I wish my lone internet-of-shit device worked well enough to participate in a botnet. My house came with an internet connected sprinkler system--if the power blips, the sprinkler system boots up before the WIFI router, can't connect and then refuses to work until rebooted. I realized this when my lawn started dying.
Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
101–110 of 182 posts
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#102I have an older Phillips toothbrush without Bluetooth, Internet or vendor-locked heads, and it charges wirelessly in a glass cup. I love it.
I recently tried to buy a second one and could only find newer models with all these garbage features I don't want. Who the hell wants their toothbrush to connect to the internet? Wound up turning to eBay to find stock of the old one.
It might sound cruel, but I hope the moron who decided to add these features into their product, and the lackey who implemented it, are having a bad day and reflecting on the wisdom of what they did.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#103A warning about Philips electric toothbrushes: you cannot turn off Bluetooth on them, even if you are not using the smart features. Also be careful with all Philips air purifiers that support Wi-Fi, because the remote control feature cannot be disabled. They create a Wi-Fi hotspot that you need to connect to with a smartphone to finish setting up the device, but if you don't use these features, the air purifier will…
I'm reminded of this that I read a few days ago: Home assistant picked up my neighbours Bluetooth toothbrush and now I can see when they brush their teeth. https://old.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/1306pcw/home...
Send them a message if they miss a brushing.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#104Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's possible but its really unreliable. A device trying to reach out to an app on your phone to proxy the data while your phone is sleeping/app not running just doesn't work that well. You don't want to have to open the app while using the device, you just want all the data to be there when you look in a week. These devices almost always have wifi since the chips usually have both anyway. And reaching out to a fixed…
If you have enough room to store WiFi credentials, then you probably have enough room to store toothbrush use statistics. There is no need to copy that data to a phone immediately . It can be put off until it's convenient.
And then the user goes out for the day, opens up the app, and wonders why the last 3 days of data is missing. Meanwhile the chip that does Bluetooth also just has wifi bundled in. Aside from the security risk, directly connecting to wifi is a vastly superior experience.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
I finally got rid of one of my fitness watches that had dreadful battery life and I couldn't figure out why. After a few months of this, I finally realized the same thing, you can't turn off the bluetooth on it. The app on your phone and the watch are constantly searching for each other to always sync and the alternative is to unpair the watch, use it, re-pair, sync and go which became a total headache, but did in fa…
I've been using Garmin GPS watches for more than a decade, they get two weeks on a single charge (double or triple that if you don't use 24/7 heart rate, or GPS, or Bluetooth/Wifi, but even on long trips I don't need months without a charge). And they have Bluetooth that syncs with my phone for weather data and optionally shows notifications, but it doesn't need a phone connection to be a great watch. Sure, my top-en…
I've gotten 5-7 days out of a charge with my entry-level Vivoactive 3 even 4 years later. They're very good.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#106Stanislav Lem wrote the "Washer Tragedy" where washing machines got smarter and were taking over. I think he would have been proud of these toothbrushes...
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
This also good: https://i.imgur.com/YnBnsKA.jpeg
“The door refused to open. It said, “Five cents, please.” He searched his pockets. No more coins; nothing. “I’ll pay you tomorrow,” he told the door. Again he tried the knob. Again it remained locked tight. “What I pay you,” he informed it, “is in the nature of a gratuity; I don’t have to pay you.” “I think otherwise,” the door said. “Look in the purchase contract you signed when you bought this conapt.” In his desk…
Well, now we're straying from the original, but there's the libertarian copypasta on Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/copypasta/comments/7iqxko/libertari...
> I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.
> “Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”
> “What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”
> “Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”
> ...
and so on.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#108Dude. This is too much. My fridge is capable of being connected to the internet, so is my oven, garage door opener and my dishwasher. WHY? These things have worked so well without this crap. I wish manufacturers would stop this insanity.
> My fridge is capable of being connected to the internet, so is my oven, garage door opener and my dishwasher. WHY? Because you bought them dude! :)
These are all things that renters would not purchase. How many people actually try and use appliances at a rental property before signing?
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#109This article is strange & many details are lacking. All the big smart toothbrushes use BLE and are not WiFi-connected. Tried to fact-check the article, but nothing. A bunch of BLE chips are also WiFi capable, so not ruling out that someone compromised the firmware to enable WiFi functionality, but I wonder how they were able to connect to WiFi to trigger a botnet in the first place. Quite skeptical of this article, w…
>A bunch of BLE chips are also WiFi capable, so not ruling out that someone compromised the firmware to enable WiFi functionality
The ESP32 is now used as a general-purposed chip even in applications where an 8-bit MCU would have been enough. A remotely exploitable vulnerability in the ESP32/SDK could have large-scale consequences.
Re: Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks
#110I have an older Phillips toothbrush without Bluetooth, Internet or vendor-locked heads, and it charges wirelessly in a glass cup. I love it. I recently tried to buy a second one and could only find newer models with all these garbage features I don't want. Who the hell wants their toothbrush to connect to the internet? Wound up turning to eBay to find stock of the old one. It might sound cruel, but I hope the moron w…
Wifi is silly, but there really is a benefit to the Bluetooth/app connection -- it is used to see where you are brushing and spots you are missing. My dentist definitely has seen an improvement in the plaque in my back teeth since I started using a smart toothbrush that uses an app on my phone.