TIL my smart doorbell got hacked at a family BBQ in Denver

So last month I'm hosting a cookout at my place in Denver, maybe 15 people over. I'm grilling and my phone starts blowing up with alerts from my smart doorbell. It's showing a live feed of my own backyard, but the camera is panning around on its own like someone is controlling it. Then the speaker starts playing this weird static noise. I had to pull the power plug right there to make it stop. Turns out I never changed the default password on the device's admin panel, just used the app login. Some bot probably scanned for it. Now I go through and change every single default password on my smart home stuff, even the ones that seem buried. Has anyone else had a smart device get taken over like that? What did you do to lock it down after?

2 comments

2 Comments

knight.diana1d ago

Oh man, that's so creepy. My smart plug got hacked once and started turning my lamp on and off at 3 AM. I felt like an idiot for using the factory password too. Now I use a password manager for all that stuff, it's the only way to keep track.

hannaho521d ago

Yeah the factory password thing is such a common trap. It feels like every device is set up to be convenient first and secure maybe never. We're basically trained to ignore basic safety for the sake of getting the thing working right away.