Mozilla Foundation - Tell Amazon to Fix this Big Security Flaw in Ring Doorbells
Mozilla Foundation - Tell Amazon to Fix this Big Security Flaw in Ring Doorbells
Amazon is still ignoring a major security issue with its Ring Doorbell our research finds. Attackers can easily take Ring devices, including their security cameras, offline. Join us and Amazon to act.
Here is an article where you can read more: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/blog/mozilla-publishes-ring-doorbell-vulnerability-following-amazons-apathy/
Quoted a portion:
(SAN FRANCISCO, CA | TUESDAY, JUNE 6, 2023) -- Today, Mozilla is publicizing a security vulnerability in Amazon’s Ring Wireless Video Doorbell. Mozilla shared the vulnerability with Amazon over 90 days ago, but Amazon has yet to address the issue. Now, per industry standards, Mozilla is sharing its findings publicly to alert Ring Doorbell users and to further pressure Amazon to take action.
Following a penetration test of the Ring Doorbell conducted in October-November 2022, Mozilla and collaborator Cure53 determined that the device is vulnerable to Wi-Fi deauthentication attacks. Bad actors can leverage these weaknesses to disconnect the device from the internet using easily-accessible tools.
As a result, those bad actors could take the doorbell offline and then have their activities go unrecorded — undermining the product’s core purpose. Even after the doorbell is reconnected to the internet, a user will receive no alert about the attack.
Mozilla’s disclosure comes just days after Ring’s $5.8 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over other serious privacy and security issues. The FTC found that “Ring’s poor privacy and lax security let employees spy on customers through their cameras, including those in their bedrooms or bathrooms, and made customers' videos, including videos of kids, vulnerable to online attackers.”
The flaw: Amazon
Sign a petition? How about not use Amazon smart home products.
It’s like signing a petition to ask McDonald’s to use real ingredients in their food. Why bother, don’t eat it.
I have a hundred other real problems.
I do both
There are a lot of things that don't affect me directly, but I might vote/sign a petition for it. Even if it doesn't actually work out in my favor, more people see it and learn about the issue.
If there's a petition going around or news about the number of people that signed, and someone was already on the fence, it might act as the straw that gets people to dump Amazon smart home products.
There's also the case where these devices are collecting data on you even if you don't own one. What if you go to a friend's place, or a friend is talking about something you're working on, or even if you walk by a house that has a smart doorbell?
Not saying everyone NEEDS to do this, because you need to have the time and mental energy to deal with it. Just saying that there's still value in doing so even if you don't use the products yourself.
it really sucks to have to walk past these cameras... no consent needed apparently but the privacy implications are huge
You're generally in a public place. At least in the US, you have no expectation of privacy in public. Anyone can record you without your consent
While that might be true, I think some of these expectations and understandings are based on a world that no longer exists.
In the past, you could only be seen by the few people around you. Even when recorded, there was a limited number of people that could see the video. Now some influencer can run up to you and share your reaction with a few hundred million people. On the side of data collection, companies have so much more aggregate data that they can use and abuse. With newer algorithms to analyze that data, they can keep pumping more and more data into it to figure out intimate details about who you are and how you feel about things.
So yea that might be how our laws and social norms are set up now, but we don't have to stick to it if it doesn't make sense anymore.
Ring doorbells are the flaw.
But they were purposely made this way precisely to spy on users and create a system of mass espionage in addition to profits.
The last 10 years:
Quick, race to install cameras, voice recorders and locks connected to the Internet made by companies who have demonstrated no higher purpose than to sell your data and certainly couldn't give two fucks what is stolen.
/Surprised Pikachu
Almost like we forget Alexa, Google,Microsoft and any other company are not your friends and if its free it's because you're the product they're selling.
Is there a fix for de-auth nowadays?
I haven't looked at it for years, but didn't it use to be that devices would listen for a de-auth from any source, meaning that a bad actor could poison any wlan in range?
From my understanding, that's how hotels did it to encourage paying for wifi: If Joe starts a hotspot called JoePhone, their systems would automatically start spamming de-auth for JoePhone.
Unless it got fixed in a 2.4/5GHz revision?
deauth attacks are still a thing, however this is changing with wpa3.
If your router has a setting called "Protected Management Frames" you should enable it ASAP, it's basically encrypted and signed communication for every packet of data, so that your computer basically refuses to trust any deauth signal that doesn't actually originate from the router (massively simplifying here).
Just double checked mine. Abbreviated as PMF, and it's a toggle to turn OFF. Also have been using wpa3 for a while now.
since Amazon owns blink also, does it have the same security flaws?
Ring and Blink are designed differently and run different hardware. However, I would guess that some Blink devices have the same issue. I might be wrong but I think all 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi is vulnerable to deauth
5ghz is also susceptible to deauth.
it's not about the frequency, it's about the protocol. both 2.4 GHz and 5GHz are vulnerable with WPA2 (or worse WEP). WPA3 is not vulnerable
Yeah but what's the exploit
My take:
Take the thing out of the wifi its connected to, it doesn't record anything during that time, and when it's reconnected it doesn't notify of an outage.
Amazon
Oh no! There's a cheap version of a tech out there that has bugs and/or cut corners at the cost of security!? 😱 What do we do now!?
I suggest we turn off the internet until it's safe again!
🙄😅
The problem is that it becomes a race to the bottom. People who buy Rings and Echos and Fire Sticks and Google Homes and Android Phones either don’t care about their privacy, don’t know about their privacy or can’t afford privacy.
Then other brands try to compete with these products and it is a race to the bottom.
Privacy is a luxury, but even then, sometimes manufacturers will create a false luxury brands but still exploit customer data. Just look at the list of car manufacturers who were recently called out by Mozilla. Just look at Google Pixels vs iPhones.
I get that, but has it not always been like this? We've been badly and dangerously copying stuff since we as humans started to invent things. I'm amazed even tjat nobody blew their gead off or want blind yet from some cheaply copied VR headset, but I might still be cheering too soon...
I know it's not a good thing, but it always existed cause it provides a way for lower incomes to gain a bit more equality by at least getting to experience the functionality of an otherwise too expensive product that was carefully certified for safety...
So it just seems weird to me to suddenly remark something that has always been there, unrelated to my opinion about it... 😅
