The researchers focused on the Philips Hue smart light bulb and found that the wireless flaw could allow hackers to take control of the light bulbs, according to researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science near Tel Aviv and Dalhousie University in Halifax, Canada. Malware created by hackers could be spread like a pathogen among the devices by compromising just one of them. The color and brightness of the Philips Hue smart light bulb can be controlled from a computer or a smartphone. The researchers showed that by compromising a single light bulb, it was possible to infect a large number of nearby lights within minutes. The worm program carried a malicious payload to each light — even if they were not part of the same private network.

Source: New York Times November 03, 2016 04:02 UTC