Overview

2020 H1 witnessed nine Internet of Things (IoT) security events that deserved close attention:

• Ripple20 0-day vulnerabilities were discovered and affected hundreds of millions of networked devices in various industries across the globe.
• A high-risk 0-day vulnerability was detected in dozens of Netgear router products.
• A group of Industrial Control System (ICS) honeypots attracted four 0-day attacks.
• A critical remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability affected millions of network devices based on OpenWrt.
• Hackers exploited 0-day vulnerabilities in DrayTek devices to launch attacks on enterprise networks.
• Hackers hijacked a smart building access system and could launch distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks on devices accessible via networks.
• Millions of devices using LoRaWAN were vulnerable to hacker attacks, and nodes, gateways, and servers in the LoRaWAN network were prone to critical vulnerabilities. Therefore, their security protection capabilities remained to be improved.
• Hackers divulged Telnet credentials of over 500,000 devices.
• Researchers discovered LiquorBot, which was a new botnet with the cryptomining function.

Introduction

As we indicated in the 2018 Annual IoT Security Report, network addresses on the Internet constantly change. Use of historical data to delineate exposure of assets will result in a deviation from reality, presenting a value higher than the actual number. Therefore, to accurately reflect the reality of a given area, we should specify a short period as the statistical cycle when calculating the number. This chapter starts with an analysis of the actual exposure of IoT assets in 2019.

With the booming of IoT applications and depletion of IPv4 addresses, IPv6 addresses will be gradually adopted, which is an irreversible trend. This means that IoT assets on IPv6 networks will become major targets of attackers. In this sense, it will be of great significance to cybersecurity to accurately survey IPv6 assets and services. For this reason, we also describe the methods for discovering IoT assets in IPv6 environments and analyze their exposure in this chapter.

LockerGoga Ransomware Alleged to Repeatedly Attack Plants

On January 24, 2019, France-based Altran Technologies was allegedly hit by LockerGoga ransomware. On March 19, Norsk Hydro, one of the largest aluminum companies worldwide, was hit by an extensive cyberattack, having machines around the globe infected with malware and some unable to operate. As a result, some plants had to switch from automatic to manual procedures, significantly compromising the productivity. This attack on the Norwegian aluminum company employed a tactic similar to that of LockerGoga. On March 12, 2019, two US chemical manufacturers Hexion and Momentive respectively suffered a LockerGoga ransomware attack9. In as short as two months, four plants in Europe and the USA became targets of ransomware attacks. Such devastating ransomware caused great damages to enterprises. According to a report on July 23, 201910, the attack could cost Norsk Hydro a whopping amount of $63.50 million to $75 million. But no exact figure was given because the computing system used for calculating profits was also compromised by the ransomware.

Extensive Power Outages in Venezuela and New York

Starting from the evening of March 7, 2019, a cyberattack hit Venezuela, leaving most parts of the country, including the capital Caracas, without power for more than 24 hours1. Because of the outage, the subway service in Caracas came to a halt, resulting in massive traffic jams. Schools, hospitals, factories, and airports were all greatly affected by this incident. Even mobile phones and networks could not work properly.

Just four months after the power outage in Venezuela, on July 13, 2019, 18:47, a large-scale blackout affected Midtown to the Upper West Side in Manhattan, leaving the Times Square, subway stations, cinemas, and Broadway in the dark2. At its peak, the New York blackout shut off power to about 73,000 people. At a press conference, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio claimed that the blackout was caused by a transformer fire. Though not a malicious cyberattack, this incident sounds the alarm on the security
of critical infrastructure.

Executive Summary

With the constant evolution of the Internet of Things (IoT), the security of IoT is becoming an issue that more and more people are concerned about. In 2016, we issued the IoT Security Whitepaper to popularize IoT security for a general audience. In 2018, we released the 2017 Annual IoT Cybersecurity Report to present our analysis of exposure of IoT assets on the Internet, device vulnerabilities, and threats and risks to which IoT devices are exposed. Our 2018 Annual IoT Security Report is focused on the actual exposure of IoT assets on the Internet, aimed at revealing the overall security posture of IoT assets based on threat intelligence. The report also allots quite a few pages to the security of the UPnP protocol stack, which is often used in IoT applications. In the 2019 Annual IoT Security Report, we continue to delve into IoT assets and the risks and threats facing them: In IoT asset reconnaissance (“recon” for short), we update data on the actual exposure of IoT assets on IPv4 networks and add data on the exposure of IoT assets on IPv6 networks; as for threats, we analyze IoT security incidents and threat sources from the perspectives of vulnerability exploitation and protocol exploitation. Finally, we provide a solution for protecting IoT devices.