Most Companies Are Unprepared for the IoT
Researchers at Ben-Gurion University warn that hackers have an unexpected resource in exploiting your environment: a Google search. IoT device manufactures set a default password for their devices, sometimes even sharing passwords between brands.
“It only took 30 minutes to find passwords for most of the devices and some of them were found merely through a Google search of the brand,” said Omer Shwartz, a Ph.D. student and researcher at Ben-Gurion.
Thanks to a survey by ForeScout and CensusWide, we also have an eye-opening view into how unprepared companies are for the Internet of Things.500 CIOs and IT managers provided data and here are the take aways:
- Approximately 15% do no keep security patches up to date.
- 47% don’t change the default passwords on devices.
- Up to 46% said they did not have a full view of the devices connected to their networks.
This is startling. Nearly half of the businesses involved in the survey couldn’t even begin managing their IoT devices. With no way to see which devices are connected to their network, they wouldn’t be able to patch or manage vulnerable devices.
Myles Bray, vice president of EMEA at ForeScout, stated: “IoT has expanded the attack surface considerably for all firms, and without basic security hygiene it is easy for bad actors to gain a foothold and then move laterally on a network to reach high-value assets and cause business disruption.”
When asked about the results of the survey Natan Bandler, CEO and Co-Founder of Cy-OT, added “What is needed is a dedicated cybersecurity solution that is monitoring both the IoT device and its activity…By doing this, an organization will be able to detect when and which devices are at risk.”
IoT Device Management
To detect all of your IoT devices, look to Syxsense. Our product is the first to be able to scan and identify the IoT devices connected to your environments.
Learn more about our IoT capabilities with our video and by starting a trial today!
