The idea that our traffic data systems are vulnerableis not a Modern one . In fact , ameliorate cyber security system on our nation ’s infrastructureis a huge antecedence the right way now . Buta new study from the University of Michiganon the vulnerability of traffic lights is shocking test copy that we need to make some major changes , and we need to make them now .
A team led by computer scientist J. Alex Haldermanrecently conduct a studyon the security of traffic lights in an nameless Michigan town and establish them to be ridiculously easy to cut . Three major weaknesses — unencrypted wireless connectedness , the use of default usernames and passwords , and vulnerable dubugging ports — meant that the investigator were able-bodied to take control over the light with a normal laptop computer . As long as the wireless card in the hacker ’s computer can pass on at the same frequency that the traffic lights utilise , it can break into the wireless connection that powers the entire organisation .
It ’s pretty nous - boggling actually . A drudge can receive the default usernames and passwords require for unfettered access and take over a whole urban center ’s dealings system with one dinkey exploit . And it reallyis a systemic job . As the Michigan research teamwrote in their paper on the experiment , “ The vulnerabilities we discover in the base are not a faulting of any one gadget or excogitation choice , but rather show a systemic want of security knowingness . ”
The really shivery affair in this stopping point is the simple fact that we ’re pretend more and more machines internet - join with conduct the necessary cyber security measures . If it ’s capriciously easy to hack into our dealings lights , it ’s in all probability freakishly easy to hack into some electronic voting machines , aesculapian devices , andpossibly even power grids .
Do n’t freak out too too much , though . The government ’s taking the terror pretty dang seriously . In fact , they’reready to go to warfare over it . [ Univ . of MichiganviaTech Review ]
mental image viaShutterstock
Cyber SecurityEncryptionInfrastructureSecurity
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