Hackers can attack robot vacuum cleaners and freely observe your home

Specifically, in automatic cleaning robots branded Ecovacs, a long list of vulnerabilities was discovered that allows bad guys to take control of the robot via Bluetooth from a distance of up to 450 feet (137m).

Hackers can send a quick driver that instantly connects back to their computer, then command the compromised robot to reconnect to the server over the internet. This server grants the attacker remote control over the hijacked robot.

Hackers will take over the robot's camera, mic and data including stored Wi-Fi login information, mapped rooms. Hacked robots can even spread the attack to other devices. suffered from other Ecovacs nearby.

The dangerous thing is that when the camera and mic are on there are no warning lights or other indicators. Some device models have audible warnings, but they can be easily disabled by hackers.

More than 10 models of Ecovacs vacuum cleaners and lawn mowers are affected by these errors including Ecovacs Deebot 900 Series, Ecovacs Deebot N8/T8 and Ecovacs Deebot X1.

The researchers tried to report these issues to Ecovacs but said they never received a response from the company.

Isabella Humphrey

Update 13 August 2024