Malicious hackers can take over control of vacuum and lawn mower robots made by Ecovacs to spy on their owners using the devices’ cameras and microphones, new research has found.
Security researchers Dennis Giese and Braelynn are due to speak at the Def Con hacking conference on Saturday detailing their research into Ecovacs robots. When they analyzed several Ecovacs products, the two researchers found a number of issues that can be abused to hack the robots via Bluetooth and surreptitiously switch on microphones and cameras remotely.
“Their security was really, really, really, really bad,” Giese told TechCrunch in an interview ahead of the talk.
The researchers said they reached out to Ecovacs to report the vulnerabilities but never heard back from the company, and believe the vulnerabilities are still not fixed and could be exploited by hackers.
For some robtos there seems to be a self hosted version of the servers available. Though I haven’t found the actual installation guide yet.
Good to know.
But does it disable these current security holes?
I can’t tell for sure, but IMO it’s pretty secure when you can block internet access for the robots as a whole.
Well, they refuse to work… :)
and no, maybe it is not secure even then, since the current attack goes by bluetooth
Am I the only one who thinks vacuums, washing machines, fridges and so on shouldn’t be connected to the internet?
I’m not super happy about it, but my roomba is absolutely essential now that I’ve been spoiled with it. I don’t like the idea of any of my appliances being online straight tied to a vendor’s app and service - but I’m willing to accept the trade off in this instance. Maybe someday I’ll upgrade to a different robot vac. I know there are FOSS setups to work around some of those challenges and circumvent some of the BS.
As someone who has never felt the need for a roomba
What so you like so much about it?
deleted by creator
I don’t disagree, but I think automation is cool, especially if you can keep it local (or have the tools to secure it on the internet). Valetudo can help make that possible. My current robot vacuum is pretty crappy, but it doesn’t have cameras or mapping. My next will be one that has mapping and can be easily flashed with local hosting.
Flashing a dreame L10s was difficult but worth it. I’d recommend it if you have the expertise. I did end up having to buy a USB breakout board from eBay, though.
I have just enough skill with hardware to get away with it with some swearing.
hackers can take over control of vacuum and lawn mower robots made by Ecovacs to spy on their owners using the devices’ cameras and microphones
Honestly, did anyone believe that this wouldn’t happen, sooner or later?
When I bought me such a device, I made sure that I would be able to install a cloud-free firmware on it. First thing. Before I wanted to use it at all.
What did you end up using?
Dreame D10S Plus with Valetudo.
Commanding it from Home Assistant.
