How millions of DSL modems were hacked in Brazil, to pay for Rio prostitutes

So, you think you’re doing a pretty good job in terms of computer security on your home PC? You’ve kept your computer fully patched against the latest vulnerabilities? You’ve ensured that your PC is running the latest-and-greatest anti-virus updates?

Good for you.

Now, how about your router?

My suspicion is that the typical computer user doesn’t give a second thought about whether their router could be harbouring a security threat, imagining that the devices don’t need to be treated with suspicion.

But if you think that, you’re quite wrong.

Fabio Assolini, a researcher for Kaspersky Labs, gave a fascinating presentation at the Virus Bulletin conference in Dallas last week, describing how more than 4.5 million home DSL routers in Brazil were found to have been silently hacked by cybercriminals last year.

Assolini described in his presentation, entitled “The tale of 1001 ADSL modems: Network devices in the sights of cybercriminals”, how at some Brazilian ISPs, more…

Read more in my article on the Naked Security website.

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Graham Cluley •   @gcluley

Graham Cluley is a veteran of the anti-virus industry having worked for a number of security companies since the early 1990s when he wrote the first ever version of Dr Solomon's Anti-Virus Toolkit for Windows. Now an independent security analyst, he regularly makes media appearances and is an international public speaker on the topic of computer security, hackers, and online privacy. Follow him on Twitter at @gcluley, on Mastodon at @[email protected], or drop him an email.