Is your device trying to kill you?

I don’t mean this in the metaphorical sense. But literally. If it’s not your device. Is it someone else’s? The person behind you in the queue at the coffee shop or supermarket might be holding a compromised device.

After the recent news of weaponised pagers and walkie talkies being detonated in Lebanon and Syria — how do we feel when something so innocuous as a personal device could be used to kill? It really starts bringing warfare all very close to home.

Details are pretty sparse on exactly how the devices were detonated — but we know it happened simultaneously and the devices were in use for some time. So let’s assume that the detonations happened using some trigger over a network like the internet or mobile network. These are in effect, IoT (internet-of-things) devices.

The Ubiquity and Risk of IoT Devices

IoT devices are now ubiquitous in modern society — your mobile phone, fridge, oven, drone, camera, laptop, tablet, watch — everything is connected.

Did you know they’re even developing buildings which are monitoring staff movements, temperatures, how long you spend at the water cooler or even in the toilet. How good the air quality is and how long you spend in the office. All sensors which are connected and sending sensitive information all potentially used as a pawn in cyber…