A team composed of scholars from the University of Macau (UM), Southeast University and the University of Massachusetts have won an excellence award at GeekPwn 2016, held in Shanghai.
In addition to developing a way to break internet encryption technologies, which they hope can serve as a wake-up call to manufacturers of smart devices, the “Phenix Coder” team also developed anti-hacking technologies.
At the competition, the team demonstrated some major security weaknesses of smart plugs from a well-known international brand, which make the products vulnerable to attacks from potential hackers.
According to a release issued by the University of Macau, the related paper is expected to be published soon.
By running a pre-set attack program on a randomly-selected network host, the team obtained authentication information about the smart plugs and thus obtained remote control.
A hacker can also obtain administrator rights over such smart plugs through firmware, thereby performing any operations he wants to. An internet-connected computer that has been compromised is known as a “zombie.”
At the competition, the team used the smart plug of a “zombie” to leave messages on GeekPwn’s official Weibo.
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