Three million malware-infected smart toothbrushes used in Swiss DDoS attacks

Post by HnUser12 » Tue, Feb 06, 2024, 10:39 PM UTC

dessant wrote: post #49

A 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…

Post by progbits » Tue, Feb 06, 2024, 10:40 PM UTC

jhbadger wrote: post #110

rkagerer wrote: post #102

I 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.

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Feb 06, 2024, 10:49 PM UTC

a321neo wrote: post #109

tjasko wrote: post #99

This 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.

Post by yread » Tue, Feb 06, 2024, 10:55 PM UTC

mynameisvlad wrote: post #88

dessant wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anyone in Wi-Fi range can exploit the device. The sensors of the air purifier can be used for spying, and the device could also serve as a hopping point for exploiting other devices in your home.

> The sensors of the air purifier can be used for spying To be able to... know if your target's house has a lot of pollutants? Is particularly warm? There is practically no useful information that can't be gleamed by just looking through their windows, blinds and all. > and the device could also be used as a hopping point for exploiting other devices in your home. It's not connected to your home network, that's the w…

Post by SoftTalker » Tue, Feb 06, 2024, 10:57 PM UTC

HnUser12 wrote: post #121

dessant wrote: post #49

A 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…

Same with my samsung tv and my neighbour keeps trying to pair her watch to it for reasons I don’t know.