Kevin Devine and GNUCitizen have teamed-up to complete some long overdue research regarding default encryption. DSL subscribers using BT’s Home Hub are at risk, the research says, because of weaknesses in the devices wireless encryption.
Research shows weaknesses in BT\'s Home Hub leaving users at risk.(IMG:BT)
GNUCitizen reported the issue alongside Devine’s work, offering the reminder that if exploited, a customer's network is vulnerable to snooping attacks, and attacks to computers on the same network.
“Many of us involved researching the security of wireless home routers, have always suspected that routers that come with default WEP/WPA keys follow predictable algorithms for practical reasons. Yes, I’m talking about routers that come with those stickers that include info such as S/N, default SSID, and default WEP/WPA key. Chances are that if you own a wireless router which uses a default WEP or WPA key, such key can be predicted based on publicly-available information such as the router’s MAC address or SSID,” Adrian Pastor of GNUCitizen said.
Adding, “In other words, it’s quite likely that the bad guys can break into your network if you’re using the default encryption key. Thanks to Kevin, our suspicion that such issue exists on the BT Home Hub has been confirmed.”
The BT Home Hub uses a 40-bit WEP encryption key, “…we can narrow down the number of possible keys to about 80,” Pastor reported. There are two tools released that aid in the method to guess and correctly pick the hardware’s default keys. One of them is being held from public released until a later date, likely at one of the more famous security cons. “We tested three different BT Home Hubs, and the attack seems to work fine.”
Speaking the thought that is on the minds of many who read the report, one reader said, “I never fail to be amazed by the fact companies are willing to ship to millions of customer’s routers which have WEP rather than WPA by default. But it is even more astonishing that the default key (which lets face it most people will never change, knowing nothing about computer security) can be derived from the default SSID.”
Remember that the SSID is also public knowledge. The trick, if you want to stop this type of attack cold, is simple; change the default SSID and use WPA not WEP.
EDIT: The name Kevine Dune was corrected. Kevin's last name is Devine.
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