IoT smart watches can put children in danger

The Internet of Things (IoT) has been, will and will bring a complete change to human life. But besides the undisputed benefits, IoT devices also bring us a lot of annoyance, and one of the biggest threats this type of device poses is privacy. personal.

Recently, researchers from Pen Test Partners, the UK, announced a tumultuous discovery of the 'danger' that low-cost smartwatches have an internet connection - a type of device. IoT - can cause problems with young children. According to research results, currently there are about 47 million children smartwatch devices in use around the world that contain vulnerabilities. But that's only the 'floating iceberg' because in reality, there are many other low-cost devices from 'unknown' manufacturers that can't be controlled.

For example, a cloud platform developed by Chinese smartwatch manufacturer Thinkrace has been found to contain multiple security holes that allow crooks to access users' personal data, including location information - a relatively valuable data for hackers. According to security researchers Pen Test Partners, such vulnerabilities are not uncommon and have been reported in mass since 2015, but many manufacturers are hesitant to patch.

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In general, smartwatch products that may be affected by security holes have been present in every corner of the world, most commonly in Turkey, Poland, Mexico, Belgium, Hong Kong, Spain, Netherlands, and China. The majority of these are low-cost devices.

In many cases, the privacy data of users of these devices is not protected by passwords or any type of identity authentication. In addition to location data, particularly in many cases hackers can also access recordings of conversations, voice messages of smartwatch users stored on vulnerable cloud databases.

Last month, security researchers AV-TEST, Germany, claimed to have discovered a data warehouse containing the unencrypted personal information of many smartwatch users through a publicly accessible web API. Includes real-time GPS location data sent via kids smart watches with a SIM card.

Instead of waiting for manufacturers to upgrade the system, patch holes, the practical thing that you should do is to switch to using products from famous manufacturers.