Israeli, Singaporean researchers develop method to protect smart home devices from cyberattacks

JERUSALEM, Aug. 4 (Xinhua) -- Israeli and Singaporean researchers have developed a method to defend smart home devices from cyberattacks, the Ben Gurion University (BGU) reported Tuesday.

The new method, developed by BGU and National University of Singapore researchers, enables telecommunications and internet service providers to monitor vulnerable home devices, the BGU said.

The ability to launch massive distributed denial-of-service attacks via internet-connected devices network of compromised devices is an exponentially growing risk in the Internet of Things (IoT).

Such massive attacks impact the target, as well as the infrastructure of telecommunication service providers (telcos).

The new method, included in a study published in the journal Computers & Security, detects connected, vulnerable IoT models before they are compromised by monitoring the data traffic from each smart home device.

This enables telcos to verify whether specific IoT models, known to be vulnerable to exploitation by malware for cyberattacks, are connected to the home network.

It helps telcos identify potential threats to their networks and take preventive actions quickly, such as offloading the large volume of traffic generated by an abundance of infected domestic IoT devices.

In turn, this could prevent the combined traffic surge from hitting the telcos' infrastructure, reduce the likelihood of service disruption, and ensure continued service availability.