Most Houses Have at Least Two Vulnerable IoT Devices, Bitdefender Telemetry Shows

Bitdefender’s Internet of Things (IoT) telemetry reveals that, on average, most households have two vulnerable devices and many of them send private information unsafely.

Whether we are aware of it or not, our households are full of smart devices. The IoT term covers pretty much anything with an online connection, and we have a lot of those devices. The biggest problem with IoT is the security, which is often an afterthought for manufacturers.

Poor security is the main gateway exploited by attackers, although their attempts might not always be targeted. When it comes to regular users, their networks and systems are constantly probed by automated bots looking for vulnerabilities, and they are much more common than you probably think.

Bitdefender’s telemetry shows that 78% of all households have at least one vulnerable devices and that, on average, each household has two vulnerable devices. But the term vulnerable is a little vague and people might not be concerned that their favorite game console isn’t as secure as they think.

Of all detected vulnerable devices, around 37% are susceptible to DDoS attacks. And the problem is valid the other way around too, as 78% of Bitdefender users found that their devices were sending information in an unsafe manner, most often over unsecured HTTP channels.

The biggest security issue is data exfiltration or, more precisely, data that could be stolen by attackers using existing vulnerabilities. It turns out that 12% of vulnerabilities allow this type of intrusion.

Finally, the most vulnerable devices in households were NAS (network-attached storage) with 30% of the total, followed by media players (28%), TVs and smart boxes (13%), IP cameras (10%), and smartphones (5%).

Users have two important steps to take for securing their homes. First, they need to update all of their connected devices to the latest firmware version, whenever possible. Secondly, using a security solution that lords over all of the connected devices is recommended, not to mention the added protection when it comes to unsecured communications, DDoS attacks, and much more.