The Ek’s Files

Aaarrr, matey! There’s some scurvy dogs afloat would like to shanghai your router!

Network World reports that a new security exploit has been observed in the wild (that’s geek-speak for the real world) where visiting a compromised web page will result in your router or wireless access point settings being changed. In the observed case, the routers were caused to redirect users to a fraudulent banking site instead of the legitimate one. Yikes!

Called drive-by pharming, this exploit is made possible mainly by the fact that many home users of routers and wireless access points don’t bother to change the router’s default login or password and don’t take other measures to secure their networks. Securing your network is not difficult. PracticallyNetworked.com (a great resource for home networking) has some good tips on how to secure your wireless network. They also offer some advice on securing networks in general, including wired networks.

Another router vulnerability was recently discovered that can take advantage of your router’s having UPnP (Universal Plug ‘n’ Play) enabled to similarly change your router settings (regardless of the browser being used, unlike what the Slashdot blurb reports). Simply disabling UPnP in your router setup will defeat this vulnerability.

The amount of nefarious activity on the internet is astonishing. Take a few minutes to make sure your ship is secure.