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Comcast made Wi-Fi motion sensing a headline feature on millions of Xfinity gateways. It reads the ripples your body makes in the signal, through walls, no camera. Here’s the five-minute check, friend. 🤯 WOW! Comcast made Wi-Fi motion sensing a headline feature on millions of Xfinity gateways. Your router reads the ripples your body makes in the signal: which room you’re in, standing or lying down, through walls, no camera, no light. And the fine print says motion data can go to law enforcement “without further notice to you.” The Short Version: Open your router app, hunt for anything labeled...

Cybersecurity researchers have found surveillance backdoors in Chinese carrier routers made by Zbtlink and the same software in a different Zbtlink-made router sold through Amazon. Chinese law requires telecom and internet companies to provide technical assistance to police and state-security agencies. In an Aug. 27 report, cybersecurity firm VulnCheck said it found two hidden programs in an $88 router bought through Amazon from a U.S. seller. One, which the researchers named Speakingstone, sends information about the router to a remote server and can receive instructions to redirect internet traffic, obtain login credentials, or take control of the device. The second,...

The Department of Homeland Security is mandating random paper ballot audits for upcoming elections, citing significant security risks posed by Chinese-manufactured components in widely-used voting machines. The Homeland Security Department will require random audits of paper ballots in the midterm elections, citing long-simmering concern that the nation’s largest voting technology companies use Chinese parts in their voting machines, according to a letter from Secretary Markwayne Mullin released Thursday. Mullin sent the letter to the White House Transparency Task Force earlier this week outlining the dangers posed by Chinese components in American voting machines and the way that these components could...

The FBI and NSA jointly announced that Russia has been systematically compromising the security of home and small office routers since at least 2024. They obtained a court order to allow them to remotely reset thousands of affected devices in the US, but if yours is one of them, it needs to be urgently replaced … CNET reports. Federal agencies, including the FBI and NSA, disclosed on April 7 that a unit of Russia’s military intelligence directorate, the GRU group known as APT28 or Fancy Bear, has been systematically compromising home and small office routers since at least 2024, using...

The FBI says your Wi-Fi network could be a target for hackers. Here's how to protect yourself. *snip* The FBI bulletin specifically named older Linksys routers that are no longer receiving software patches or security updates.

It's not just TikTok that's in trouble over cybersecurity. U.S. authorities are investigating TP-Link, a Chinese company that holds 65% of the U.S. market for home and small-business routers, for potential national security risks, the Wall Street Journal reports today. The company’s routers have been linked to cyberattacks targeting Western organizations and government agencies. Key points Security Concerns: Microsoft found that Chinese hackers used TP-Link routers in cyberattacks. Government Probes: Commerce, Defense, and Justice departments are investigating, with a potential U.S. ban on TP-Link devices under consideration for next year. Router Flaws: TP-Link routers are often shipped with unaddressed security...

Your router is a crucial part of your home’s connection. It’s the primary way the internet gets into your house, and it sends out the Wi-Fi signal that connects all your wireless devices. Has it been years since you updated your router? We put together a quick quiz to help you choose the perfect model for your home and needs. This is a must if your connection is spotty and your router isn’t equipped with the latest security standards. Tap or click here to take our router-finder quiz. Even if your firmware is up to date, your router is still...

As the contentious audit of Maricopa County, Arizona's 2020 election results draws nearer to a close, audit officials still lack access to computer equipment that auditors believe is critical to ensure a full review of the county's records. Maricopa County officials in May refused to hand over routers requested by election auditors at the time, claiming that to do so would pose a security risk due to the county's intermingling of various departments on multiple routers. The routers "support [more than 50] departments, not just elections operations," including "critical law enforcement data that, by law, cannot be disclosed, as well...

Netgear has patched serious security vulnerabilities in its DGN2200v1 network router, following the discovery of "very odd behaviour" by a Microsoft security research team - a somewhat understated way of saying that attackers can gain "complete control over the router."

Officials in Maricopa County, Arizona, are refusing to comply with subpoenas from the state Senate that require them to turn over routers or router images to auditors reviewing the November 2020 election, saying that surrendering the items will cause a "significant security risk" to local law enforcement. "We had previously believed that the risk would be eliminated by redacting the law enforcement data on the routers and not producing it. But we were informed that redaction did not eliminate the risk," Deputy County Attorney Joseph LaRue said in a letter this week to Senate Audit Liaison Ken Bennett, reports The...

What you should do is factory-reset your router, disable UPnP, then check for firmware updates, since some companies have patched the vulnerability out. This won’t fix any other compromised systems, but it’s a necessary first step. After that, you can factory-reset any other internet-connected device that you’re concerned about. You might also want to just buy a new router, as recent models do not appear to be susceptible to this type of attack. This information comes from a blog post entitled "UPnProxy: EternalSilence" penned by researchers at Cambridge, Massachusetts-based data management firm Akamai. Cybercriminals have learned how to take advantage...

If your home is plagued by Wi-Fi dropouts and other router issues, you may want to think about an upgrade, perhaps to one that offers multiple bands to up your choices and, with luck, performance. Hence TP-Link's AC5400 Wireless Tri-Band MU-MIMO, also known as the Archer C5400 Gigabit Router. This sucker offers a total of six distinct networks, kind of: 1 x 2.4 GHz, and 2 x 5 GHz, with all three options available for both regular use or as specially noted "Guest" networks, so you won't get in trouble for some overnight interloper's porn downloads. Or whatever your issue...

...and I need recommendations.

A few months back, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed a complaint against Taiwan-based hardware maker Asus accusing it of misrepresenting its products' security features and failure to address security vulnerabilities. The two parties have agreed to a settlement, one that forces Asus to subject its procedures and products to independent security audits for the next 20 years. According to the FTC's complaint, Asus has failed numerous times in addressing severe security issues and has made false claims about its products to its customers. Asus had flaws in its AiDisk and AiCloud router features The FTC pointed to numerous...

Italian security researchers from VoidSec have come across a botnet structure that was using vulnerable Aethra Internet routers and modems to launch brute-force attacks on WordPress websites. This particular incident was uncovered after one of the VoidSec researchers was sifting through his WordPress log file and found a brute-force attack coming from the same IP range. After further investigation, all the IPs came from six Internet Service Providers (ISP): Fastweb, Albacom (BT-Italia), Clouditalia, Qcom, WIND, and BSI Assurance UK, four of which are from Italy. What all these networks had in common were Aethra routers. VoidSec researchers narrowed down most...

Analysis America's broadband watchdog is suffering a backlash over plans to control software updates to Wi-Fi routers, smartphones, and even laptops. In a proposed update [PDF] to the regulator's rules over radiofrequency equipment, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) would oblige manufacturers to "specify which parties will be authorized to make software changes." In addition, it proposes that "modifications by third parties should not be permitted unless the third party receives its own certification." While the intent is to make the FCC's certification of the next generation of wireless equipment faster and more flexible, open source advocates were quick to notice...

... Networking device manufacturers ZyXEL Communications and Netgear have confirmed that some of their routers are affected by a recently disclosed vulnerability in a USB device-sharing service called NetUSB. ZyXEL will begin issuing firmware updates in June, while Netgear plans to start releasing patches in the third quarter of the year. The vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2015-3036, is located in a Linux kernel module called NetUSB that's commonly used in routers and other embedded devices. The module is developed by a Taiwan-based company called KCodes Technology and allows routers to share USB devices with other computers via the Internet Protocol (IP)....

Millions of routers and other embedded devices are affected by a serious vulnerability that could allow hackers to compromise them. The vulnerability is located in a service called NetUSB, which lets devices connected over USB to a computer be shared with other machines on a local network or the Internet via IP (Internet Protocol). The shared devices can be printers, webcams, thumb drives, external hard disks and more. NetUSB is implemented in Linux-based embedded systems, such as routers, as a kernel driver. The driver is developed by Taiwan-based KCodes Technology. Once enabled, it opens a server that listens on TCP...

Arstechnica has an article up concerning a remote coded execution bug in some routers. Arstechnica does not wish their articles to be posted or excerpted here, so the webpage addy is included for those wishing to read more about it. Affects D-Link and Trendnet routers.

Comcast's attempt to expand WiFi hotspots around the country has been met with a class action lawsuit in San Francisco by customers who claim the cable giant is trying to use their wireless routers to let others access the Internet. According to the Courthouse News Service, the lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court by lead plaintiff Toyer Grear and it charges that Comcast gave unsuspecting customers across the country routers that would broadcast secondary signals allowing others to connect with the Internet without the customer's approval. ... The suit claims Comcast hoped to piggyback off its customers so it...