What Are IoT Botnet Attacks and How Can You Prevent Them?
The interconnectivity of everyday devices achieved through Internet of Things (IoT) technology generates insights to improve our living conditions and increase efficiency. But this has its downsides too, including IoT botnet attacks.
There’s no doubting the dangers of IoT attacks, especially with multiple devices sharing the same network. The focus should be on how to prevent these attacks.
What Are IoT Botnet Attacks?
Cybercriminals perform IoT botnet attacks by infecting computer networks with malware to compromise IoT devices. Having gained remote access and control over infected devices with malware, hackers carry out a series of illegitimate activities.
IoT botnet attacks are a game of numbers. The higher the number of connected devices, the more impact they have on targeted systems. The goal is to cause data breaches with traffic commotion.
How Do IoT Botnet Attacks Work?
IoT botnet attacks target devices with shared internet connectivity such as smartphones, smartwatches, laptops, etc. The bots can be non-evasive. They stay in the background until the actors trigger a particular action.
A typical IoT botnet attack plays out in numerous ways.
Identify Weaknesses in Target
The first step in an IoT botnet attack is finding a way to get into the targeted device. Every application looks secure on the surface, but most systems have some known or unknown vulnerabilities. It depends on how far you look. They scan for loopholes until they find one and leverage it to gain access.
After discovering a weakness in the system, threat actors infect it with malware that spreads across all devices on the shared IoT network.
Connect Device to Server
IoT botnet attacks aren’t random. Attackers plan their activities and initiate them from remote locations. The next step is to connect the devices to servers in the hackers' control room. Once they establish an active connection, they roll out their action plan.
The shared connection among IoT devices works to threat actors' advantage. It enables them to compromise multiple applications with a single command, saving time and resources.
Perform Desired Attack
Hackers have different motives for executing IoT botnet attacks. While stealing sensitive data is a common goal, it isn’t always the case. Money is obviously a chief aim, so cybercriminals may hijack your system and demand a sum of money before restoring access to you. But there’s no guarantee that they’ll hand your system back to you.
Common Forms of IoT Botnet Attacks
There are several cyberattack methods suitable for IoT botnet attacks. These are the go-to techniques for threat actors.
Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) Attack
A Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack is the process ofsending an enormous volume of traffic to a systemwith the intention of causing downtime. The traffic isn’t from human users but from compromised computer networks. If threat actors penetrate your IoT devices, they can use them to drive traffic to their targets in a DDoS attack.
When the system receives entries beyond its operational capacity, it records a traffic jam. It can no longer function, nor process legitimate traffic that should actually gain access.
Brute Force Attack
Brute force is the use of “force” to gain unauthorized access to applications bytrying out multiple usernames and passwordsto find a match. A trial-and-error login technique, the cyberattacker collects tons of credentials and systematically runs them via your system until one is successful.
Brute force attacks targeted at IoT systems are automated. An intruder uses digital applications to generate various login combinations and quickly tries them on the target. Besides making random guesses, they also try valid login details which they obtained from other platforms through credential theft.
Most phishing attacks are in the form of emails. The perpetrator contacts you in disguise as someone familiar or as a legitimate organization with a business offer. Although many email providers try to prevent this by directing messages from suspicious addresses to Spam, determined hackers go the extra mile to ensure their messages arrive in your inbox. Once they’ve caught your attention, theylure you into revealing sensitive information, ask you to click a malicious link, or open a malware-infected document.
Sniffing is when someone intercepts or tracks activities on a network. It involves the use of a packet sniffer to access information in transit. Hackers also use this method to contaminate systems with malicious codes for further hijacking.
Hackers deploying IoT botnet attacks use active sniffing to flood a network with traffic and inject it with malware to extract your personal identifiers or take control of your connected devices.
How to Prevent IoT Botnet Attacks
The positives of using IoT technology typically outweigh the downsides. Nonetheless, you’ll still be worried about botnet attacks, so how can you prevent them?
Deactivate Dormant Apps
The apps on your IoT devices make up their attack surfaces. The more there are, the more windows for cybercriminals to gain entry through. Half the time, you may not even use all these apps!
In scanning your network for weak links, hackers may discover dormant apps. They are of no use to you and expose you to attacks. Reducing the number of apps on your connected devices is a precaution against related attacks.
Use a Virtual Private Network
Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) offer much-needed privacy and security. Intruders can intercept your data by compromising your internet protocol (IP) address on a local area network (LAN). This is possible because they can see and track your network.
A VPNmakes your connection private and encrypts data, so intruders can’t access it. All interactions on your devices are properly secure against third parties. Hackers won’t be able to identify your location, let alone intercept your network.
Use Stronger Passwords
Many users make it easy for hackers by creating weak passwords. Using familiar names and figures as passwords is one of the biggest mistakes you can make. If your password looks simple to you, it’s easy for threat actors to crack too.
Make your passwords complex by combining upper- and lower-case letters with numbers and special characters. Learn to use phrases instead of single words. You can generate the most complex passwords but remembering them can be difficult.Using an effective password managersolves this challenge.
Update Your Devices
Outdated security features in IoT devices create loopholes for cyberattacks. If software providers play their part by upgrading defenses, the least you can do is implement those updates.
Simply keep your active apps up to date (presuming that you’ve already deleted non-active software). That way, you don’t have to worry about vulnerabilities from obsolete infrastructure.
Secure IoT Devices With Cybersecurity Awareness
IoT devices are just like any other device in terms of security. Use them with cybersecurity in mind, lest you expose yourself to cyber threats.
Don’t get carried away by an app’s features. Verify security features before buying and adding sensitive data. It can be easy enough to secure your IoT devices against cyberattacks, but you need to have a proactive mindset first.
Houses and business premises are often filled with smart home devices, but these can be exploited by equally smart hackers. Here’s what to do.
If an AI can roast you, it can also prep you for emergencies.
The key is not to spook your friends with over-the-top shenanigans.
I plugged random USB devices into my phone and was pleasantly surprised by how many actually worked.
My foolproof plan is to use Windows 10 until 2030, with the latest security updates.
You don’t need to fork out for expensive hardware to run an AI on your PC.
