actually suspect mine is compromised, it's been behaving funny for a month or two, needing to be restarted a lot. (Which, ironically, is a signal of a _buggy_ compromise, your router of course…

If you wanted to see whether you could potentially be targeted by this botnet then you can check Shodan (https://www.shodan.io). Just enter your IP address in the search box and if your network has any services exposed to the Internet you will see them.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no way to be "safe". You might be safer if you disable UPnP, it certainly decreases the attack surface.

I'm sorry, I didn't intend to start a nit-pick on whether or not all software contains bugs. My response was too glib. The GP asked: > If I have UPnP disabled, am I safe? The answer is yes: If you can disable UPnP, your router will be safe from this particular exploit. Which is, I think, what he was asking. Everyone should disable UPnP in their routers. It won't make your router "safe" from all exploits, but it will…

Thanks, my reply wasn't very good either. I suspect most people can disable UPnP without ever noticing a problem. If anything, it is more used by malware than anything you actually want.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#106

I think it's time for windows, and ios, and firewall / antivirus companies to scan for info about the routers used and alert people that their network is easily hacked, may already be hacked, and is in danger of being used by criminals to attack other countries and companies. Extra info such as, the router you are using has not had any available firmware updates for 3 years and likely needs to be replaced. It's obvio…

We actually offer such a monitoring service at Shodan, though it's largely aimed at companies so you need to use the API. Here's an article on how to setup a real-time monitor for your network:

https://help.shodan.io/guides/how-to-monitor-network

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#107
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I were you I'd check to see if your router can run one of the several open source firmware packages like OpenWRT, dd-wrt, or Tomato. In my personal experience the OpenWRT/lede team is on top of security issues, and the router web interface and tooling is completely fine. I'd be confident that flashing your device with modern open source firmware would solve the problem, but if you're paranoid just recycle the devi…

In general, I am cautious of running my own open source thing without being an expert in the relevant area (or interested in becoming one) -- having to put something together (and maintain it) yourself seldom, in my experience, ends up _more_ secure or _more_ maintainable, when you don't know what you're doing. However, routers may be an exception. Apparently the industry has basically no business motivation to keep…

I’d recommend swapping out your consumer grade router for a commercial packaged version of pfSense. Just as easy to setup as most consumer grade routers and it auto updates (if you want) and has a decently secure base. Sure, you’ll spend $50 more, but isn’t the piece of mind worth it?

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#108
post #38

So, what is the most secured option for the moment? Buy a x86 box and turn it into a router? But it consumes more power than a low-power router, and buying more network adapter is not that cheap. I am currently using the open source tomato firmware. However, since there is a bug/feature in the router so that I cannot flash an image too large, or otherwise it would not work. Also, the configuration is limited to 32 KB…

I highly recommend looking into pfSense. I’ve been running it for years and it’s been solid.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#109

They are currently talking about creating a cyber civilian corps that would be under the Department of Homeland Security. The purpose would be some yet to be defined “assisting businesses and state / local governments in crisis”. However maybe we should have them knocking on doors having ppl set up their home network. Obviously a lot of responsibility is being pushed back on companies to make this easier, but still w…

It’s been talked about for years under DHS. I was part of one of the early iterations of it called NetGuard. I have zero hope for any such initiative after the experience despite thinking its sorely needed.

Re: A 100k Botnet Turns Home Routers to Email Spammers

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I think this is a really good OpenWrt-router, with good value for money and easy installation... It is fair mentioning that this model is discontinued from TP-Link and you will probably have to buy it second hand. It also comes in at least 5 revisions, with various levels of support, making life a little bit more difficult for the average, uninformed buyer. As a side note: I have a 350mbps symmetrical FTTH link…

Do you know well this router runs Wireguard using OpenWRT?

Actually looking into Wireguard on OpenWrt[1], I don't see anything router-specific about supporting that.

As long as you have enough flash to install the modules, I can't see why this shouldn't work on any router.

[1] https://danrl.com/blog/2017/luci-proto-wireguard/

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