12 Steps to Stop the Next IoT Attack in its Tracks

IoT Attack

Distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) #IoT attack against DNS are a wake up call to how fragile the #Internet can be.

The IoT attack against Domain Name Servers from a botnet of thousands of devices means it’s way past time to take IoT security seriously. The bad actors around the world who previously used PCs, servers and smartphones to carry out attacks have now set their sights on the growing tidal wave of IoT devices. It’s time for consumers and enterprises to protect themselves and others by locking down their devices, gateways and platforms. While staying secure is a never-ending journey, here’s a list of twelve actions you can take to get started:

  1. Change the default usernames and passwords on your IoT devices and edge gateways to something strong.
  2. Device telemetry connections must be outbound-only. Never listen for incoming commands or you’ll get hacked.
  3. Devices should support secure boot with cryptographically signed code by the manufacturer to ensure firmware is unaltered.
  4. Devices must have enough compute power and RAM to create a transport layer security (TLS) tunnel to secure data in transit.
  5. Use devices and edge gateways that include a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip to securely store keys, connection strings and passwords in hardware.
  6. IoT platforms must maintain a list of authorized devices, edge gateways, associated keys and expiration dates/times to authenticate each device.
  7. The telemetry ingestion component of IoT platforms must limit IP address ranges to just those used by managed devices and edge gateways.
  8. Since embedded IoT devices and edge gateways are only secure at a single point in time, IoT platforms must be able to remotely update their firmware to keep them secure.
  9. When telemetry arrives in an IoT platform, the queue, bus or storage where data comes to rest must be encrypted.
  10. Devices and edge gateways managed by an IoT platform must update/rotate their security access tokens prior to expiration.
  11. Field gateways in the fog layer must authenticate connected IoT devices, encrypt their data at rest and then authenticate with upstream IoT platforms.
  12. IoT platforms must authenticate each device sending telemetry and blacklist compromised devices to prevent attacks.

Keeping the various components that make up the IoT value chain secure requires constant vigilance. In addition to doing your part, it’s important to hold the vendors of the IoT devices, gateways and platforms accountable for delivering technology that’s secure today and in the future.

Keep your Mobile Data Safe when Apps Talk to Each Other

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Convert Win32 applications using local interprocess communications (IPC) to #mobile #apps that securely send #data to each other via contracts.

In the 90s, platforms and programming languages allowed developers to call functions that were increasingly farther away from the calling code. Calling into subroutines gave way to instantiating classes to call functions. Calling exported functions in separate C DLLs gave way to using Object Linking and Embedding (OLE) to call functions in separate programs. You could even embed the UI of a different program like Excel inside your app.

Developers went nuts with this stuff and started calling functions or passing messages to other local apps using Named Pipes, Mailslots, shared databases, TCP, UDP, message queues and shared files. On Windows Mobile, point-to-point queues were used with multiple executables to get around app memory limits. The problem with IPC is that security took a back seat and apps were just asking to be hacked as they listened for incoming connections like little web servers.

Today’s modern mobile platforms don’t allow this. Platforms require things like contracts, intents and extensions. They declare API interactions and what information can be shared between two apps as well as the files they can open. Users are prompted to give their permission to this type of interaction between apps which prevents data leakage at the device edge.

Reduce risk to your business by migrating your apps to a more secure method of data sharing between app sandboxes. What is your organization doing to secure app data sharing?

Learn how to digitally transform your company in my newest book, “Mobile Strategies for Business: 50 Actionable Insights to Digitally Transform your Business.”

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